Pierre-Simon Laplace

"Given for one instant an intelligence which could comprehend all the forces by which nature is animated and the respective situation of the beings who compose it—an intelligence sufficiently vast to s…"

"The theory of chance consists in reducing all the events of the same kind to a certain number of cases equally possible, that is to say, to such as we may be equally undecided about in regard to their…"

"It is to the influence of the opinion of those whom the multitude judges best informed, and to whom it has been accustomed to give its confidence in regard to the most important matters of life, that …"

"The most important questions of life... are indeed for the most part only problems of probability. Strictly speaking it may even be said that nearly all our knowledge is problematical; and in the smal…"

"Imaginary causes have gradually receded with the widening bounds of knowledge and disappear entirely before sound philosophy, which sees in them only the expression of our ignorance of the true causes…"

"All these efforts in the search for truth tend to lead it back continually to the vast intelligence... but from which it will always remain infinitely removed. This tendency peculiar to the human race…"

"Nature laughs at the difficulties of integration."

"It is India that gave us the ingenious method of expressing all numbers by means of ten symbols, each symbol receiving a value of position as well as an absolute value; a profound and important idea w…"