Physicist Quotes - Page 20

• To a physicist life looks nothing short of a miracle. It's just amazing what living things can do.

  Paul Davies

  Miracle, Looks, Living Things

  "Big Think Interview With Paul Davies". Interview with Austin Allen, bigthink.com. April 15, 2010.

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• When I was young, Stephen Hawking wasn't the world's most famous physicist. The fame didn't arrive until the publication of "A Brief History of Time," by which time I was in my late teens. When I was a child, he was well known among physicists, but they are a fairly select, serious bunch, not much given to celebrity idolizing.

  Stephen Hawking

  Children, Teens, World

  "Q & A: Stephen Hawking and daughter Lucy". Today Interview, www.nbcnews.com. November 1, 2007.

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• Physics has entered a remarkable era. Ideas that were once the realm of science fiction are now entering our theoretical — and maybe even experimental — grasp. Brand-new theoretical discoveries about extra dimensions have irreversibly changed how particle physicists, astrophysicists, and cosmologists now think about the world. The sheer number and pace of discoveries tells us that we've most likely only scratched the surface of the wondrous possibilities that lie in store. Ideas have taken on a life of their own.

  Lisa Randall

  Lying, Taken, Thinking

  "Warped Passages: Unraveling the Universe's Hidden Dimensions". Book by Lisa Randall, 2005.

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• At any one time there is a natural tendency among physicists to believe that we already know the essential ingredients of a comprehensive theory . But each time a new frontier of observation is broached we inevitably discover new phenomena which force us to modify substantially our previous conceptions. I believe this process to be unending, that the delights and challenges of unexpected discovery will continue always.

  Val Logsdon Fitch

  Believe, Discovery, Challenges

  "Les Prix Nobel" ("The Nobel Prizes 1980") edited by Wilhelm Odelberg, Nobel Foundation, Stockholm, www.nobelprize.org. 1981.

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• If physics is too difficult for the physicists, the nonphysicist may wonder whether he should try at all to grasp its complexities and ambiguities. It is undeniably an effort, but probably one worth making, for the basic questions are important and the new experimental results are often fascinating. And if the layman runs into serious perplexities, he can be consoled with the thought that the points which baffle him are more than likely the ones for which the professionals have not found satisfactory answers.

  Edward Condon

  Running, Effort, Important

  "Physics, in What is Science?: Twelve Eminent Scientists and Philosophers Explain Their Various Fields to the Layman". Book by James Roy Newman, published by Simon and Schuster, p. 102, 1955.

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• In reality, as any physicist will tell you, the physical world is made up of moving energy. All matter is energy.

  Frederick Lenz

  Moving, Buddhism, Science

  Frederick Lenz (1994). “Surfing the Himalayas: conversations and travels with Master Fwap”, Interglobal Seminars

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• I've never heard a person say, 'I had a rotten mother, but she's such a great physicist.

  Sonia Manzano

  Mother, Rotten, Heard

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• We have to give up the idea of realism to a far greater extent than most physicists believe today.

  Anton Zeilinger

  Giving Up, Believe, Ideas

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• Physics admits of a lovely unification, not just at the level of fundamental forces, but when considering its extent and implications. Classifications like "optics" or "thermodynamics" are just straitjackets, preventing physicists from seeing countless intersections.

  Ted Chiang

  Lovely, Fundamentals, Levels

  Ted Chiang (2016). “Arrival (Stories of Your Life MTI)”, p.52, Vintage

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• The development of quantum mechanics early in the twentieth century obliged physicists to change radically the concepts they used to describe the world.

  Alain Aspect

  Development, World, Mechanic

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• I have a theory that evolutionary biologists are more vain than particle physicists.

  Robin Ince

  Vain, Theory, Biologist

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• I have an abiding interest in how ordinary people produce knowledge, and what it means for individuals to know the world. I thought I'd be a theoretical physicist because I love physicists' views of the world - I find general relativity and quantum theory thrilling - but I have always felt uneasy with the idea of an Ultimate Truth. One of the functions of science is to help us instrumentally; it helps us to build things like microchips and GPS satellites. But another function of science in the modern world is to help us feel "at home in the universe".

  Margaret Wertheim

  Mean, Home, People

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• Does it mean, if you don't understand something, and the community of physicists don't understand it, that means God did it? Is that how you want to play this game? Because if it is, here's a list of things in the past that the physicists at the time didn't understand [and now we do understand] [...]. If that's how you want to invoke your evidence for God, then God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance that's getting smaller and smaller and smaller as time moves on - so just be ready for that to happen, if that's how you want to come at the problem

  Neil deGrasse Tyson

  Moving, Ignorance, Mean

  "The Moon, the Tides and why Neil DeGrasse Tyson is Colbert's God". "The Science Studio" with Roger Bingham, January 20, 2011.

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