Failure in Science
Thomas J. Watson is attributed with saying "If you want to succeed, double your failure rate". Wired Magazine editor Kevin Kelly likewise explains that a great deal can be learned from things going unexpectedly, and that part of science's success comes from keeping blunders "small, manageable, constant, and trackable". He uses the example of engineers and programmers who push systems to their limits, breaking them to learn about them. Kelly also warns against creating a culture (e.g. school system) that punishes failure harshly, because this inhibits a creative process, and risks teaching people not to communicate important failures with others (e.g. Null results).
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Famous quotes containing the words failure and/or science:
“I read less and less. I have not forgiven books for their failure to tell me the truth and make me happy.”
—Mason Cooley (b. 1927)
“The poet uses the results of science and philosophy, and generalizes their widest deductions.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)