American scientist and inventor (1909-1991)
I say that our system of tests and grades, as it now exists, is one source of the low yield of great men from our universities. The marking system is a traumatic experience from which most students emerge with a deep determination never to get into a situation where they can be marked again. They just won't ever again take a chance.
EDWIN H. LAND
address at MIT, "Generation of Greatness: The Idea of a University in an Age of Science", May 22, 1957
In my opinion, neither organisms nor organizations evolve slowly and surely into something better, but drift until some small change occurs which has immediate and overwhelming significance. The special role of the human being is not to wait for these favorable accidents but deliberately to introduce the small change that will have great significance.
EDWIN H. LAND
address at MIT, "Generation of Greatness: The Idea of a University in an Age of Science", May 22, 1957
I don't mind conducting the orchestra if I can play the violin.
EDWIN H. LAND
attributed, Insisting on the Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land
You must expect failure after failure after failure before you succeed.
EDWIN H. LAND
attributed, Insisting on the Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land
The test of an invention is the power of an inventor to push it through in the face of staunch--not opposition, but indifference--in society.
EDWIN H. LAND
attributed, Insisting on the Impossible: The Life of Edwin Land
Long before he puts the problem into words, the scientist knows how to confine his questions to ones that he thinks are answerable. He wouldn't be able to formulate them otherwise. His taste, discernment, wisdom, shrewdness and experience have established within him an inner knowledge of what is feasible.
EDWIN H. LAND
LIFE Magazine, October 27, 1972
We live in a world changing so rapidly that what we mean frequently by common sense is doing the thing that would have been right last year.
EDWIN H. LAND
statement to Polaroid Corporation employees, June 25, 1958
In this country, there is an opportunity for the development of man's intellectual, cultural, and spiritual potentialities that has never existed before in the history of our species. I mean not simply an opportunity for greatness for a few, but an opportunity for greatness for the many.
EDWIN H. LAND
address at MIT, "Generation of Greatness: The Idea of a University in an Age of Science", May 22, 1957
Science is a method to keep yourself from kidding yourself.
EDWIN H. LAND
attributed, QFINANCE: The Ultimate Resource
You always start with a fantasy. Part of the fantasy technique is to visualize something as perfect. Then with the experiments you work back from the fantasy to reality, hacking away at the components.
EDWIN H. LAND
attributed, Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, March 2002
Photography is unlike any other art form. In the other arts there is always a continuous interplay between the artist and his art. He has the painting or sculpture before him. What we have tried to do is to provide a medium for "artistic expression" to anyone with only a reasonable amount of time. By giving him a camera system with which he need only control his selection of focus, composition and lighting, we free him to select the moment and to criticize immediately what he has done. We enable him to see what else he wants to do on the basis of what he has just learned.
EDWIN H. LAND
LIFE Magazine, October 27, 1972
Don't undertake a project unless it is manifestly important and nearly impossible.
EDWIN H. LAND
"The Vindication of Edwin Land", Forbes, May 4, 1987