Richard Feynman quotes

Richard Feynman was an American theoretical physicist renowned for his work in quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics. His unique teaching style and infectious curiosity inspired generations of scientists and students. He became famous for his Feynman diagrams and for making science accessible to the public. Here are 220 of his quotes:

God was invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand. (Richard Feynman)
I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics. View quote
Richard Feynman
Physics is like sex: sure, it may give some practical results, but that's not why we do it. View quote
Richard Feynman
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool. View quote
Richard Feynman
Principles You can't say A is made of B or vice versa. All mass is interaction. View quote
Richard Feynman
I don't know what's the matter with people: they don't learn by understanding; they learn by some other way - by rote or something. Their knowledge is so fragile! View quote
Richard Feynman
I'd hate to die twice. It's so boring. View quote
Richard Feynman
Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts. View quote
Richard Feynman
It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn't get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man. View quote
Richard Feynman
What we need is imagination, but imagination in a terrible strait-jacket. View quote
Richard Feynman
For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled. (Richard Feynman)
Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry. View quote
Richard Feynman
There are 1011 stars in the galaxy. That used to be a huge number. But it's only a hundred billion. It's less than the national deficit! We used to call them astronomical numbers. Now we should call them economical numbers. View quote
Richard Feynman
Hell, if I could explain it to the average person, it wouldn't have been worth the Nobel prize. View quote
Richard Feynman
The imagination of nature is far, far greater than the imagination of man. View quote
Richard Feynman
We are at the very beginning of time for the human race. It is not unreasonable that we grapple with problems. But there are tens of thousands of years in the future. Our responsibility is to do what we can, learn what we can, improve the solutions, and pass them on. View quote
Richard Feynman
People are always asking for the latest developments in the unification of this theory with that theory, and they don't give us a chance to tell them anything about what we know pretty well. They always want to know the things we don't know. View quote
Richard Feynman
I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something. View quote
Richard Feynman
I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. View quote
Richard Feynman
While I am describing to you how Nature works, you won't understand why Nature works that way. But you see, nobody understands that. View quote
Richard Feynman
Nature isn't classical, dammit, and if you want to make a simulation of nature, you'd better make it quantum mechanical, and by golly it's a wonderful problem, because it doesn't look so easy. (Richard Feynman)
Nature's imagination far surpasses our own. View quote
Richard Feynman
A person talks in such generalities that everyone can understand him and it's considered to be some deep philosophy. However, I would like to be very rather more special and I would like to be understood in an honest way, rather than in a vague way. View quote
Richard Feynman
We absolutely must leave room for doubt or there is no progress and no learning. There is no learning without having to pose a question. And a question requires doubt. People search for certainty. But there is no certainty. People are terrified - how can you live and not know? It is not odd at all. You only think you know, as a matter of fact. And most of your actions are based on incomplete knowledge and you really don't know what it is all about, or what the purpose of the world is, or know a great deal of other things. It is possible to live and not know. View quote
Richard Feynman
To those who do not know mathematics it is difficult to get across a real feeling as to the beauty, the deepest beauty, of nature. ... If you want to learn about nature, to appreciate nature, it is necessary to understand the language that she speaks in. View quote
Richard Feynman

Richard Feynman

Richard Feynman - Image
Photo: Copyright Tamiko Thiel 1984, CC BY-SA 3.0
Occupation: American Physicist
Born: May 11, 1918
Died: February 15, 1988
Quotes count: 220
Wikipedia: Richard Feynman

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