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Quotes by Physicist
"An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made, in a narrow field."
266
"In particular, I established a reasonably accurate energy threshold for permanent displacement of a nucleus from its regular lattice position, substantially smaller than had been previously presumed."
229
"I was born not knowing and have had only a little time to change that here and there."
223
"Science always has its origin in the adaptation of thought to some definite field of experience."
213
"Your theory is crazy, but it's not crazy enough to be true."
211
"The science of today is the technology of tomorrow."
180
"I appeal to my fellow scientists to remember their responsibility to humanity."
164
"The decision to use the atom bomb on Japanese cities, and the consequent buildup of enormous nuclear arsenals, was made by governments, on the basis of political and military perceptions."
159
"At a time when science plays such a powerful role in the life of society, when the destiny of the whole of mankind may hinge on the results of scientific research, it is incumbent on all scientists to be fully conscious of that role, and conduct themselves accordingly."
148
"If the militarily most powerful - and least threatened - states need nuclear weapons for their security, how can one deny such security to countries that are truly insecure? The present nuclear policy is a recipe for proliferation. It is a policy for disaster."
146
"But scientists on both sides of the iron curtain played a very significant role in maintaining the momentum of the nuclear arms race throughout the four decades of the Cold War."
145
"Access to the Vedas is the greatest privilege this century may claim over all previous centuries."
128
"In order to more fully understand this reality, we must take into account other dimensions of a broader reality."
105
"It is nice to know that the computer understands the problem. But I would like to understand it too."
103
"When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb."
91
"The task which we have set ourselves is simply to show why and for what purpose we hold that standpoint during most of our lives, and why and for what purpose we are provisionally obliged to abandon it."
90
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool."
87
"It is my opinion that everything must be based on a simple idea. And it is my opinion that this idea, once we have finally discovered it, will be so compelling, so beautiful, that we will say to one another, yes, how could it have been any different."
87
"Among my activities was membership in the Boy Scouts; I rose each year through the ranks, eventually achieving the rank of Eagle Scout and undertaking leadership roles in the organization."
86
"My father was a professor of civil engineering at MIT, and my mother taught high school English."
82
"Someone told me that each equation I included in the book would halve the sales."
79
"But heat can also be produced by the friction of liquids, in which there could be no question of changes in structure, or of the liberation of latent heat."
77
"Not only does God play dice, but... he sometimes throws them where they cannot be seen."
75
"As you say, the way string theory requires all these extra dimensions and this comes from certain consistency requirements about how string should behave and so on."
75
"To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit."
74
"It is no good to try to stop knowledge from going forward. Ignorance is never better than knowledge."
73
"Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it."
72
"God used beautiful mathematics in creating the world."
71
"Knowledge once gained casts a light beyond its own immediate boundaries."
70
"Many applications of the coincidence method will therefore be found in the large field of nuclear physics, and we can say without exaggeration that the method is one of the essential tools of the modern nuclear physicist."
70
"T is generally recognized that women are better than men at languages, personal relations and multitasking, but less good at map-reading and spatial awareness. It is therefore not unreasonable to suppose that women might be less good at mathematics and physics. It is not politically correct to say such things....But it cannot be denied that there are differences between men and women. Of course, these are differences between the averages only. There are wide variations about the mean."
70
"No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical."
69
"Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry."
69
"Ordinary photons do have spin, they have a notion of helicity so they spin around their direction on motion."
68
"Strict conservation of energy in the elementary process had thus been confirmed also by a negative experiment."
68
"We are told that the possession of nuclear weapons - in some cases even the testing of these weapons - is essential for national security. But this argument can be made by other countries as well."
67
"My goal is simple. It is a complete understanding of the universe, why it is as it is and why it exists at all."
67
"It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If it doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong."
66
"A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering."
66
"According to well-known electrodynamic laws, an electron moving in a magnetic field is acted upon by a force which runs perpendicular to the direction of motion of the electron and to the direction of the magnetic field, and whose magnitude is easily determined."
64
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