"Bottom up thinkers try to start from experience and move from experience to understanding. They don't start with certain general principles they think beforehand are likely to be true they just hope to find out what reality is like.“


-John Polkinghorne

posted in experience


Bottom up thinkers try to start from experience and move from experience to understanding. They don't start with certain general principles they think beforehand are likely to be true they just hope to find out what reality is like.

Other Quotes You Might Like

Discover more inspiring quotes from our collection

"People, and especially theologians, should try to familiarize themselves with scientific ideas. Of course, science is technical in many respects, but there are some very good books that try to set out some of the conceptual structure of science."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote
"If the experience of science teaches anything, it's that the world is very strange and surprising. The many revolutions in science have certainly shown that."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote
"I very much enjoyed my career in science. I didn't leave science because I was disillusioned, but felt I'd done my bit for it after about twenty-five years."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote
"Those theologians who are beginning to take the doctrine of creation very seriously should pay some attention to science's story."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote
"Science cannot tell theology how to construct a doctrine of creation, but you can't construct a doctrine of creation without taking account of the age of the universe and the evolutionary character of cosmic history."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote
"I also think we need to maintain distinctions - the doctrine of creation is different from a scientific cosmology, and we should resist the temptation, which sometimes scientists give in to, to try to assimilate the concepts of theology to the concepts of science."

-John Polkinghorne

scienceView Quote

More Quotes About experience

Explore other inspiring quotes in this category

"It evolved from my experience in the fifties, growing up during the McCarthy era, and hearing a lot of assumptions that America was wonderful and Communism was terrible."

-Warren Farrell

experienceView Quote
"I feel responsible that everyone has a really wonderful experience and to do the best work possible, and to always know my lines and to always be on time and to bring a level to the show in terms of quality that other people will follow."

-Julianna Margulies

experienceView Quote
"Acting is not a mystery. There's nothing that I know that other actors don't know. We all act, we're all actors, we all know the same thing. The only thing that separates us is experience."

-Vincent D'Onofrio

experienceView Quote
"Many children are natural fantasists, I think, perhaps because their imaginations have yet to be clobbered into submission by experience."

-David Mitchell

experienceView Quote
"I got pregnant at 40 by surprise. It's funny, because when we found out we were pregnant, I said, 'Okay, let's experience that.' You just have to just go with it because it's rare."

-Julianna Margulies

experienceView Quote
"At our best, it's a good experience but we do 22 episodes a year, so there are some clunkers."

-Vincent D'Onofrio

experienceView Quote