Theory Quotes
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A theory has only the alternative of being right or wrong. A model has a third possibility: it may be right, but irrelevant.
Manfred Eigen
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Kepler had to realize clearly that logical-mathematical theoretizing, no matter how lucid, could not guarantee truth by itself; that the most beautiful logical theory means nothing in natural science without comparison with the exactest experience. Without this philosophic attitude, his work would not have been possible.
Albert Einstein
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Backlock, a poet blind from his birth, could describe visual objects with accuracy; Professor Sanderson, who was also blind, gave excellent lectures on color, and taught others the theory of ideas which they had and he had not. In the social sphere these gifted ones are mostly women; they can watch a world which they never saw, and estimate forces of which they have only heard. We call it intuition.
Thomas Hardy
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However we select from nature a complex of phenomena using the criterion of simplicity, in no case will its theoretical treatment turn out to be forever appropriate (sufficient).... I do not doubt that the day will come when general relativity, too, will have to yield to another one, for reasons which at present we do not yet surmise. I believe that this process of deepening theory has no limits.
Albert Einstein
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Theory regards this opening as incorrect, but it is impossible to agree with this. Out of the five tournament games played by me with the King's Gambit, I have won all five.
David Bronstein
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In order to govern, the question is not to follow out a more or less valid theory but to build with whatever materials are at hand. The inevitable must be accepted and turned to advantage.
Napoleon Bonaparte
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The gospel of Jesus is not a rational concept to be explained in a theory of salvation, but a story about God’s presence in Jesus’ solidarity with the oppressed, which led to his death on the cross. What is redemptive is the faith that God snatches victory out of defeat, life out of death, and hope out of despair.
James Hal Cone
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When you have two competing theories that make exactly the same predictions, the simpler one is the better.
William of Occam
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A little experience is worth much argument; a few facts are better than any theory.
William Stanley Jevons
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Set theory in sheep's clothing.
Willard Van Orman Quine
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The most important single thing about string theory is that it's a highly mathematical theory, and the mathematics holds together in a very tight and consistent way. It contains in its basic structure both quantum mechanics and the theory of gravity. That's big news.
Leonard Susskind
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The scientific theorist is not to be envied. For Nature, or more precisely experiment, is an exorable and not very friendly judge of his work. It never says "yes" to a theory. In the most favorable cases it says "Maybe," and in the great majority of cases simply "No." If an experiment agrees with a theory it means for the latter "Maybe," and if it does not agree it means "No." Probably every theory will some day experience its "No" - most theories, soon after conception.
Albert Einstein
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The more evolutionary theory gets called an atheistic theory, the greater the risk that it will lose its place in public school biology courses in the United States. If the theory is thought of in this way, one should not be surprised if a judge at some point decides that teaching evolutionary theory violates the Constitutional principle of neutrality with respect to religion.
Elliott Sober
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No fairer destiny could be allotted to any physical theory than that it should of itself point out the way to the introduction of a more comprehensive theory, in which it lives on as a limiting case.
Albert Einstein
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The special theory of relativity owes its origins to Maxwell's equations of the electromagnetic field.
Albert Einstein
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By an application of the theory of relativity to the taste of readers, today in Germany I am called a German man of science, and in England I am represented as a Swiss Jew. If I come to be represented as a bête noire, the descriptions will be reversed, and I shall become a Swiss Jew for the Germans and a German man of science for the English!
Albert Einstein
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Whether you can observe a thing or not depends on the theory which you use. It is the theory which decides what can be observed.
Albert Einstein
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If my theory of relativity is proven successful, Germany will claim me as a German and France will declare me a citizen of the world. Should my theory prove untrue, France will say that I am a German, and Germany will declare that I am a Jew.
Albert Einstein
