Welcome to our collection of quotes by Jonas Salk. We hope you enjoy pondering them and please share widely.
Wikipedia Summary for Jonas Salk
Jonas Edward Salk (born Jonas Salk; October 28, 1914 – June 23, 1995) was an American virologist and medical researcher who developed one of the first successful polio vaccines. He was born in New York City and attended the City College of New York and New York University School of Medicine.
In 1947, Salk accepted a professorship in the School of Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh. It was there that he undertook a project to determine the number of different types of poliovirus, starting in 1948. For the next seven years, Salk devoted himself towards developing a vaccine against polio.
Salk was immediately hailed as a "miracle worker" when the vaccine's success was first made public in April 1955, and chose to not patent the vaccine or seek any profit from it in order to maximize its global distribution. The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis and the University of Pittsburgh looked into patenting the vaccine but, since Salk's techniques were not novel, their patent attorney said "if there were any patentable novelty to be found in this phase it would lie within an extremely narrow scope and would be of doubtful value." An immediate rush to vaccinate began in both the United States and around the world. Many countries began polio immunization campaigns using Salk's vaccine, including Canada, Sweden, Denmark, Norway, West Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Belgium. By 1959, the Salk vaccine had reached about 90 countries. An attenuated live oral polio vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin, coming into commercial use in 1961. Less than 25 years after the release of Salk's vaccine, domestic transmission of polio had been eliminated in the United States.
In 1963, Salk founded the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California, which is today a center for medical and scientific research. He continued to conduct research and publish books in his later years, focusing in his last years on the search for a vaccine against HIV. Salk also campaigned vigorously for mandatory vaccination throughout the rest of his life, calling the universal vaccination of children against disease a "moral commitment". Salk's personal papers are today stored in Geisel Library at the University of California, San Diego.
At one time we had wisdom, but little knowledge. Now we have a great deal of knowledge, but do we have enough wisdom to deal with that knowledge?
Wisdom: It's something that you know when you see it. You can recognize it, you can experience it. I have defined wisdom as the capacity to make judgments that when looked back upon will seem to have been wise.
It is said to await certainty is to await eternity.
It is courage based on confidence, not daring, and it is confidence based on experience.
In my view, art and the approach to life through art, using it as a vehicle for education and even for doing science is so vital that it is part of a great new revolution that is taking place. I believe we are entering a whole new epoch.
I couldn't possibly have become a member of this Institute, you know, if I hadn't organized it myself.
Evolution favors the survival of the wisest.
Life is an error-making and an error-correcting process.
Eventually we'll realize that if we destroy the ecosystem, we destroy ourselves.
Are we being good ancestors?
Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors.
It is possible to create an epidemic of health which is self-organizing and self-propelling.
I see the triumph of good over evil as a manifestation of the error-correcting process of evolution.
There is a moment of conception and a moment of birth, but between them there is a long period of gestation.
I think of the need for more wisdom in the world, to deal with the knowledge that we have. At one time we had wisdom, but little knowledge. Now we have a great deal of knowledge, but do we have enough wisdom to deal with that knowledge?
I overcame the nightmares because of my dreams.
A good parent gives their child roots and wings.
The mind, in addition to medicine, has powers to turn the immune system around.
Who owns the patent on this vaccine?'
'Well, the people, I would say. There is not patent. Could you patent the sun?
When you inoculate children with a polio vaccine, you don't sleep well for two or three months.
I think of evolution as an error-making and error-correcting process, and we are constantly learning from experience.
If all insects disappeared, all life on earth would perish. If all humans disappeared, all life on earth would flourish.
What people think of as the moment of discovery is really the discovery of the question.
Solutions come through evolution. They come through asking the right questions, because the answers pre-exist. It is the questions that we must define and discover. You don't invent the answer-you reveal the answer.
Find the right questions. You don't invent the answers, you reveal the answers.
My ambition was to bring to bear on medicine a chemical approach. I did that by chemical manipulation of viruses and chemical ways of thinking in biomedical research.
This is perhaps the most beautiful time in human history; it is really pregnant with all kinds of creative possibilities made possible by science and technology which now constitute the slave of man -- if man is not enslaved by it.
If all the insects were to disappear from the earth, within 50 years all life on earth would end. If all human beings disappeared from the earth, within 50 years all forms of life would flourish.
Reply when questioned on the safety of the polio vaccine he developed:
It is safe, and you can't get safer than safe.
Good parents give their children Roots and Wings. Roots to know where home is, wings to fly away and exercise what's been taught them.
Your dreams tell you what to do; your reason tells you how to do it.
There is no such thing as failure, there's just giving up too soon.
Charlotte's Web Life is magic, the way nature works seems to be quite magical.
I pictured myself as a virus or a cancer cell and tried to sense what it would be like.
Nothing happens quite by chance. It's a question of accretion of information and experience.
Longer Version:
Nothing happens quite by chance. It's a question of accretion of information and experience ... it's just chance that I happened to be here at this particular time when there was available and at my disposal the great experience of all the investigators who plodded along for a number of years.
Intuition will tell the thinking mind where to look next.
It is always with excitement that I wake up in the morning wondering what my intuition will toss up to me, like gifts from the sea. I work with it and rely on it. It's my partner.
I have had dreams and I have had nightmares, but I have conquered my nightmares because of my dreams.
The reward for work well done is the opportunity to do more.
There is hope in dreams, imagination, and in the courage of those who wish to make those dreams a reality.
The worst tragedy that could have befallen me was my success. I knew right away that I was through -- cast out.
Hope lies in dreams, in imagination, and in the courage of those who dare to make dreams into reality.