Dwarfs standing on the shoulders of giants (Latin: nanos gigantum humeris insidentes) is a Western metaphor with a contemporary interpretation meaning "One who develops future intellectual pursuits by understanding and building on the research and works created by notable thinkers of the past".
Its most familiar expression is found in the letters of Isaac Newton:
If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.However, the metaphor was first recorded in the twelfth century and attributed to Bernard of Chartres.
Read more about Standing On The Shoulders Of Giants: Attribution and Meaning, References During The Sixteenth To Nineteenth Centuries, Contemporary References
Famous quotes containing the words standing on, standing, shoulders and/or giants:
“Standing on the bare ground,—my head bathed by the blithe air, and uplifted into infinite space,—all mean egotism vanishes. I become a transparent eye-ball; I am nothing; I see all; the currents of the Universal Being circulate through me; I am part and particle of God.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“The bourgeoisie and the petty bourgeoisie have armed themselves against the rising proletariat with, among other things, “culture.” It’s an old ploy of the bourgeoisie. They keep a standing “art” to defend their collapsing culture.”
—George Grosz (1893–1959)
“One man with a head on his shoulders is worth a dozen without.”
—Elizabeth I (1533–1603)
“We have grasped the mystery of the atom and rejected the Sermon on the Mount.... The world has achieved brilliance without wisdom, power without conscience. Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants.”
—Omar Bradley (1893–1981)