Arthur Eddington Quotes

Science is one thing, wisdom is another. Science is an edged tool, with which men play like children, and cut their own fingers. If you look at the results which science has brought in its train, you will find them to consist almost wholly in elements of mischief. See how much belongs to the word "Explosion" alone, of which the ancients knew nothing.

On one occasion when [William] Smart found him engrossed with his fundamental theory, he asked Eddington how many people he thought would understand what he was writing-after a pause came the reply, 'Perhaps seven.'

The pursuit of truth in science transcends national boundaries. It takes us beyond hatred and anger and fear. It is the best of us.

A star is drawing on some vast reservoir of energy by means unknown to us. This reservoir can scarcely be other than the subatomic energy which, it is known exists abundantly in all matter; we sometimes dream that man will one day learn how to release it and use it for his service. The store is well nigh inexhaustible, if only it could be tapped. There is sufficient in the Sun to maintain its output of heat for 15 billion years.

If an army of monkeys were strumming on typewriters, they might write all the books in the British Museum.

Man is slightly nearer to the atom than to the star. ... From his central position man can survey the grandest works of Nature with the astronomer, or the minutest works with the physicist. ... [K]nowledge of the stars leads through the atom; and important knowledge of the atom has been reached through the stars.

It is also a good rule not to put overmuch confidence in the observational results that are put forward until they are confirmed by theory.

To the pure geometer the radius of curvature is an incidental characteristic - like the grin of the Cheshire cat. To the physicist it is an indispensable characteristic. It would be going too far to say that to the physicist the cat is merely incidental to the grin. Physics is concerned with interrelatedness such as the interrelatedness of cats and grins. In this case the "cat without a grin" and the "grin without a cat" are equally set aside as purely mathematical phantasies.

The word reality frightens me.

Never accept a fact until it has been verified by theory.

In Einstein's theory of relativity the observer is a man who sets out in quest of truth armed with a measuring-rod. In quantum theory he sets out with a sieve.

Our ultimate analysis of space leads us not to a "here" and a "there," but to an extension such as that which relates "here" and "there." To put the conclusion rather crudely-space is not a lot of points close together; it is a lot of distances interlocked.

An ocean traveler has even more vividly the impression that the ocean is made of waves than that it is made of water.

What is possible in the Cavendish Laboratory may not be too difficult in the sun.

Our model of Nature should not be like a building-a handsome structure for the populace to admire, until in the course of time some one takes away a corner stone and the edifice comes toppling down. It should be like an engine with movable parts. We need not fix the position of any one lever; that is to be adjusted from time to time as the latest observations indicate. The aim of the theorist is to know the train of wheels which the lever sets in motion-that binding of the parts which is the soul of the engine.

The universe will finally become a ball of radiation, becoming more and more rarified and passing into longer and longer wave-lengths. The longest waves of radiation are Hertzian waves of the kind used in broadcasting. About every 1500 million years this ball of radio waves will double in diameter; and it will go on expanding in geometrical progression for ever. Perhaps then I may describe the end of the physical world as-one stupendous broadcast.

Every body continues in its state of rest or uniform motion in a straight line, except insofar as it doesn't.

We are bits of stellar matter that got cold by accident, bits of a star gone wrong.

Schrödinger's wave-mechanics is not a physical theory, but a dodge - and a very good dodge too.

I am aware that many critics consider the conditions in the stars not sufficiently extreme . . . the stars are not hot enough. The critics lay themselves open to an obvious retort: we tell them to go and find a hotter place.

Probably the simplest hypothesis... is that there may be a slow process of annihilation of matter.

It is reasonable to hope that in the not too distant future we shall be competent to understand so simple a thing as a star.

It cannot be denied that for a society which has to create scarcity to save its members from starvation, to whom abundance spells disaster, and to whom unlimited energy means unlimited power for war and destruction, there is an ominous cloud in the distance though at present it be no bigger than a man's hand.

There is no space without aether, and no aether which does not occupy space.

You cannot disturb the tiniest petal of a flower without the troubling of a distant star.

I don't believe any experiment until it is confirmed by theory. I find this is a witty inversion of "conventional" wisdom.

I ask you to look both ways. For the road to a knowledge of the stars leads through the atom; and important knowledge of the atom has been reached through the stars.

When an investigator has developed a formula which gives a complete representation of the phenomena within a certain range, he may be prone to satisfaction. Would it not be wiser if he should say 'Foiled again! I can find out no more about Nature along this line.'

In any attempt to bridge the domains of experience belonging to the spiritual and physical sides of nature, time occupies the key position.

If I let my fingers wander idly over the keys of a typewriter it might happen that my screed made an intelligible sentence. If an army of monkeys were strumming on typewriters they might write all the books in the British Museum. The chance of their doing so is decidedly more favourable than the chance of the molecules returning to one half of the vessel.

The electron, as it leaves the atom, crystallises out of Schrodinger's mist like a genie emerging from his bottle.

But it is necessary to insist more strongly than usual that what I am putting before you is a model-the Bohr model atom-because later I shall take you to a profounder level of representation in which the electron instead of being confined to a particular locality is distributed in a sort of probability haze all over the atom.

Let us suppose that an ichthyologist is exploring the life of the ocean. He casts a net into the water and brings up a fishy assortment. Surveying his catch, he proceeds in the usual manner of a scientist to systematise what it reveals. He arrives at two generalisations: No sea-creature is less than two inches long. (2) All sea-creatures have gills. These are both true of his catch, and he assumes tentatively that they will remain true however often he repeats it.

The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory.

For the truth of the conclusions of physical science, observation is the supreme Court of Appeal.

In the most modern theories of physics probability seems to have replaced aether as "the nominative of the verb 'to undulate'."

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?"

Oh leave the Wise our measures to collate. One thing at least is certain, light has weight. One thing is certain and the rest debate. Light rays, when near the Sun, do not go straight.

It is a primitive form of thought that things exist or do not exist.

Electrical force is defined as something which causes motion of electrical charge; an electrical charge is something which exerts electric force.

[When thinking about the new relativity and quantum theories] I have felt a homesickness for the paths of physical science where there are ore or less discernible handrails to keep us from the worst morasses of foolishness.

The physical world is entirely abstract and without actuality apart from its linkage to consciousness.

An electron is no more (and no less) hypothetical than a star. Nowadays we count electrons one by one in a Geiger counter, as we count the stars one by one on a photographic plate.

I believe there are 15, 747, 724, 136, 275, 002, 577, 605, 653, 961, 181, 555, 468, 044, 717, 914, 527, 116, 709, 366, 231, 425, 076, 185, 631, 031, 296 protons in the universe and the same number of electrons.

So far as physics is concerned, time's arrow is a property of entropy alone.

Events do not happen; they are just there, and we come across them.

Whatever else there may be in our nature, responsibility toward truth is one of its attributes.

Whether in the intellectual pursuits of science or in the mystical pursuits of the spirit, the light beckons ahead, and the purpose surging in our nature responds.