“One thing I have learned in a long life: that all our science, measured against reality, is primitive and childlike—and yet it is the most precious thing we have.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one. One could say that it has affected us quantitatively, not qualitatively.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“The search for truth is more precious than its possession.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“In the field of observations, chance favors only the prepared mind.”
— Louis Pasteur Primary source“The prize is the pleasure of finding the thing out.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“This delicate little plant [curiosity], aside from stimulation, stands mainly in need of freedom.
— Albert Einstein Primary source“The belief in an external world independent of the perceiving subject is the basis of all natural science.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“But we must not forget that when radium was discovered no one knew that it would prove useful in hospitals. The work was one of pure science. And this is a proof that scientific work must not be considered from the point of view of the direct usefulness of it. It must be done for itself, for the beauty of science, and then there is always the chance that a scientific discovery may become like the radium a benefit for humanity.”
— Marie Curie Primary source“I have no dress except the one I wear. If you are going to be kind enough to give me one [a wedding dress], please let it be practical and dark, so that I can put it on afterwards to go to the laboratory.”
— Marie Curie Secondary source“We’ve learned from experience that the truth will come out. Other experimenters will repeat your experiment and find out whether you were wrong or right. Nature’s phenomena will agree or they’ll disagree with your theory. And, although you may gain some temporary fame and excitement, you will not gain a good reputation as a scientist if you haven’t tried to be very careful in this kind of work.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“Every scientific law, every scientific principle, every statement of the results of an observation is some kind of a summary which leaves out details.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“In science we must be interested in things, not in persons.”
— Marie Curie Secondary source“The only way to have real success in science, the field I’m familiar with, is to describe the evidence very carefully without regard to the way you feel it should be. If you have a theory, you must try to explain what’s good and what’s bad about it equally. In science, you learn a kind of standard integrity and honesty.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“Observation is the ultimate and final judge of the truth of an idea.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“All our science lacks a human side.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“The motive of science was the extension of man, on all sides, into Nature, till his hands should touch the stars.”
— Ralph Waldo Emerson Primary source“The test of all knowledge is experiment. Experiment is the sole judge of scientific truth.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.”
— Richard Feynman Primary source“A theory is the more impressive the greater the simplicity of its premises is, the more different kinds of things it relates, and the more extended is its area of applicability.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“Nature is full of infinite causes that have never occured in experience.”
— Leonardo da Vinci Primary source“Experience never errs; it is only your judgments that err by promising themselves effects such as are not caused by your experiments.”
— Leonardo da Vinci Primary source“There isn’t always an explanation for everything.”
— Ernest Hemingway Primary source“One reason why mathematics enjoys special esteem, above all other sciences, is that its propositions are absolutely certain and indisputable, while those of all other sciences are to some extent debatable and in constant danger of being overthrown by newly discovered facts.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“I believe in intuitions and inspirations. I sometimes feel that I am right. I do not know that I am.”
— Albert Einstein Secondary source“Development of Western science is based on two great achievements: the invention of the formal logical system (in Euclidean geometry) by the Greek philosophers, and the discovery of the possibility of finding out causal relationships by systematic experiment (Renaissance).”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn a living at it.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“I am among those who think that science has great beauty. A scientist in his laboratory is not only a technician: he is also a child placed before natural phenomena which impress him like a fairy tale.”
— Marie Curie Secondary source“Intellectual individualism and scientific eras emerged simultaneously in history and have remained inseparable ever since.”
— Albert Einstein Primary source“There are sadistic scientists who hurry to hunt down errors instead of establishing the truth.”
— Marie Curie Disputed“Everything should be as simple as possible, but not simpler.”
— Albert Einstein DisputedTruth Knowledge Curiosity Observation Reality