No fuss over ignorance
Samuel Butler is often said to have said
Science, after all, is only an expression for our ignorance of our own ignorance.
which he might have never said. Anyway, I think that it might be hard to accurately cite this quote for anyone who actually read Samuel Butler’s note-books. But then, maybe he never wanted us to be that precise at all.
Knowledge (…) is based ultimately upon ignorance. To get knowledge out of ignorance seems almost as hopeless a task as to get something out of any number of nothings, but this in practice is what we have to do and the less fuss we make over it the better.
— Samuel Butler, Note-Books