The Time Machine Science Quotes Page 2
(Chapter.Paragraph)
| Quote #4 As I stood there in the gathering dark I thought that in this simple explanation I had mastered the problem of the world – mastered the whole secret of these delicious people. [...] Very simple was my explanation, and plausible enough – as most wrong theories are! (4.32) |
The Time Traveller says something like this a few times (check 4.20 for another). Rather than make him look foolish, we think this actually shows him to be a good scientist. To do science right, you've got to be cool with being wrong once in a while. In fact, being wrong may help you find your way to the right answer. Here the Time Traveller is showing us how science is done.
| Quote #5 "Face this world. Learn its ways, watch it, be careful of too hasty guesses at its meaning. In the end you will find clues to it all." (5.14) |
Here the Time Traveller is reminding himself to think through things scientifically – to collect data and then come up with a theory. (Sherlock Holmes has a famous line about this: "It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.") Even the Time Traveller, who is a pretty good scientist most of the time, needs to remind himself that this is how a scientist acts. In other words, science is hard work – it doesn't come naturally.
| Quote #6 . . . I discovered, from the flaring of my matches, that a steady current of air set down the shafts. Further, I threw a scrap of paper into the throat of one, and, instead of fluttering slowly down, it was at once sucked swiftly out of sight. (5.16) |
The Time Traveller doesn't do a lot of what we would consider experimenting in the future, but here he does, in order to determine whether the wells are sucking air down.
