It Has Been Said

IT HAS BEEN SAID and collected by BRIAN WILLIAMS* "The purpose of models is not to fit the data but to sharpen the question ."—S. Karlin "Ecology is awash with all manner of untested (and often untestable) models, most claiming to be heuristic, many simple elaborations of earlier untested models . Entirejournals are devoted to such work, and are as remote from biological reality as are faith-healers."—D. Simberloff "It appears that many of the expectations modelers held for full systems models simply will never be realized. Knowing the reasons behind these limitations gives some stoic consolation. If one is caught in a dark maze it is better to light a candle than to repeatedly walk into the walls. Those to whom prediction is the sine qua non of science . . . will continue to dismiss theoretical models, but they seem concerned only with the darkness and not the maze."—R. E. Ulanowicz "This new display can recognize speech." "This nudist play can wreck a nice beach." Problems in computer recognition of speech.—Anon. "A living organism is not a single, complicated biochemical machine. Rather it must be viewed as a large population of relatively simple machines. The complexity of its behaviour is due to the highly nonlinear nature of the interactions between all of the members of this polymorphic population. To animate machines , therefore, is not to bring 'life' to a machine; rather it is to organize a population of machines in such a way that their interactive dynamics [are] 'alive.' "—C. G. Langton *Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, South Parks Road, Oxford, OXI 3PS, England. Material appearing under this title is collected with the aim of making the serious a bit less serious, the ponderous a bit less heavy, and the reading hours a bit more fun. Toward this goal we invite a guest editor of this feature for each issue. Will readers volunteer to share their sense of humor by collecting or recollecting items that have brought smiles to their faces? We invite your participation. Originals are also welcomed. Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 36, 4 ¦ Summer 1993 | 623 ". . . AI has focussed primarily on the production of intelligent solutions rather than on the production of intelligent behaviour. There is a world of difference between these two possible foci."—C. G. Langton "If our brains were simple enough for us to understand them, we'd be so simple we couldn't."—Anon. "Old professors never die, they just lose their faculties."—Anon. "To punish me for my contempt for authority, Fate made me an authority myself."—A. Einstein "And, he gave it for his Opinion; that whoever could make two ears of Corn or two Blades of Grass to grow upon a spot of Ground where only one grew before; would deserve better of Mankind, and do more essential Service to his Country than the whole Race of Politicians put together."—J. Swift. ". . . What modern physics says is somewhat confused. Nevertheless, we are bound to believe it on pain of death. If there were any community which rejected the doctrines of modern physics, physicists employed by a hostile government would have no difficulty in exterminating it. The modern physicist, therefore, enjoys powers for exceeding those of the Inquisition in its palmiest days, and it certainly behoves us to treat his pronouncements with due care."—B. Russell "My own misgivings concerning scientific advance and stagnation arise mainly from the changed spirit of science and from the unchecked advance of Big Science which endangers great science. . . . Biology seems to have escaped this danger so far, but not, of course, the closely related dangers connected with large-scale applications."—K. Popper "The statesmen of the world who boast and threaten that they have Doomsday weapons are far more dangerous and far more estranged from reality than many people on whom the label 'psychotic' is affixed."—R. D. Laing "An important scientific investigation rarely makes its way by gradually winning over and converting its opponents: it rarely happens that Saul becomes Paul. What does happen is that its opponents gradually die out and that the growing generation is familiarized with the idea from the beginning."— M. Planck "In a sense, the citation is...