American - Physicist | May 11, 1918 - February 15, 1988
I don't know what's the matter with people: they don't learn by understanding; they learn by some other way - by rote, or something. Their knowledge is so fragile!
Richard P. Feynman
KnowledgePeopleLearnUnderstanding
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.
FoolYourselfYouPersonFirstMust
It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn't get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man.
HopeHistoryIgnoranceManDirection
It is a curious historical fact that modern quantum mechanics began with two quite different mathematical formulations: the differential equation of Schroedinger and the matrix algebra of Heisenberg. The two apparently dissimilar approaches were proved to be mathematically equivalent.
CuriousTwoHistoricalQuantumFact
Trying to understand the way nature works involves a most terrible test of human reasoning ability. It involves subtle trickery, beautiful tightropes of logic on which one has to walk in order not to make a mistake in predicting what will happen. The quantum mechanical and the relativity ideas are examples of this.
NatureBeautifulWalkMistakeIdeas
Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so that each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry.
NatureOrganizationSmallPatterns
Poets say science takes away from the beauty of the stars - mere globs of gas atoms. I, too, can see the stars on a desert night, and feel them. But do I see less or more?
BeautyStarsScienceNightDesert
Reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.
NatureRealityOverTakeFooled
Because the theory of quantum mechanics could explain all of chemistry and the various properties of substances, it was a tremendous success. But still there was the problem of the interaction of light and matter.
SuccessLightProblemChemistry
The fact that the colors in the flower have evolved in order to attract insects to pollinate it is interesting; that means insects can see the colors. That adds a question: does this aesthetic sense we have also exist in lower forms of life?
LifeFlowerColorsInterestingSee
The thing that doesn't fit is the thing that's the most interesting: the part that doesn't go according to what you expected.
InterestingYouGoMostExpected
The most remarkable discovery in all of astronomy is that the stars are made of atoms of the same kind as those on the earth.
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