It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you.

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From a lecture delivered on October 15, 1936 at Cambridge University, discussing the result of an experiment in 1909 where alpha particles were scattered backwards when fired at a thin sheet of metal foil, which led to the discovery of the atomic nucleus. The full lecture was reprinted in Background to Modern Science: Ten Lectures at Cambridge arranged by the History of Science Committee 1936.

More quotes by Ernest Rutherford

Radioactivity is shown to be accompanied by chemical changes in which new types of matter are being continually produced. … The conclusion is drawn that these chemical changes must be sub-atomic in character.

I do not know if you appreciate the fact that long papers have a way of frightening readers, who feel that they have not time to dip into them.

It is just as surprising as if a gunner fired a shell at a single sheet of paper and for some reason or other the projectile bounded back again.

The study of the radio-active substances and of the discharge of electricity through gases has supplied very strong experimental evidence in support of the fundamental ideas of the existing atomic theory. It has also indicated that the atom itself is not the smallest unit of matter but is a complicated structure made up of a number of smaller bodies.

Radio-activity (1904)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Ernest Rutherford (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.

It was almost as incredible as if you fired a 15-inch shell at a piece of tissue paper and it came back and hit you.

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