What Do These Famous Quotes Reveal About the Minds of Great Scientists?

[Sid Collins]

“The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine.”
-Nikola Tesla

 

[tfr000]

The scientist does not study nature because it is useful to do so. He studies it because he takes pleasure in it, and he takes pleasure in it because it is beautiful. If nature were not beautiful it would not be worth knowing, and life would not be worth living. I am not speaking, of course, of the beauty which strikes the senses, of the beauty of qualities and appearances. I am far from despising this, but it has nothing to do with science. What I mean is that more intimate beauty which comes from the harmonious order of its parts, and which a pure intelligence can grasp. Henri Poincaré

 

[epenguin]

Johnny von Neumann... always slept very late, so I was kind and I did not wake him until well after 10 in the morning. When I called his hotel in London, he answered the phone in bed, and I said Johnny, you're quite right.' And he said to me,

'You wake me up early in the morning to tell me I'm right? Please wait until I'm wrong.'

(recounted by Jacob Bronowski in 'The Ascent of Man')

 

[davideddy928]

Yo mama

 

[Hornbein]

"This idiot race that thinks it has free will."

-- Albert Einstein in Berlin

 

[Silicon Waffle]

Yo mama

I thought it was you!

 

[Monsterboy]

 

[Rubidium_71]

"I don't want to believe, I want to know." - Carl Sagan

 

[davideddy928]

I thought it was you!

I'm my own scientist. That's what I'd say. I should give up physics and be a comedian

 

[Silicon Waffle]

I'm my own scientist. That's what I'd say. I should give up physics and be a comedian

What types of comedy would you want to enter ? Where and how to find the audience ?...

 

[davideddy928]

Here's to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They're not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can quote them, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can't do is ignore them. Because they change things. They push the human race forward. And while some may see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

 

[Giant]

There was this quote by someone. I don't remember by who and I don't remember the exact words either. It was something like we don't know the universe as the universe is, we know it as we have questioned it. Meaning, our understanding is as good as our ability to ask questions. If anyone knows what it was exactly,, please tell me :)

 

[Hornbein]

There was this quote by someone. I don't remember by who and I don't remember the exact words either. It was something like we don't know the universe as the universe is, we know it as we have questioned it. Meaning, our understanding is as good as our ability to ask questions. If anyone knows what it was exactly,, please tell me :)

I often feel that way about the Internet. I think, "show me some interesting fact, damn it, that I have no inkling of!" No response.

 

[Demystifier]

When all think alike, no one thinks very much.
Walter Lippmann

The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it.
Bertrand Russell

 

[Demystifier]

No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical.
Niels Bohr

How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progres.
Niels Bohr

 

[ujjwal3097]

Imagination is bigger than knowledge
Albert Einstein

 

[Hornbein]

Young man, in mathematics you don't understand things. You just get used to them. -- John von Neumann

 

[Demystifier]

There is nothing so practical as a good theory.
- Kurt Lewin

There is nothing so convincing as a good hand-waving argument.
- Hrvoje Nikolić

 

[epenguin]

The first one is often attributed to Leonid Brezhnev. Though I can't imagine he thought of it himself.

 

[arivero]

What's the difference between an intelligent person and a wise person?
When confronted with a problem which cannot be solved by the standard method, the intelligent person changes the method.
The wise one changes the problem.
Hrvoje Nikolic

This quote looks very much as most of the answers in StackOverflow (and cousins). They always tell the OP to do a different thing instead of the one he is asking help for. Cheap Karma, it seems.

 

[George Jones]

Equations may be universal, but the way we understand them and combine them with other results is very personal.
Christophe Grojean

 

[George Jones]

... scientific research is more honestly reported as a tangle of deduction, induction, and guesswork
Steven Weinberg

 

[Demystifier]

Talking about physical laws without talking about ontology is like talking about legal laws without talking about humans. A professional can do it to make the laws more efficient, but then one can miss what the laws are really about.
- Hrvoje Nikolić

 

[AlexCaledin]

I'll tell you a story. When I was thirteen I met a girl, Arlene. Arlene was my first girlfriend. We went together for many years, at first not so seriously, then more seriously. We fell in love. When I was nineteen we got engaged, and when I was twenty-six we got married. I loved her very deeply. We grew up together. I changed her by imparting to her my point of view, my rationality. She changed me. She helped me a lot. She taught me that one has to be irrational sometimes. That doesn't mean stupid, it just means that there are occasions, situations, you should think about, and others you shouldn't.
...
My rule is, when you are unhappy, think about it. But when you’re happy, don’t. Why spoil it?
...
But with Arlene I was really happy for a while. So I have had it all. After Arlene, the rest of my life didn't have to be so good, you see, because I had already had it all.

Feynman's Rainbow: A Search for Beauty in Physics and in Life
page 158...160

 

[Auto-Didact]

Doing things crazy you have to get used to the idea that crazy might be alright; crazy is alright if it works. - Sir Roger Penrose

 

[Dr Transport]

Feynman giving a lecture:

"Gravity is a weak force" (as a light fixture crashes to the ground) "but it is not negligible..."

 

[dwunder]

Nothing wrong with quoting yourself. Quotes aren't good because of who said them, despite what people may think. The message is the same regardless if Albert Einstein said it or Justin Bieber.

If a credible source is no longer required for pontification, have a seat. I have much to offer. :-D

 

[Auto-Didact]

... scientific research is more honestly reported as a tangle of deduction, induction, and guesswork
Steven Weinberg

The sciences do not try to explain, they hardly try to interpret, they mainly make models. By a model is meant a mathematical construct which, with the addition of certain verbal interpretations, describes observed phenomenon. The justification of such a mathematical construct is solely and precisely that it is expected to work.
- John von Neumann

 

[AlexCaledin]

 

[Casmo]

Really awesome quotes!