74 quotes
Progress in science is often built on wrong theories that are later corrected. It is better to be wrong than to be vague.
The Scientist As Rebel (2006)
Lawrence Bragg, a shrewd observer of the birth of quantum mechanics, summed up the situation in a few words: "Everything in the future is a wave — everything in the past is a particle."
A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.
Disturbing the Universe (1979)
Fifty years ago Kurt Gödel... proved that the world of pure mathematics is inexhaustible. … I hope that the notion of a final statement of the laws of physics will prove as illusory as the notion of a formal decision process for all mathematics.
Infinite in All Directions (1988)
It belongs to everybody who is willing to make the effort to learn it. And what is true of science is true of poetry. ... Poetry and science are gifts given to all of humanity.
The Scientist As Rebel (2006)
It was beautiful … slowly, he just somehow woke up.
Sharing the food is to me more important than arguing about beliefs. Jesus, according to the gospels, thought so too.
Progress In Religion (2000)
If you disagree with the majority opinion on global warming, you are an enemy of science. There is a secular religion around the world that we can call environmentalism.
To me, the meaning of progress in religion is simply this, that as we move from the past to the future the good works inspired by religion should more and more prevail over the evil.
Progress In Religion (2000)
I don't say that this personal theology is supported or proved by scientific evidence. I only say that it is consistent with scientific evidence.
Progress In Religion (2000)
It is something that gives people an illusion of illimitable power, and it is, in some ways, responsible for all our troubles — this, what you might call technical arrogance, that overcomes people when they see what they can do with their minds.
The Day After Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb (1981)
If we had a reliable way to label our toys good and bad, it would be easy to regulate technology wisely. But we can rarely see far enough ahead to know which road leads to damnation.
Disturbing the Universe (1979)
I will argue that group selection is important, contrary to the prevailing dogma among biologists. If group selection is important, Prisoner's Dilemma is not a good model for evolution. It is still an amusing toy for mathematicians and game-theorists to play with.
Nobody knows what dark matter is. It is another deep mystery waiting to be explored. We know only that it is there, and that it weighs more than the stuff that we can see.
The Scientist As Rebel (2006)
I am neither a saint nor a theologian. To me, good works are more important than theology. We all know that religion has been historically, and still is today, a cause of great evil as well as great good in human affairs.
Progress In Religion (2000)
What was needed was a little more human charity, a little more willingness to listen rather than to lay down the law, a little more humility. Scientists stand in need of these Christian virtues just as much as preachers do.
Infinite in All Directions (1988)
Dick Feynman told me about his "sum over histories" of quantum mechanics... I said to him, "You're crazy." But he wasn't.
I hope we still have some bright twelve-year-olds who are interested in science. We must be careful not to discourage our twelve-year-olds by making them waste the best years of their lives on preparing for examinations.
The idea that God may be approached and understood through intellectual analysis is uniquely Christian. ...It is probably not an accident that modern science grew explosively in Christian Europe and left the rest of the world behind.
The Scientist As Rebel (2006)
... the most important questions and insights and goals are unpredictable.