Quotes

Men and women are not content to console themselves with myths of gods and of giants or to restrict their thinking to the affairs of the daily life; they also build telescopes and satellites and accelerators, and sit at their desks for endless hours in an attempt to to decipher the meaning of the data they collect.The effort of understanding the universe is among the very few things that elevate the human life above the level of a farce, giving it some of the dignity of a tragedy.

Steven Weinberg, The First Three Minutes (1993) - VIII Epilogue: A Look to the Future

Out there was this huge world, which exists independently of us, human beings, and that we are of front as a great, eternal enigma, accessible only partially to our observation and thinking. The contemplation of this world drew me like a liberation, and I immediately noticed that many of the men I had learned to esteem and admire had found the own freedom and inner security by devoting themselves to it. The intellectual possession of this extrapersonal world mi flashed through the mind, more or less consciously, as the highest goal among those granted to man.The friends who could not be lost were the men of the present and the past who had had the same goal, with the deep horizons they had been able to open up.

Albert Einstein (Scientific Autobiography, 1949)

The purpose of science is to make difficult things easier to understand. The purpose of poetry is to express simple things in an incomprehensible way. They are two incompatible things.

Paul A.M. Dirac, quoted.by Helge Kragh in Dirac: A Scientific Biography (1990)

It is believed that the application of a systematic “scientific method” involves wearing a white coat and being obtuse–an automatic turning of the crank and collection of data of the kind Kuhn calls “normal science” and Rutherford “stamp collecting.” Actually, the creation of new science is a creative act, literally, and people who are not creative are not very good at it.

Philip W. Anderson_, Some ideas on the Aesthetics of Science, Nishina Memorial Lecture, Tokyo May 18, 1989.

The scientist must make order: science is done with facts just as a house is done with bricks, but the accumulation of facts is no more science than a pile of bricks is a house.

Henri Poincaré, Science and the Hypothesis, (1902)

Science is the only universal education. The humanities are only about people. Technology is only about the things that people use. But people form only an infinitesimal fraction of the universe. Science is about everything. …

Warren Siegel, Common misconceptions , in http://insti.physics.sunysb.edu/~siegel/warning.html

Many politicians, as well as many representatives of industry and academia, are convinced that society should only invest in research that is likely to generate direct and specific benefits in the form of wealth creation and improvements in the quality of life. In particular, they believe that research in High Energy Physics and Astrophysics are unnecessary and wasteful luxuries, that these disciplines consume resources rather than promote economic growth and human well-being. For example, let me quote from a recent letter to the Economist: ‘Physicists working in fundamental research would feel harassed if they had to point to anything useful that could be derived from their theoretical workings … It is far more important to encourage our ‘best brains’ to solve real problems and leave theology to the professionals of religion.’ Instead, I believe that these people are completely wrong, and that the policy they advocate is very unwise and counterproductive.

If Faraday, Roentgen, and Hertz had focused on the ‘real problems’ of their day, we would never have developed electric motors, X-rays, and radio. It is true that physicists working in fundamental research deal with ’exotic’ phenomena that are not in themselves particularly useful. It is also true that this type of research is expensive. Nevertheless, I maintain that their work continues to have an enormous impact on our lives. In truth, the search for fundamental knowledge, driven by human curiosity, is just as important as the search for solutions to specific practical problems.

Sheldon Glashow, The scientific and technological importance of particle physics, paris October 4, 2002, trad.it. courtesy Prof. Guido Martinelli

If research driven by scientific curiosity is economically important, why should it be publicly funded rather than private? The reason is that there are sciences that bring general benefits, rather than benefits specific to individual products. any economic return from this research cannot be ascribed to a single company or entrepreneur. This is the reason why pure research is funded by governments without regard to the immediate commercial interest of the results.Government funding of basic research, not directed to immediate purposes, must continue if we are to achieve further progress."

Chris Llewellyn-Smith, reported by Sheldon Glashow, cited.

I wonder where Italian expertise will go–at least what you have left today. The situation is demoralizing, and it is clear that young people are turning elsewhere. Research institutions want to do only applied research, increasingly mortifying basic research. But basic research is comparable to the roots of a tree: if you want fruit you have to feed the roots. Instead, in Italy they cut off the roots. So what fruit do you think that tree can produce tomorrow? Carlo Rubbia, reported at https://www.scienzainrete.it/italia150/carlo-rubbia

My talk this afternoon will be about the philosophy of science rather than about science itself. This is, in some ways, unusual for me and, I suppose, is generally unusual for a scientist in the midst of his or her activities._ I have read the observation (though I have forgotten the source) that the philosophy of science is as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds._

Steven Weinberg, Newtonianism, reductionism and the art of congressional testimony, Nature volume 330, pages433-437,(1987) https://www.nature.com/articles/330433a0

This is not to deny all value to philosophy, most of which has no nothing to do with science. Nor do I mean to deny any value ala philosophy of science, which at best strikes me as an enjoyable account of the history and discoveries of science. But we should not expect it to provide today’s scientists with useful guidance on where to direct their work or what they are likely to find.

Steven Weinberg, The Dream of the Unity of the Universe, VII - Against Philosophy, (1993)

Today we continue to search for the order of nature, but we do not think of it as an order based on human values… My view is that this ardent aspiration for a holistic view of nature is precisely what scientists have had to dispose of. We simply do not find anything in the laws of nature that corresponds in any way to the ideas of virtue, justice, love or contention, and we cannot rely on philosophy as a reliable guide to scientific explanation.

_Steven Weinberg, Explaining the World, V - Ancient Science and Religion, (2015)

Lo scienziato non studia la natura perché sia utile farlo. La studia perché ne ricava piacere; e ne ricava piacere perché è bella. Se la natura non fosse bella, non varrebbe la pena conoscerla, e la vita non sarebbe degna di essere vissuta. Ovviamente, non mi riferisco alla bellezza che colpisce i sensi, alla bellezza delle qualità e delle apparenze. Non la disprezzo affatto, ma non ha niente a che fare con la scienza. Intendo riferirmi a quell’intima bellezza che deriva dall’ordine armonioso delle parti e che può essere colta da un’intelligenza pura. (…) Proprio perché la semplicità e la vastità sono entrambe belle noi cerchiamo di preferenza fatti semplici e fatti vasti; e ne traiamo piacere, ora dal seguire il corso immenso delle stelle, ora dall’osservare con un microscopio quella prodigiosa piccolezza che è anche una vastità, e ora nel ricercare nelle ere geologiche quei segni del passato che ci attraggono per la loro lontananza

Henri Poincaré, Science and Method,Part I. Ch. 1 : The Selection of Facts, (1908)

In the South Seas live a people who in fact practice cargo worship: during World War II they saw planes loaded with every good thing land, and now they would like it to continue. They have laid out on the ground some kind of runways; they light fires on their sides; they have built a little hut in which a man sits with two pieces of wood like headphones, and from which bamboos protrude like radio antennas (the man represents the air traffic controller); and they wait for the planes to land. They do everything correctly; the shape is perfect and respects the original one: but the thing doesn’t work. No plane lands. Thus I speak of cargo cult sciences: they are sciences that follow the apparent precepts and forms of scientific inquiry but which, however, lack an essential element, since airplanes do not land. Richard Feynman (Master Lecture at CalTech, 1974, transcribed in the appendix to “Surely you’re joking, Mr.Feynman!”)

_If science is fallible let alone the rest! Edoardo Boncinelli (response to a journalist’s question cited in G.Corbellini, “Science,” ch. 1)

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said in a rather disdainful tone, “it means exactly what I want - no more and no less.” “The question is,” Alice replied, “whether words can be made to have so many different meanings.” “The question is,” Humpty Dumpty replied, “who is in charge - that’s all.” Lewis Carroll (Through the Magic Mirror.)