With my *ahem!* scientific background, the following quote resonates with me. I thought readers of this blog might also appreciate it:

"Although it is a grand achievement to have added but one jot or tittle to the sum of human knowledge it is grander still to have added a thought. It is best for a man to try to be both poet and naturalist—not to be too much of a naturalist and so overlook the beauty of things, or too much of a poet and so fail to understand them or even perceive those hidden beauties only revealed by close observation."

From the "Journal of a Disappointed Man" by W.N.P. Barbellion