Richard Feynman Quotes
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As you know, a theory in physics is not useful unless it is able to predict underlined effects which we would otherwise expect.
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The other thing that gives a scientific man the creeps in the world today are the methods of choosing leaders - in every nation. Today, for example, in the United States, the two political parties have decided to employ public relations men, that is, advertising men, who are trained in the necessary methods of telling the truth or lying in order to develop a product.
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If you're doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid - not only what you think is right about it; other causes that could possibly explain your results; and things you thought of that you've eliminated by some other experiment, and how they worked -to make sure the other fellow can tell they have been eliminated.
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If a guy tells me the probability of failure is 1 in 100,000, I know he's full of crap.
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When a Caltech student asked the eminent cosmologist Michael Turner what his "bias" was in favoring one or another particle as a likely candidate to compromise dark matter in the universe, Feynmann snapped, "Why do you want to know his bias? Form your own bias!"
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The electron is a theory. But the theory is so good we can almost consider them real.
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Of course, you only live one life, and you make all your mistakes, and learn what not to do, and that's the end of you.
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Science is what we do to keep us from lying to ourselves
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Nature does not care what we call it, she just keeps on doing it.
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The beauty that is there is also available for me, too. But I see a deeper beauty that isn't so readily available to others.... I don't see how studying a flower ever detracts from its beauty. It only adds
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I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy.
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Our freedom to doubt was born out of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle: permit us to question - to doubt - to not be sure. I think that it is important that we do not forget this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained.
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The unanswerable mysteries... the attitude that all is uncertain... to summarize it - the humility of the intellect.
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I learned from her that every woman is worried about her looks, no matter how beautiful she is.
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The idea that no one really knew how to run a government led to the idea that we should arrange a system by which new ideas could be developed, tried out, and tossed out if necessary, with more new ideas brought in - a trial and error system.
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We've learned from experience that the truth will out.
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If we want to solve a problem that we have never solved before, we must leave the door to the unknown ajar.
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Science is like sex: sometimes something useful comes out, but that is not the reason we are doing it
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No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it.
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The exception tests the rule.
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Computer science is not as old as physics; it lags by a couple of hundred years. However, this does not mean that there is significantly less on the computer scientist's plate than on the physicist's: younger it may be, but it has had a far more intense upbringing!
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To guess what to keep and what to throw away takes considerable skill. Actually it is probably merely a matter of luck, but it looks as if it takes considerable skill.
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The problem of creating something new, but which is consistent with everything which has been seen before, is one of extreme difficulty.
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I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.