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Freeman Dyson
81 quotes
“The whole point of science is that most of it is uncertain. That's why science is exciting--because we don't know. Science is all about things we don't understand. The public, of course, imagines science is just a set of facts. But it's not. Science is a process of exploring, which is always partial. We explore, and we find out things that we understand. We find out things we thought we understood were wrong. That's how it makes progress. (2014 interview)”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The public has a distorted view of science, because children are taught in school that science is a collection of firmly established truths. In fact, science is not a collection of truths. It is a continuing exploration of mysteries. (New York Review of Books, 2011)”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It has been generally believed that only the complex numbers could legitimately be used as the ground field in discussing quantum-mechanical operators. Over the complex field, Frobenius' theorem is of course not valid; the only division algebra over the complex field is formed by the complex numbers themselves. However, Frobenius' theorem is relevant precisely because the appropriate ground field for much of quantum mechanics is real rather than complex.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1200 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: (p. 1200)
“I am acutely aware of the fact that the marriage between mathematics and physics, which was so enormously fruitful in past centuries, has recently ended in divorce.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1972 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Missed Opportunities (1972)
“Thirty-one years ago [1948], Dick Feynman told me about his "sum over histories" version of quantum mechanics. "The electron does anything it likes," he said. "It just goes in any direction at any speed, forward or backward in time, however it likes, and then you add up the amplitudes and it gives you the wave-function." I said to him, "You're crazy." But he wasn't.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1979 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Address of March 1979 in Some Strangeness in the Proportion: A Centennial Symposium to Celebrate the Achievements of Albert Einstein (1980), the report of the Einstein Centennial Symposium held 4-9 March 1979 at Princet…
Also quoted by: Richard Feynman
“I have felt it myself. The glitter of nuclear weapons. It is irresistible if you come to them as a scientist. To feel it's there in your hands, to release this energy that fuels the stars, to let it do your bidding. To perform these miracles, to lift a million tons of rock into the sky. It is something that gives people an illusion of illimitable power, and it is, in some ways, responsible for all our troubles — this, what you might call technical arrogance, that overcomes people when they see what they can do with their minds.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1981 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in The Day After Trinity: J. Robert Oppenheimer and the Atomic Bomb (1981), a documentary film directed by Jon Else, written by David Peoples, Janet Peoples, and Jon Else.
“As we look out into the Universe and identify the many accidents of physics and astronomy that have worked together to our benefit, it almost seems as if the Universe must in some sense have known that we were coming.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1986 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (1986) by John D. Barrow and Frank J. Tipler, p. 318
“The bottom line for mathematicians is that the architecture has to be right. In all the mathematics that I did, the essential point was to find the right architecture. It's like building a bridge. Once the main lines of the structure are right, then the details miraculously fit. The problem is the overall design.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1994 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Freeman Dyson: Mathematician, Physicist, and Writer". Interview with Donald J. Albers, The College Mathematics Journal, vol 25, no. 1, (January 1994)
“Anyone who compares the bibliography with the reprinted papers will notice that mathematics and physics have not been given equal treatment. There is a strong bias in favor of mathematics. The bias arises from the fact that mathematical papers, provided that are correct and not trivial, have permanent value, whereas most papers in physics journals are ephemeral. For this reason, it is customary to publish complete collected works of mathematicians but only selected works of physicists.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1996 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Selected Papers of Freeman Dyson with Commentary. American Mathematical Soc. (1996) p. 1
“The laws of nature are constructed in such a way as to make the universe as interesting as possible.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 1997 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Imagined Worlds (1997)
“In desperation I asked Fermi whether he was not impressed by the agreement between our calculated numbers and his measured numbers. He replied, "How many arbitrary parameters did you use for your calculations?" I thought for a moment about our cut-off procedures and said, "Four." He said, "I remember my friend Johnny von Neumann used to say, with four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk." With that, the conversation was over.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2004 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: A meeting with Enrico Fermi" in Nature 427 (22 January 2004), p. 297 (subscription required)
“The biggest breakthrough in the next 50 years will be the discovery of extraterrestrial life. We have been searching for it for 50 years and found nothing. That proves life is rarer than we hoped, but does not prove that the universe is lifeless. We are only now developing the tools to make our searches efficient and far-reaching, as optical and radio detection and data processing move forward.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2006 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Freeman Dyson forecasts the future" at NewScientist.com (15 November 2006)
“I believe global warming is grossly exaggerated as a problem. It's a real problem, but it's nothing like as serious as people are led to believe. The idea that global warming is the most important problem facing the world is total nonsense and is doing a lot of harm. It distracts people's attention from much more serious problems.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2007 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: Interview in Salon (29 September 2007)
“All the books that I have seen about the science and the economics of global warming, including the two books under review, miss the main point. The main point is religious rather than scientific. There is a worldwide secular religion which we may call environmentalism, holding that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible. … Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2008 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: The New York Review of Books (12 June 2008)
“There’s very good news from the asteroids. It appears that a large fraction of them, including the big ones, are actually very rich in H2O. Nobody imagined that. They thought they were just big rocks … It’s easier to get to an asteroid than to Mars, because the gravity is lower and landing is easier. Certainly the asteroids are much more practical, right now. If we start space colonies in, say, the next 20 years, I would put my money on the asteroids.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2010 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: As quoted in "The Danger of Cosmic Genius" by Kenneth Brower, The Atlantic (December 2010)
“... the most important questions and insights and goals are unpredictable.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) first seen 2020 wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
Recorded in: email sent to David Brown, 1 January 2020, quoted in (published by Web of Stories - Life Stories of Remarkable People)
“There is a great satisfaction in building good tools for other people to use.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“If we had a reliable way to label our toys good and bad, it would be easy to regulate technology wisely. But we can rarely see far enough ahead to know which road leads to damnation. Whoever concerns himself with big technology, either to push it forward or to stop it, is gambling in human lives.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is characteristic of all deep human problems that they are not to be approached without some humor and some bewilderment.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A good cause can become bad if we fight for it with means that are indiscriminately murderous. A bad cause can become good if enough people fight for it in a spirit of comradeship and self-sacrifice. In the end it is how you fight, as much as why you fight, that makes your cause good or bad.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“A good scientist is a person with original ideas. A good engineer is a person who makes a design that works with as few original ideas as possible. There are no prima donnas in engineering.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“An awareness of our smallness may help to redeem us from the arrogance which is the besetting sin of the scientists.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Science is not a monolithic body of doctrine. Science is a culture, constantly growing and changing. The science of today has broken out of the molds of classical nineteenth-century science, just as the paintings of Pablo Picasso and Jackson Pollock broke out of the molds of nineteenth century art. Science has as many competing styles as painting or poetry. The diversity of science also finds a parallel in the diversity of religion.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“There is no easy solution to the conflict between fundamentalist Christian dogma and the facts of biological evolution. I am not saying that the conflict could have been altogether avoided. I am saying only that the conflict was made more bitter and more damaging, both to religion and to science, by the dogmatic and self-righteousness of scientists. What was needed was a little more human charity, a little more willingness to listen rather than to lay down the law, a little more humility. Scientists stand in need of these Christian virtues just as much as preachers do.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Scientifically speaking, a butterfly is at least as mysterious as a superstring. When something ceases to be mysterious it ceases to be of absorbing interest to scientists. Almost all things scientists think and dream about are mysterious.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Imagine, if you can, four things that have very different sizes. First, the entire universe. Second, the planet Earth. Third, the nucleus of an atom. Fourth, a superstring. The step in size from each of these things to the next is roughly the same... twenty powers of ten....”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“What philosophical conclusions should we draw from the abstract style of the superstring theory? We might conclude, as Sir James Jeans concluded long ago, that the Great Architect of the Universe now begins to appear as a Pure Mathematician, and that if we work hard enough at mathematics we shall be able to read his mind. Or we might conclude that our pursuit of abstractions is leading us far away from those parts of the creation which are most interesting from a human point of view. It is too early yet to come to conclusions.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Fifty years ago Kurt Gödel... proved that the world of pure mathematics is inexhaustible. … I hope that the notion of a final statement of the laws of physics will prove as illusory as the notion of a formal decision process for all mathematics. If it should turn out that the whole of physical reality can be described by a finite set of equations, I would be disappointed, I would feel that the Creator had been uncharacteristically lacking in imagination.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“We must be careful not to discourage our twelve-year-olds by making them waste the best years of their lives preparing for examinations.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The expansion of life, moving out from Earth into its inheritance, is an even greater theme than the expansion of England across the Atlantic. As Hakluyt wrote that there is under our noses the great and ample country of Virginia, I am saying that there is under our noses the territory of nine planets, forty moons, ten thousand asteroids and a trillion comets.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Sharing the food is to me more important than arguing about beliefs. Jesus, according to the gospels, thought so too.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am content to be one of the multitude of Christians who do not care much about the doctrine of the Trinity or the historical truth of the gospels. Both as a scientist and as a religious person, I am accustomed to living with uncertainty. Science is exciting because it is full of unsolved mysteries, and religion is exciting for the same reason. The greatest unsolved mysteries are the mysteries of our existence as conscious beings in a small corner of a vast universe.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I do not claim any ability to read God's mind. I am sure of only one thing. When we look at the glory of stars and galaxies in the sky and the glory of forests and flowers in the living world around us, it is evident that God loves diversity. Perhaps the universe is constructed according to a principle of maximum diversity.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The principle of maximum diversity says that the laws of nature, and the initial conditions at the beginning of time, are such as to make the universe as interesting as possible. As a result, life is possible but not too easy. Maximum diversity often leads to maximum stress. In the end we survive, but only by the skin of our teeth. This is the confession of faith of a scientific heretic. Perhaps I may claim as evidence for progress in religion the fact that we no longer burn heretics.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Like all the new technologies that have arisen from scientific knowledge, biotechnology is a tool that can be used either for good or for evil purposes. The role of ethics is to strengthen the good and avoid the evil.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Unfortunately a large number of people in many countries are strongly opposed to green technology, for reasons having little to do with the real dangers. It is important to treat the opponents with respect, to pay attention to their fears, to go gently into the new world of green technology so that neither human dignity nor religious conviction is violated. If we can go gently, we have a good chance of achieving within a hundred years the goals of ecological sustainability and social justice that green technology brings within our reach.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I have five minutes left to give you a message to take home. The message is simple. "God forbid that we should give out a dream of our own imagination for a pattern of the world". This was said by Francis Bacon, one of the founding fathers of modern science, almost four hundred years ago. Bacon was the smartest man of his time, with the possible exception of William Shakespeare.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“I am saying to modern scientists and theologians: don't imagine that our latest ideas about the Big Bang or the human genome have solved the mysteries of the universe or the mysteries of life. Here are Bacon's words again: "The subtlety of nature is greater many times over than the subtlety of the senses and understanding". In the last four hundred years, science has fulfilled many of Bacon's dreams, but it still does not come close to capturing the full subtlety of nature.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“To talk about the end of science is just as foolish as to talk about the end of religion. Science and religion are both still close to their beginnings, with no ends in sight. Science and religion are both destined to grow and change in the millennia that lie ahead of us, perhaps solving some old mysteries, certainly discovering new mysteries of which we yet have no inkling.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“After sketching his program for the scientific revolution that he foresaw, Bacon ends his account with a prayer: "Humbly we pray that this mind may be steadfast in us, and that through these our hands, and the hands of others to whom thou shalt give the same spirit, thou wilt vouchsafe to endow the human family with new mercies". That is still a good prayer for all of us as we begin the twenty-first century.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Science and religion are two windows that people look through, trying to understand the big universe outside, trying to understand why we are here. The two windows give different views, but they look out at the same universe. Both views are one-sided, neither is complete. Both leave out essential features of the real world. And both are worthy of respect.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“In the little town of Princeton where I live, we have more than twenty churches and at least one synagogue, providing different forms of worship and belief for different kinds of people. They do more than any other organizations in the town to hold the community together. Within this community of people, held together by religious traditions of human brotherhood and sharing of burdens, a smaller community of professional scientists also flourishes.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The great question for our time is, how to make sure that the continuing scientific revolution brings benefits to everybody rather than widening the gap between rich and poor. To lift up poor countries, and poor people in rich countries, from poverty, to give them a chance of a decent life, technology is not enough. Technology must be guided and driven by ethics if it is to do more than provide new toys for the rich.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Scientists and business leaders who care about social justice should join forces with environmental and religious organizations to give political clout to ethics. Science and religion should work together to abolish the gross inequalities that prevail in the modern world. That is my vision, and it is the same vision that inspired Francis Bacon four hundred years ago, when he prayed that through science God would "endow the human family with new mercies".”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“The progress of science requires the growth of understanding in both directions, downward from the whole to the parts and upward from the parts to the whole. A reductionist philosophy, arbitrarily proclaiming that the growth of understanding must go only in one direction, makes no scientific sense. Indeed, dogmatic philosophical beliefs of any kind have no place in science.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Over periods of 10,000 years the distinctions between Western and Eastern and African cultures lose all meaning. Over a time span of 100,000 years we are all Africans. And over a time span of 300 million years we are all amphibians, waddling uncertainly out of dried-up ponds onto the alien and hostile land.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Progress in science is often built on wrong theories that are later corrected. It is better to be wrong than to be vague.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Science as subversion has a long history. ... Davis and Sakharov belong to an old tradition in science that goes all the way back to the rebels Benjamin Franklin and Joseph Priestley in the eighteenth century, to Galileo and Giordano Bruno in the seventeenth and sixteenth. If science ceases to be a rebellion against authority, then it does not deserve the talents of our brightest children. ... We should try to introduce our children to science today as a rebellion against poverty and ugliness and militarism and economic injustice.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“Gödel's theorem shows conclusively that in pure mathematics reductionism does not work. To decide whether a mathematical statement is true, it is not sufficient to reduce the statement to marks on paper and to study the behavior of the marks. Except in trivial cases, you can decide the truth of a statement only by studying its meaning and its context in the larger world of mathematical ideas.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source
“It is a curious paradox that several of the greatest and most creative spirits in science, after achieving important discoveries by following their unfettered imaginations, were in their later years obsessed with reductionist philosophy and as a result became sterile. Hilbert was a prime example of this paradox. Einstein was another.”
Freeman Dyson (1923–2020) said by 2020 at the latest wikiquote, CC BY-SA 4.0 source