'Imagination is more important than knowledge. For knowledge is limited, whereas imagination embraces the entire world.'

A quote by Lauren Bacall

"Imagination is the highest kite one can fly."

A quote by Florence Nightingale

"Poetry and imagination begin life."

'Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.'

- Pablo Picasso

'Knowledge will forever govern ignorance.'

- US President James Madison (1751-1836)

'It's those who lie outside ordinary experience who have the most to teach us.'

- Author Malcolm Gladwell (1963 - present)

'The arts and sciences are avatars of human creativity. It's our attempt to influence things, the universe internal to ourselves and external to us.'

- Mae Jemison (1956-present), the first Black woman in space

'There cannot be mental atrophy in any person who continues to observe, to remember what he observes, and to seek answers for his unceasing hows and whys about things.'

-Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922)

'Happiness depends more upon the internal frame of a persons own mind—than on the externals in the world.'

- George Washington (1732-1799)

Einstein and the fourth dimension

How Einstein's greatest theoretical achievement contains a simple but mind-bending proposition—the dimension of time is physically connected to the three observable spatial dimensions.

'Everything you look at can become a fairy tale and you can get a story from everything you touch.'

- Danish author Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875)

'The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.'

- Marine biologist and environmentalist Rachel Carson (1907-1964)

A quote by scientist Nikola Tesla

"The scientific man does not aim at an immediate result ... His duty is to lay the foundation for those who are to come, and point the way."

'Try to be a rainbow in someone's cloud.'

- Maya Angelou

'May your future be limited only by your dreams.'

- Teacher and astronaut Christa McAuliffe (1948-1986)

'The beautiful thing about learning is nobody can take it away from you.'

- American musician BB King (1925-2015)

'Those who dream by day are cognizant of many things which escape those who dream only by night.'

- Edgar Allan Poe (1809-1849) in "Elenora"

'I love quotations because it is a joy to find thoughts one might have, beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognized wiser than oneself.'

- Actress and singer Marlene Dietrich (1901-1992)

'Art is the human disposition of sensible or intelligible matter for an aesthetic end.'

- Author James Joyce (1882 -1941)

'Mistakes are almost always of a sacred nature. Never try to correct them. On the contrary: rationalize them, understand them thoroughly. After that, it will be possible for you to sublimate them.'

- Artist Salvador Dalí (1904-1989)

'And I knew that it was better to live out one's absurdity than to die for that of others.'

-Ralph Ellison, from "Invisible Man" (1913-1994)

'In life, unlike chess, the game continues after checkmate.'

- Isaac Asimov

Mathematicians often solve problems using wordless mental processes

It's a common technique among expert mathematicians, where thinkers rely on intuition, blurry perceptions and subconscious work—no writing, no formulas. The state is distinct from daydreaming, and often relies on sudden illuminations stemming from extended periods of subconscious reflection.

'Follow your enthusiasm. It's something I've always believed in. Find those parts of your life you enjoy the most. Do what you enjoy doing.'

- "Muppets" creator Jim Henson (1936-1990)

'No army can withstand the strength of an idea whose time has come.'

-Author Victor Hugo (1802-1885)

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

Before Dawkins, other biologists proposed the power of mutating ideas

Nobel Prize winner Jacques Monod proposed, “Ideas have retained some of the properties of organisms. Like them, they tend to perpetuate their structure and to breed; they too can fuse, recombine, segregate their content; indeed they too can evolve, and in this evolution selection must surely play an important role.”

Against his wishes, Albert Einstein's brain was removed before his cremation, and the pathologist responsible stored it for decades in mason jars within a beer cooler.

Learn more about the history of fireworks, which dates back to an accidental invention during an alchemist's quest for information about immortality.

Researchers believe the brain consolidates memories, processes emotions, and plans for the future during dream states

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

Salvador Dalí believed he was his own dead brother, who had died nine months before he was born

According to the physics of black holes, our 4D reality may be a hologram—a projection of information coded on a 2D surface on the edge of the universe.

Chaos theory—informally known as the butterfly effect—is the reason why weather forecasts are presented with probabilities rather than certainties.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

Apeirophobia is an overwhelming fear of living forever, perhaps stemming from the brain's inability to conceptualize an infinite life.

Dorothy's famous entrance into Oz in 'The Wizard of Oz' relied on analog tricks, including a body double and sepia-toned paint, as much as it did on technology

English mathematician Ada Lovelace wrote the first computer algorithm a century before computers existed and hypothesized that computing devices would one day be able to compose music—foreseeing the generative AI systems of today.

See the 25 of the best photos of auroras from around the world.

Explore an interactive map built from more than 100,000 survey responses on where people find joy in their lives

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

Electrical grids worldwide must double their power delivery capacity by 2050 to meet surging demand from AI and electric vehicles.

How fusion—which releases energy when two lighter atoms combine to form a heavier atom—differs from fission

Famed poet TS Eliot rejected the manuscript for George Orwell's political fable 'Animal Farm,' writing that its criticism of authoritarianism was not 'the right point of view.'

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Art theft is the third-largest source of criminal revenues worldwide, thanks in part to the subjective nature of valuing a work of art.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

The 19th-century painters of the Hudson River School were among the first American romantics, with portraits that displayed the natural beauty of the young country.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

The power and influence of the American presidency have expanded significantly over time—far beyond what the founders envisioned.