William Ian Beardmore Beveridge - The art of scientific investigation

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Every experience and history teach us that in the biological and medical sciences reason seldom can progress far from the facts without going astray.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
The scientist who has an independent mind and is able to judge the evidence on its merits rather than in light of prevailing conceptions is the one most likely to be able to realize the potentialities in something really new.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
It is true that much time and effort is devoted to training and equipping the scientist's mind, but little attention is paid to the technique of making the best use of it.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
A useful habit for scientists to develop is that of not trusting ideas based on reason only.... Practically all reasoning is influenced by feelings, prejudice and past experience, albeit often subconsciously.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Too often I have been able to [do] little more than indicate the difficulties likely to be met — yet merely to be forewarned is often help.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
It is more important to have a clear understanding of general principles, without, however, thinking of them as fixed laws, than to load the mind with a mass of detailed technical information which can readily be found in reference books or card indexes.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Probably the majority of discoveries in biology and medicine have been come upon unexpectedly, or at least had an element of chance in them, especially the most important and revolutionary ones.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
The role of reason in research is not so much in exploring the frontiers of knowledge as in developing the findings of the explorers.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Research is one of those highly complex and subtle activities that usually remain quite unformulated in the minds of those who practice them. This is probably why most scientists think that it is not possible to give any formal instruction in how to do research.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Often the original discovery, like the crude ore from the mine, is of little value until it has been refined and fully developed.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
When adults first become conscious of something new, they usually either attack or try to escape from it... Attack includes such mild forms as ridicule, and escape includes merely putting out of mind.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Cultivate an intellectual habit of subordinating one's opinions and wishes to objective evidence and a reverence for things as they really are.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
While playing the part of the detective the investigator follows clues, but having captured his alleged fact, he turns judge and examines the case by means of logically arranged evidence. Both functions are equally essential but they are different.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Careful and correct use of language is a powerful aid to straight thinking, for putting into words precisely what we mean necessitates getting our own minds quite clear on what we mean.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Hypothesis is a tool which can cause trouble if not used properly. We must be ready to abandon out hypothesis as soon as it is shown to be inconsistent with the facts.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
... no one believes an hypothesis except its originator but everyone believes an experiment except the experimenter.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Elaborate apparatus plays an important part in the science of to-day, but I sometimes wonder if we are not inclined to forget that the most important instrument in research must always be the mind of man.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
The Imagination merely enables us to wander into the darkness of the unknown where, by the dim light of the knowledge we carry, we may glimpse something that seems of interest. But when we bring it out and examine it more closely it usually proves to be only trash whose glitter had caught our attention. Imagination is at once the source of all hope and inspiration but also of frustration. To forget this is to court despair.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge
Many discoveries must have been stillborn or smothered at birth. We know only those which survived.

William Ian Beardmore Beveridge