“When a fact came along, he junked theories that failed to match.”
Source: Have Space Suit—Will Travel (1958), Chapter 12
“One can judge from experiment, or one can blindly accept authority. To the scientific mind, experimental proof is all important and theory is merely a convenience in description, to be junked when it no longer fits. To the academic mind, authority is everything and facts are junked when they do not fit theory laid down by authority.”
“Life-Line”, p. 24
The Past Through Tomorrow (1967)
Context: There are but two ways of forming an opinion in science. One is the scientific method; the other, the scholastic. One can judge from experiment, or one can blindly accept authority. To the scientific mind, experimental proof is all important and theory is merely a convenience in description, to be junked when it no longer fits. To the academic mind, authority is everything and facts are junked when they do not fit theory laid down by authority.
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Robert A. Heinlein 557
American science fiction author 1907–1988Related quotes
“Everything must be taken into account. If the fact will not fit the theory — let the theory go.”
Source: The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920)
Michael J. Behe
(1952) American biochemist, author, and intelligent design advocate
Darwin’s Black Box: The Biochemical Challenge to Evolution (1996)
Ivar Ekeland
(1944) French mathematician
Source: The Best of All Possible Worlds (2006), Chapter 3, The Least Action Principle, p. 48.
“If the facts don't fit the theory, change the facts.”
Albert Einstein
(1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity
The earliest published attribution of this quote to Einstein found on Google Books is the 1991 book The Art of Computer Systems Performance Analysis by Raj Jain (p. 507), but no source to Einstein's original writings is given and the quote itself is older; for example New Guard: Volume 5, Issue 3 from 1961 says on p. 312 http://books.google.com/books?id=5BbZAAAAMAAJ&q=%22fit+the+theory%22#search_anchor "Someone once said that if the facts do not fit the theory, then the facts must be changed", while Product engineering: Volume 29, Issues 9-12 from 1958 gives the slight variant on p. 9 "There is an age-old adage, 'If the facts don't fit the theory, change the theory.' But too often it's easier to keep the theory and change the facts." These quotes are themselves probably variants of an even earlier saying which used the phrasing "so much the worse for the facts", many examples of which can be seen in this search http://www.google.com/search?tbo=p&tbm=bks&q=facts+fit+%22so+much+the+worse+for+the+facts%22&tbs=,cdr:1,cd_max:Dec%2031_2%201950&num=10; for example, the 1851 American Whig Review, Volumes 13-14 says on p. 488 http://books.google.com/books?id=910CAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA488#v=onepage&q&f=false "However, Mr. Newhall may possibly have been of that casuist's opinion, who, when told that the facts of the matter did not bear out his hypothesis, said 'So much the worse for the facts.'" The German idealist philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte circa 1800 did say "If theory conflicts with the facts, so much the worse for the facts." The Hungarian Marxist Georg Lukacs in his "Tactics and Ethics" (1923) echoed the same quotation.
Misattributed
Georges Bataille
(1897–1962) French intellectual and literary figure
Source: L’Expérience Intérieure (1943), p. 7
John Ziman
(1925–2005) New Zealand physicist
[John M. Ziman, The Force of Knowledge: The Scientific Dimension of Society, Cambridge University Press, 1976, 0-521-09917-X, 98]