I've come across a few good quotes relating to patterns lately.

I found this one yesterday in "Ubiquity" by Mark Buchanan (Phoenix, 2000)...

   
"The aims of scientific thought are to see the              
            general in the particular and the eternal in                
                the transitory."

                    (quoting Alfred North Whitehead, p. 85)

I think this quote complements the one above in regards to looking for the general (or patterns) in the "particular".

In my opinion this quote suggests an objective behind the "aims of scientific thought" (1). That is, a reason for looking for patterns...

"so that everyone understands what is being talked about" (2).


    "First, the taking in of scattered particulars            
        under the one Idea,

 *       so that everyone understands what is                 being talked about...

      Second, the separation of the Idea into
        parts,

            by dividing it at the joints, as nature                 directs, not breaking any limb in half as             a bad carver might."


                        Plato, Phaedrus, 265D



I also think there is a strong element of "patterns to details" in this.



(1) see quote in former above forum post

(2) quoted in Notes on the Synthesis of Form            (Christopher Alexander. Harvard, 1964)