stand on the shoulders of giants

Syllable breakdown

Dictionary meaning

to build upon the discoveries, ideas, and intellectual work of predecessors in order to see further and achieve more than would be possible working from scratch; the phrase expresses the cumulative and collaborative nature of human knowledge, in which each generation's innovations rest on foundations laid by those who came before; famously articulated by Isaac Newton in a letter to Robert Hooke in 1676, the metaphor has become a defining expression of scientific humility and the recognition that individual genius is inseparable from the collective heritage of learning it inherits; the phrase is inscribed on the edge of British two-pound coins, and is quoted across science, philosophy, and culture to acknowledge intellectual debt and continuity