The Clock, Icon of Science

Philosophers were always looking for new handles on the universe—new similes, new metaphors, new analogies. Despite their scorn for those who cast the Creator of the Universe in man's image, the theologians never ceased to scrutinize man's own handiwork as their clues to God. Now man was a proud clockmaker, a maker of self-moving machines. Once set in motion, the mechanical clock seemed to tick with a life of its own. Might not the universe itself be a vast clock made and set in motion by the...

 Robert Boyle's Definition of a Good Hypothesis

The Requisites of a good Hypothesis are: That It be Intelligible. That It neither Assume nor Suppose anything Impossible, unintelligible, or demonstrably False. That It be consistent with Itself. That It be lit and sufficient to Explicate the Phaenomena, especially the chief. That It be, at least, consistent, with the rest of the Phaenomena It particularly relates to, and do not contradict any other known Phaenomena of nature, or manifest Physical Truth. The Qualities and Conditions of...