Quotes & Sayings About Science Albert Einstein

Fortunate Newton, happy childhood of science. Nature to him was an open book. He stands before us strong, certain, and alone. — Albert Einstein

Philosophy is empty if it isn't based on science. Science discovers, philosophy interprets. — Albert Einstein

Experience alone can decide on truth. — Albert Einstein

All the fifty years of conscious brooding have brought me no closer to answer the question, "What are light quanta?" Of course today every rascal thinks he knows the answer, but he is deluding himself. — Albert Einstein

It is my inner conviction that the development of science seeks in the main to satisfy the longing for pure knowledge. — Albert Einstein

If this conviction had not been a strongly emotional one and if those searching for knowledge had not been inspired by Spinoza's Amor Dei Intellectualis, they would hardly have been capable of that untiring devotion which alone enables man to attain his greatest achievements. — Albert Einstein

If what is seen and experienced is portrayed in the language of logic, then it is science. If it is communicated through forms whose connections are not accessible to the conscious mind but are recognized intuitively, then it is art. — Albert Einstein

Gandhi, the greatest political genius of our time, has pointed the way. He was shown of what sacrifices people are capable once they have found the right way. His work for the liberation of India is a living testimony to the fact that a will governed by firm conviction is stronger than a seemingly invincible material power. — Albert Einstein

Science is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. — Albert Einstein

There is, fortunately, a minority composed of those who recognize early in their lives that the most beautiful and satisfying experiences open to humankind are not derived from the outside, but are bound up with the development of the individual's own feeling, thinking and acting. The genuine artists, investigators and thinkers have always been persons of this kind. However inconspicuously the life of these individuals runs its course, none the less the fruits of their endeavors are the most valuable contributions which one generation can make to its successors. — Albert Einstein

I am exclusively occupied with the problem of gravitation and hope with the help of a local mathematician friend [Marcel Grossman] to overcome all the difficulties. One thing is certain, however, that never in life have I been quite so tormented. A great respect for mathematics has been instilled within me, the subtler aspects of which, in my stupidity, I regarded until now as pure luxury. — Albert Einstein

In art, and in the higher ranges of science, there is a feeling of harmony which underlies all endeavor. There is no true greatness in art or science without that sense of harmony. — Albert Einstein

It is the theory which decides what we can observe — Albert Einstein

Wisdom is not a product of schooling but of the lifelong attempt to acquire it. — Albert Einstein

The creative scientist studies nature with the rapt gaze of the lover, and is guided as often by aesthetics as by rational considerations in guessing how nature works. — Albert Einstein

The Theory of Relativity confers an absolute meaning on a magnitude which in classical theory has only a relative significance: the velocity of light. The velocity of light is to the Theory of Relativity as the elementary quantum of action is to the Quantum Theory: it is its absolute core. — Max Planck

Most of the fundamental ideas of science are essentially simple, and may, as a rule, be expressed in a language comprehensible to everyone. — Albert Einstein

It seems to me that the idea of a personal God is an anthropological concept which I cannot take seriously. I also cannot imagine some will or goal outside the human sphere ... Science has been charged with undermining morality, but the charge is unjust. A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties and needs; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death. — Albert Einstein

It appears that the solution of the problem of time and space is reserved to philosophers who, like Leibniz, are mathematicians, or to mathematicians who, like Einstein, are philosophers. — Hans Reichenbach

A conflict arises when a religious community insists on the absolute truthfulness of all statements recorded in the Bible. This means an intervention on the part of religion into the sphere of science; this is where the struggle of the Church against doctrines of Galileo and Darwin belongs. — Albert Einstein

The most important function of art and science is to
Awaken the cosmic religious feeling and keep it alive. — Albert Einstein

It would take a civilization far more advanced than ours, unbelievably advanced, to begin to manipulate negative energy to create gateways to the past. But if you could obtain large quantities of negative energy - and that's a big "IF" - then you could create a time machine that apparently obeys Einstein's equation and perhaps the laws of quantum theory. — Michio Kaku

Scientists contribute in a variety of ways and I don't think I can singular one even including [Albert] Einstein, that I can say that he's the best. We don't work like the best basketball player and the best musician and so on. Science is a collective effort. — Ahmed H. Zewail

I am ceaselessly occupied with the question of the constitution of radiation ... This quantum question is so incredibly important and difficult that everyone should busy himself on it. — Albert Einstein

The most fundamental question we can ever ask ourselves is whether or not the universe we live in is friendly or hostile. — Albert Einstein

I believe in logic, the sequence of cause and effect, and in science its only begotten son our law, which was conceived by the ancient Greeks, thrived under Isaac Newton, suffered under Albert Einstein ...
That fragment of a 'creed for materialism' which a friend in college had once shown him rose through Donald's confused mind. — John The Apostle

No path leads from a knowledge of that which is to that which should be. — Albert Einstein

I know little about nature and hardly anything about men. — Albert Einstein

Nobody knows how the stand of our knowledge about the atom would be without him. Personally, Bohr is one of the amiable colleagues I have met. He utters his opinions like one perpetually groping and never like one who believes himself to be in possession of the truth. — Albert Einstein

Belief in an external world independent of the perceiving subject is the basis of all natural science. — Albert Einstein

Matter tells space how to curve, space tells matter how to move. — Albert Einstein

In scientific thinking are always present elements of poetry. Science and music requires a thought homogeneous. — Albert Einstein

What distinguishes the language of science from language as we ordinarily understand the word? ... What science strives for is an utmost acuteness and clarity of concepts as regards their mutual relation and their correspondence to sensory data. — Albert Einstein

For the moral attitudes of a people that is supported by religion need always aim at preserving and promoting the sanity and vitality of the community and its individuals, since otherwise this community is bound to perish. A people that were to honour falsehood, defamation, fraud, and murder would be unable, indeed, to subsist for very long. — Albert Einstein

Those whose acquaintance with scientific research is derived chiefly from its practical results easily develop a completely false notion of the mentality of the men who, surrounded by a skeptical world, have shown the way to kindred spirits scattered wide through the world and through the centuries. Only one who has devoted his life to similar ends can have a vivid realization of what has inspired these men and given them the strength to remain true to their purpose in spite of countless failures. It is cosmic religious feeling that gives a man such strength. A contemporary has said, not unjustly, that in this materialistic age of ours the serious scientific workers are the only profoundly religious people. — Albert Einstein

George Bernard Shaw, in a toast at a dinner feting Albert Einstein, proclaimed, "Science is always wrong. It never solves a problem without creating 10 more." Isn't that glorious? Science (and I think this applies to all kinds of research and scholarship) produces ignorance, possibly at a faster rate than it produces knowledge. Science, then, is not like the onion in the often used analogy of stripping away layer after layer to get at some core, central, fundamental truth. Rather it's like the magic well: no matter how — Stuart Firestein

The creative principle [of science] resides in mathematics. — Albert Einstein

Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it. — Albert Einstein

How can he possibly be humble? He hasn't done anything yet. — Albert Einstein

It would be possible to describe everything scientifically, but it would make no sense; it would be without meaning, as if you described a Beethoven symphony as a variation of wave pressure. — Albert Einstein

For us physicists believe the separation between past, present, and future is only an illusion, although a convincing one. — Albert Einstein

Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. — Albert Einstein

By far the most important consequence of the conceptual revolution brought about in physics by relativity and quantum theory lies not in such details as that meter sticks shorten when they move or that simultaneous position and momentum have no meaning, but in the insight that we had not been using our minds properly and that it is important to find out how to do so. — Percy Williams Bridgman

From the standpoint of daily life, however, there is one thing we do know: that we are here for the sake of each other - above all for those upon whose smile and well-being our own happiness depends, and also for the countless unknown souls with whose fate we are connected by a bond of sympathy. Many times a day I realize how much my own outer and inner life is built upon the labors of my fellow men, both living and dead, and how earnestly I must exert myself in order to give in return as much as I have received. — Albert Einstein

The physicist's greatest tool is his wastebasket. — Albert Einstein

I think a strong claim can be made that the process of scientific discovery may be regarded as a form of art. This is best seen in the theoretical aspects of Physical Science. The mathematical theorist builds up on certain assumptions and according to well understood logical rules, step by step, a stately edifice, while his imaginative power brings out clearly the hidden relations between its parts. A well constructed theory is in some respects undoubtedly an artistic production. A fine example is the famous Kinetic Theory of Maxwell ... The theory of relativity by Einstein, quite apart from any question of its validity, cannot but be regarded as a magnificent work of art. — Ernest Rutherford

It was my good fortune to be linked with Mme. Curie through twenty years of sublime and unclouded friendship. I came to admire her human grandeur to an ever growing degree. Her strength, her purity of will, her austerity toward herself, her objectivity, her incorruptible judgement - all these were of a kind seldom found joined in a single individual ... The greatest scientific deed of her life - proving the existence of radioactive elements and isolating them - owes its accomplishment not merely to bold intuition but to a devotion and tenacity in execution under the most extreme hardships imaginable, such as the history of experimental science has not often witnessed. — Albert Einstein

Albert Einstein, for one, repeatedly expressed these feelings, as in the following celebrated passage (Einstein, 1949, p. 5): The fairest thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the fundamental emotion which stands at the cradle of true art and true science ... the mystery of the eternity of life, and the inkling of the marvellous structure of reality, together with the single-hearted endeavor to comprehend a portion, be it ever so tiny, of the reason that manifests itself in nature. — Fritjof Capra

If there is any religion that could respond to the needs of modern science, it would be Buddhism. — Albert Einstein

I agree with Schopenhauer that one of the most powerful motives that attracts people to science and art is the longing to escape from everyday life. — Albert Einstein

You do not really understand something unless you can explain it to your grandmother. — Albert Einstein

It is harder to crack prejudice than an atom. — Albert Einstein

Science has gone a long way toward helping man to free himself from the burden of hard labor; yet, science itself is not a liberator. It creates means, not goals. It is up to men to utilize those means to achieve reasonable goals. — Albert Einstein

How does it happen that a properly endowed natural scientist comes to concern himself with epistemology? Is there no more valuable work in his specialty? I hear many of my colleagues saying, and I sense it from many more, that they feel this way. I cannot share this sentiment. When I think about the ablest students whom I have encountered in my teaching, that is, those who distinguish themselves by their independence of judgment and not merely their quick-wittedness, I can affirm that they had a vigorous interest in epistemology. They happily began discussions about the goals and methods of science, and they showed unequivocally, through their tenacity in defending their views, that the subject seemed important to them. Indeed, one should not be surprised at this. — Albert Einstein

Human knowledge and skills alone cannot lead humanity to a happy and dignified life. — Albert Einstein

You are right in speaking of the moral foundations of science, but you cannot turn around and speak of the scientific foundations of morality. — Albert Einstein

I maintain that the cosmic religious feeling is the strongest and noblest motive for scientific research. — Albert Einstein

People complain that our generation has no philosophers. They are wrong. They now sit in another faculty. Their names are Max Planck and Albert Einstein. Upon appointment as the first president of the Kaiser Wilhelm Society, Berlin, formed for the advancement of science. — Adolf Von Harnack

Anyone who thinks science is trying to make human life easier or more pleasant is utterly mistaken. — Albert Einstein

Look to the stars and from them learn. — Albert Einstein

Astrology is a science in itself and contains an illuminating body of knowledge. It taught me many things and I am greatly indebted to it. — Albert Einstein

What Artistic and Scientific Experience Have in Common - Where the world ceases to be the scene of our personal hopes and wishes, where we face it as free beings admiring, asking, and observing, there we enter the realm of Art and Science. If what is seen and experienced is portrayed in the language of logic, we are engaged in science. If it is communicated through forms whose connections are not accessible to the conscious mind but are recognized intuitively as meaninful, then we are engaged in art. Common to both is the loving devotion to that which transcends personal concerns and volition. — Albert Einstein

Epistemology without contact with science becomes an empty scheme. Science without epistemology is-insofar as it is thinkable at all-primitive and muddled. — Albert Einstein

The importance of C.F. Gauss for the development of modern physical theory and especially for the mathematical fundament of the theory of relativity is overwhelming indeed; also his achievement of the system of absolute measurement in the field of electromagnetism. In my opinion it is impossible to achieve a coherent objective picture of the world on the basis of concepts which are taken more or less from inner psychological experience. — Albert Einstein

Mathematics is the poetry of logic and the music of reason. — Albert Einstein

One cannot help but be in awe when
[one] contemplates the mysteries of eternity,
of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. — Albert Einstein

The total number of people who understand relativistic time, even after eighty years since the advent of special relativity, is still much smaller than the number of people who believe in horoscopes. — Yuval Ne'eman

Life is just like a game,
First you have to learn rules of the game,
And then play it better then any one else. — Albert Einstein

I refuse to make money out of my science. My laurel is not for sale like so many bales of cotton. — Albert Einstein

Where the world ceases to be the scene of our personal hopes and wishes, where we face it as free beings admiring, asking and observing, there we enter the realm of Art and Science. — Albert Einstein

The human spirit must prevail over technology. — Albert Einstein

I believe my theory of relativity to be true. But it will only be proved for certain in 1981, when I am dead. — Albert Einstein

Asked in 1919 whether it was true that only three people in the world understood the theory of general relativity, [Eddington] allegedly replied: 'Who's the third? — Arthur Stanley Eddington

[Newton wrote to Halley ... that he would not give Hooke any credit] That, alas, is vanity. You find it in so many scientists. You know, it has always hurt me to think that Galileo did not acknowledge the work of Kepler. — Albert Einstein

The state exists for man,not man for the state.The same may be said ofscience. These are old phrases,coined by people who saw in human individuality the highest human value .I would hesitate to repeat them,were it not for the ever recurring danger that they may be forgotten,especially in these days of organization and stereotypes. — Albert Einstein

The longing to behold this pre-established harmony [of phenomena and theoretical principles] is the source of the inexhaustible patience and perseverance with which Planck has devoted himself ... The state of mind which enables a man to do work of this kind is akin to that of the religious worshiper or the lover; the daily effort comes from no deliberate intention or program, but straight from the heart. — Albert Einstein

After a certain high level of technical skill is achieved, science and art tend to coalesce in esthetics, plasticity, and form. The greatest scientists are artists as well. Remark — Albert Einstein

Condemnation before investigation, is the highest form of ignorance. — Albert Einstein

Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe. — Albert Einstein

Insofar as we may at all claim that slavery has been abolished today, we owe its abolition to the practical consequences of science — Albert Einstein

Common sense invents and constructs no less than its own field than science does in its domain. It is, however, in the nature of common sense not to be aware of this situation. — Albert Einstein

What a deep [trust] in the rationality of the structure of the world and what a longing to understand even a small glimpse of the reason revealed in the world there must have been in Kepler and Newton to enable them to unravel the mechanism of the heavens in long years of lonely work! — Albert Einstein

In a Sense, we all are Time Travelers! We are Surviving each and every Active Time-Point in this Timeline....... — Aldrin Mathew

The world has changed far more in the past 100 years than in any other century in history. The reason is not political or economic but technological-technologies that flowed directly from advances in basic science. Clearly, no scientist better represents those advances than Albert Einstein: TIME's Person of the Century. — Stephen Hawking

To be sure, the doctrine of a personal God interfering with natural events could never be refuted, in the real sense, by science, for this doctrine can always take refuge in those domains in which scientific knowledge has not yet been able to set foot. But I am persuaded that such behavior on the part of the representatives of religion would not only be unworthy but also fatal. For a doctrine which is able to maintain itself not in clear light, but only in the dark, will of necessity lose its effect on mankind, with incalculable harm to human progress. — Albert Einstein

Every one who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble. — Albert Einstein

The important thing is to not stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existence. One cannot help but be in awe when he contemplates the mysteries of eternity, of life, of the marvelous structure of reality. It is enough if one tries merely to comprehend a little of this mystery each day.
- "Old Man's Advice to Youth: 'Never Lose a Holy Curiosity.'" LIFE Magazine (2 May 1955) p. 64 — Albert Einstein

Politics is for the moment and equation is for eternity. — Albert Einstein

Science without religion is lame, religion without science is blind. — Albert Einstein

Physics is essentially an intuitive and concrete science. Mathematics is only a means for expressing the laws that govern phenomena. — Albert Einstein

Galileo - the father of modern physics - indeed of modern science. — Albert Einstein

I find the idea quite intolerable that an electron exposed to radiation should choose of its own free will not only its moment to jump off but its direction. In that case I would rather be a cobbler, or even an employee in a gaming house, than a physicist. — Albert Einstein

If we trace out what we behold and experience through the language of logic, we are doing science; if we show it in forms whose interrelashionships are not accessible to our conscious thought but we are intuitively recognized as meaningful, we are doing art.. — Albert Einstein

My interest in science was always essentially limited to the study of principles ... That I have published so little is due to this same circumstance, as the great need to grasp principles has caused me to spend most of my time on fruitless pursuits. — Albert Einstein

As soon as science has emerged from its initial stages, theoretical advances are no longer achieved merely by a process of arrangement. Guided by empirical data, the investigator rather develops a system of thought which, in general, is built up logically from a small number of fundamental assumptions, the so-called axioms. We call such a system of thought a theory. The theory finds the justification for its existence in the fact that it correlates a large number of single observations, and it is just here that the 'truth' of the theory lies. — Albert Einstein

We owe a lot to the Indians, who taught us how to count, without which no worthwhile scientific discovery could have been made. — Albert Einstein

In the temple of science are many mansions, and various indeed are they that dwell therein and the motives that have led them thither. Many take to science out of a joyful sense of superior intellectual power; science is their own special sport to which they look for vivid experience and the satisfaction of ambition; many others are to be found in the temple who have offered the products of their brains on this altar for purely utilitarian purposes. Were [someone to] drive all the people belonging to these two categories out of the temple, the assemblage would be seriously depleted, but there would still be some men, of both present and past times, left inside. Our Planck is one of them, and that is why we love him. — Albert Einstein

The physicists say that I am a mathematician, and the mathematicians say that I am a physicist. I am a completely isolated man and though everybody knows me, there are very few people who really know me. — Albert Einstein

Pure science is a myth: Both mathematical theoreticians like Albert Einstein and practical crackpots like Henry Ford dealt with different aspects of the same world. — Edward Abbey

Einstein, my upset stomach hates your theory [of General Relativity] - it almost hates you yourself! How am I to' provide for my students? What am I to answer to the philosophers?!! — Paul Ehrenfest