Yet is it possible in terms of the motion of atoms to explain how men can invent an electric motor, or design and build a great cathedral? If such achievements represent anything more than the requirements of physical law, it means that science must investigate the additional controlling factors, whatever they may be, in order that the world of nature may be adequately understood.
Arthur ComptonTwenty thousand years ago the family was the social unit. Now the social unit has become the world, in which it may truthfully be said that each person's welfare affects that of every other.
Arthur ComptonYet is it possible in terms of the motion of atoms to explain how men can invent an electric motor, or design and build a great cathedral? If such achievements represent anything more than the requirements of physical law, it means that science must investigate the additional controlling factors, whatever they may be, in order that the world of nature may be adequately understood.
Arthur ComptonAt your next breath each of you will probably inhale half a dozen or so of the molecules of Caesarโs last breath.
Arthur ComptonThe scientist who recognizes God knows only the God of Newton. To him the God imagined by Laplace and Comte is wholly inadequate. He feels that God is in nature, that the orderly ways in which nature works are themselves the manifestations of God's will and purpose. Its laws are his orderly way of working.
Arthur ComptonThe story is told of Lord Kelvin, a famous Scotch physicist of the last century, that after he had given a lecture on atoms and molecules, one of his students came to him with the question, "Professor, what is your idea of the structure of the atom." "What," said Kelvin, "The structure of the atom? Why, don't you know, the very word 'atom' means the thing that can't be cut. How then can it have a structure?" "That," remarked the facetious young man, "shows the disadvantage of knowing Greek."
Arthur Compton