“When all is said and done, science is about things and theology is about words. Things behave in the same way everywhere, but words do not. … Theology works in one culture alone. If you have not grown up in Polkinghorne's culture, where words such as "incarnation" and "trinity" have a profound meaning, you cannot share his vision.”

— Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

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Freeman Dyson 90

theoretical physicist and mathematician 1923

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“Your questions refer to words; so I have to talk about words.
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““The rules that society chooses to live by have always struck me as especially fascinating,” she said. “There are things one can do but not talk about, and there are things one can talk about but not do. There are things—not apparently gender-related—that men can do, but not women, and there are things women can do, but not men. We live in an invisible maze, and we have all learned where to turn and when, so as to find our way through.”
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“We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.”

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Address in Baltimore, Maryland http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=88871 (18 April 1864)
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Dissi, a quelle parole, che gli uomini che volevan fare a lor modo, bisognava che si facessino un mondo a lor modo, perché in questo non si usava cosí.
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Source: The Phantom Tollbooth

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Freeman Dyson 90

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