The Key to Everything

The history of each branch of science can be divided into three phases. The first phase is exploration, to see what nature is doing. The second phase is precise observation and measurement, to describe nature accurately. The third phase is explanation, to build theories that enable us to understand nature.

Read more from Freeman Dyson's review of Scale: The Universal Laws of Growth, Innovation, Sustainability, and the Pace of Life in Organisms, Cities, Economies, and Companies by Geoffrey West at the New York Review of Books.