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Fred Hoyle

64 quotes

“I helped him willingly and most efficiently, the latter because I knew that if I did jobs cheerfully and badly I wouldn’t be asked too often.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“His new leisure also afforded my father the opportunity of indulging another of his favorite occupations—talking. There was a great deal of talk in our house, which had two effects on me: one, that I learned not to listen when I don’t want to listen; and the other, an aversion to talking.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is no room in these streamlined days for such artistry. Everything is now decided by rule and rote, but this is one of the reasons why England is no longer in the great country she used to be.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“My education was still full of holes, which I made a resolve to fill. I am still trying to carry it out.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Of all the backgrounds it seems to me that the typical suburban community must be by far the worst. The child’s parents have already compromised with life by living in such a place. It would be far better from the child’s point of view to be raised in an actual slum. The danger is, of course, that the child quickly comes to regard comfort as the number one priority.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Assuming children and students do not wish to learn anything, then I suppose the present method of teaching is about right. It seems predicated on the notion that learning is an unpleasant medicine which must be swallowed at any price. But where a child is keen to learn, present methods seem woefully and even shockingly inadequate.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The correct procedure I am sure it is to learn by doing, not by being told what to do. The notion that one can learn by attending a course of lectures is as absurd as the notion that the way to learn to ride a bicycle would be to hire someone to ride it for you, and to sit hour after hour watching him. The only reason for attending a lecture is to acquire hints as to the right method of tackling some particular problem or other. And this would be almost unnecessary in a properly designed and graded system of examples.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“But only gradually have I learned that such ultimate successes are not what the present-day authorities in Britain really want. What really delights them is extreme tidiness combined with a façade of everyday competence. This of course is why Britain plunges further and further downhill with every passing year. The truth is the opposite: it is the ultimate success that really counts.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is an important difference between an advance in science and achievements in the humanities. A great musician consumes intellectual capital, he does not supply it, or at least it is usual for him to consume more than he creates. It has been impossible to use the motto theme of the Fifth Symphony after Beethoven used it. In science, on the other hand, the situation is the other way round. A breakthrough invariably opens up more new problems to be solved. A Newton or an Einstein may leave the world with a century or more of clearing up to be done.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“One could conceive of other abstract systems, the consequences of which could be calculated, without it being necessary to provide a realization in actual material terms. We can conceive of other universes without those universes being compelled to exist. This indeed is the business of the pure mathematician.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The creationist is a sham religious person who, curiously, has no true sense of religion. In the language of religion, it is the facts we observe in the world around us that must be seen to constitute the words of God. Documents, whether the Bible, Qur'an or those writings that held such force for Velikovsky, are only the words of men. To prefer the words of men to those of God is what one can mean by blasphemy. This, we think, is the instinctive point of view of most scientists who, curiously again, have a deeper understanding of the real nature of religion than have the many who delude themselves into a frenzied belief in the words, often the meaningless words, of men. Indeed, the lesser the meaning, the greater the frenzy, in something like inverse proportion.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) first seen 1993 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Our Place in the Cosmos (1993), p. 14
“I have been astonished by the way in which the tug of war between left and right is conducted. What seems to happen is this: the left, the ideas-men, the liberals, propose a new idea involving change. The conservatives oppose all change on principle. An argument now develops in which I find myself unable to take any real part. I know that without new ideas, without change, even the most modest enterprise soon congeals and dies. But I also know that most new ideas, like mutations, turn out very badly. Hence from the beginning I am aware of the basic dilemma. But not so the liberals or the conservatives. The liberals, for their part, are quite convinced that the new idea is an excellent one, but when pressed for proof they merely follow the dictum of Robert Owen, “never argue, repeat your assertion.” So far as the liberals are concerned I feel as if I were in the presence of divine revelation. The conservatives on the other hand are blockers, stone wallers, Verdun-types with “they shall not pass” expression written all over their faces. On the whole, because I know that most new ideas are dubious, I end by voting with the conservatives.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The attitude of the conservative is basically wrong: change should not be opposed. Not in a root and branch sense. What the conservatives should demand and insist on is that any projected changes should be reversible. The deadly changes are those which are irreversible, like the British introducing Greeks into Cyprus. Or like taking the sparrow and the rabbit to Australia. So long as a projected change can be shown to be reversible there should be no very serious objection to making a tryout. If the first step along the new road turns out well, the second step can be made, but if it turns out badly one simply retreats to where one was before. This seems to me to be the essential principle of social change.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is no substitute for continuous endeavor. Of course all older men have good intentions, they have every wish “to keep up.” But the endless calls of students and committees and the ceaseless ringing of the telephone can defeat the best intentions. Only very recently I myself summoned the courage to deal with the problem. My solution is to answer only essential letters, entirely to ignore the telephone, and to restrict severely my participation in committee meetings. In modern ant-like society, with its penchant for excreting mountains of trivial literature, it needs an enormous determination to follow these simple precepts.”
Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) said by 2001 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source