Vicki

“This does not mean that science is just the art of making measurable predictions. Some philosophers of science overly circumscribe science by limiting it to its numerical predictions. They miss the point, because they confuse the instruments with the objectives. Verifiable quantitative predictions are instruments to validate hypotheses. The objective of scientific research is not just to arrive at predictions: it is to understand how the world functions; to construct and develop an image of the world, a conceptual structure to enable us to think about. Before being technical, science is visionary.”
― Carlo Rovelli, La realtà non è come ci appare: La struttura elementare delle cose

“It's—everything,' said Ancel. 'All the most elegant fashions, the most powerful people. Here you're important. It's not like a small village where you can never affect the world. I like feeling—'
Like part of it. Like the master of it. Like he had power over men, like if they wanted him they had to pay a fortune for it. Like he was more valuable than the wine goblet Berenger held, or the silver pitcher a servant had poured from. Like he mattered.
'Perhaps I ought to think of it more like that.'
'How do you think of it?'
'I think,' said Berenger, 'that the only person in this place who shows me their real face is you.”
― C.S. Pacat, Pet

“have so much that your hearts have become small. You can live very well with very little.”
― Nicholas Kotar, The Song of the Sirin