Feynman Physicist Quotes & Sayings

Architect of quantum theories, brash young group leader on the atomic bomb project, inventor of the ubiquitous Feynman diagram, ebullient bongo player and storyteller, Richard Phillips Feynman was the most brilliant, iconoclastic, and influential physicist of modern times. — James Gleick

Because atomic behavior is so unlike ordinary experience, it is very difficult to get used to, and it appears peculiar and mysterious to everyone - both to the novice and to the experienced physicist. — Richard P. Feynman

Computer science is not as old as physics; it lags by a couple of hundred years. However, this does not mean that there is significantly less on the computer scientist's plate than on the physicist's: younger it may be, but it has had a far more intense upbringing! — Richard P. Feynman

The late Richard Feynman, a superb physicist, said once as we talked about the laser that the way to tell a great idea is that, when people hear it, they say, 'Gee, I could have thought of that.' — Charles Hard Townes

The first demonstration of the law of conservation of energy was not by a physicist but by a medical man. He demonstrated with rats. If you burn food you can find out how much heat is generated. If you then feed the same amount of food to rats it is converted, with oxygen, into carbon dioxide, in the same way as in burning. When you measure the energy in each case you find out that living creatures do exactly the same as non-living creatures. The law for conservation of energy is as true for life as for other phenomena. Incidentally, — Richard Feynman

Mysteries like these repeating cycles make it very interesting to be a theoretical physicist: Nature gives us such wonderful puzzles! Why does She repeat the electron at 206 times and 3,640 times its mass? — Richard Feynman

The great Caltech physicist Richard Feynman once observed that if you had to reduce scientific history to one important statement it would be: "All things are made of atoms. — Bill Bryson

Therefore psychologically we must keep all the theories in our heads, and every theoretical physicist who is any good knows six or seven different theoretical representations for exactly the same physics. — Richard P. Feynman

In 1965, physicist Richard Feynman opined, "I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics," and the sentiment is equally applicable today. — Sean Carroll

In fact the total amount that a physicist knows is very little. He has only to remember the rules to get him from one place to another and he is all right ... — Richard Feynman

I think it is safe to say that no one understands quantum mechanics. Do not keep saying to yourself, if you can possibly avoid it, "But how can it be like that?" because you will go "down the drain" into a blind alley from which nobody has yet escaped. - Nobel physicist Richard Feynman — Robert Lanza