Niels Bohr Quotes

The great extension of our experience in recent years has brought light to the insufficiency of our simple mechanical conceptions and, as a consequence, has shaken the foundation on which the customary interpretation of observation was based. ~ Niels Bohr

We depend on our words ... Our task is to communicate experience and ideas to others. We must strive continually to extend the scope of our description, but in such a way that our messages do not thereby lose their objective or unambiguous character ... We are suspended in language in such a way that we cannot say what is up and what is down. The word 'reality' is also a word, a word which we must learn to use correctly. ~ Niels Bohr

Physics is not about how the world is, it is about what we can say about the world ~ Niels Bohr

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth. ~ Niels Bohr

If we couldn't laugh at ourselves, that would be the end of everything. ~ Niels Bohr

If anybody says he can think about quantum physics without getting giddy, that only shows he has not understood the first thing about them. ~ Niels Bohr

Niels Bohr brainwashed a whole generation of theorists into thinking that the job (interpreting quantum theory) was done 50 years ago. ~ Murray Gell-Mann

It is difficult to predict, especially the future. ~ Niels Bohr

It is not enough to be wrong, one must also be polite. ~ Niels Bohr

A person who wasn't outraged on first hearing about quantum theory didn't understand what had been said. ~ Niels Bohr

In our description of nature the purpose is not to disclose the real essence of the phenomena but only to track down, as far as possible, relations between the manifold aspects of our experience. ~ Niels Bohr

Oh what idiots we have all been, this is just as it must be ~ Niels Bohr

Despite the earnest belief of most of his fans, Einstein did not win his Nobel Prize for the theory of relativity, special or general. He won for explaining a strange effect in quantum mechanics, the photoelectric effect. His solution provided the first real evidence that quantum mechanics wasn't a crude stopgap for justifying anomalous experiments, but actually corresponds to reality. And the fact that Einstein came up with it is ironic for two reasons. One, as he got older and crustier, Einstein came to distrust quantum mechanics. Its statistical and deeply probabilistic nature sounded too much like gambling to him, and it prompted him to object that "God does not play dice with the universe." He was wrong, and it's too bad that most people have never heard the rejoinder by Niels Bohr: "Einstein! Stop telling God what to do. ~ Sam Kean

It is the hallmark of any deep truth that its negation is also a deep truth ~ Niels Bohr

Anyone who can contemplate quantum mechanics without getting dizzy hasn't understood it. ~ Niels Bohr

Using the word much as it is used in atomic physics to characterize the relationship between experience obtained by different experimental arrangements and visualized only by mutually exclusive ideas, we may truly say that different human cultures are complimentary to each other ... each such culture represents a harmonious balance of traditional conventions by means of which latent potentialities of human life unfold themselves in a way which reveals to us new aspects of its unlimited richness and variety. ~ Niels Bohr

Isolated material particles are abstractions, their properties being definable and observable only through their interaction with other systems . ~ Niels Bohr

Every sentence I utter must be understood not as an affirmation, but as a question. ~ Niels Bohr

I did not like the man [Niels Bohr] when you showed him to me, with his hair all overhis head ... ~ Winston Churchill

And anyone who thinks they can talk about quantum theory without feeling dizzy hasn't yet understood the first thing about it. ~ Niels Bohr

Truth and clarity are complementary ~ Niels Bohr

It is a great pity that human beings cannot find all of their satisfaction in scientific contemplativeness. ~ Niels Bohr

Rutherford is a man you can rely on; he comes regularly and enquires how things are going and talks about the smallest details - Rutherford is such an outstanding man and really interested in the work of all the people around him. ~ Niels Bohr

Truth is something that we can attempt to doubt, and then perhaps, after much exertion, discover that part of the doubt is not justified. ~ Niels Bohr

Stop telling God what to do with his dice. ~ Niels Bohr

The Stone Age didn't end because the World ran out of stones ~ Niels Bohr

[About the great synthesis of atomic physics in the 1920s]
It was a heroic time. It was not the doing of any one man; it involved the collaboration of scores of scientists from many different lands. But from the first to last the deeply creative, subtle and critical spirit of Niels Bohr guided, restrained, deepened and finally transmuted the enterprise. ~ J. Robert Oppenheimer

Of course I don't believe in it [pointing to horseshoe on his office wall]. But I understand that it brings you luck whether you believe in it or not. ~ Niels Bohr

I go into the Upanishads to ask questions. ~ Niels Bohr

It is very difficult to make an accurate prediction, especially about the future. ~ Niels Bohr

There are two sorts of truth: trivialities, where opposites are clearly absurd, and profound truths, recognised by the fact that the opposite is also a profound truth ~ Niels Bohr

When we measure something we are forcing an undetermined, undefined world to assume an experimental value. We are not measuring the world, we are creating it. ~ Niels Bohr

An independant reality in the ordinary physical sense can neither be ascribed to the phenomenon nor to the agencies of observation. ~ Niels Bohr

Address to Albert Einstein: You are not thinking. You are merely being logical. ~ Niels Bohr

What is that we human beings ultimately depend on? We depend on our words. We are suspended in language. Our task is to communicate experience and ideas to others. ~ Niels Bohr

[About describing atomic models in the language of classical physics:]
We must be clear that when it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry. The poet, too, is not nearly so concerned with describing facts as with creating images and establishing mental connections. ~ Niels Bohr

Anybody who is not shocked by this subject has failed to understand it. [of quantum mechanics] ~ Niels Bohr

How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress. ~ Niels Bohr

One thought spectra are marvellous, but it is not possible to make progress there. Just as if you have the wing of a butterfly then certainly it is very regular with the colors and so on, but nobody thought one could get the basis of biology from the coloring of the wing of a butterfly. ~ Niels Bohr

Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself it's own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it. ~ Niels Bohr

Perhaps I have found out a little about the structure of atoms. ~ Niels Bohr

A physicist is just an atom's way of looking at itself. ~ Niels Bohr

In physics we deal with states of affairs much simpler than those of psychology and yet we again and again learn that our task is not to investigate the essence of things-we do not at all know what this would mean&mash;but to develop those concepts that allow us to speak with each other about the events of nature in a fruitful manner. ~ Niels Bohr

Every valuable human being must be a radical and a rebel, for what he must aim at is to make things better than they are ~ Niels Bohr

You are not thinking, you are just being logical. ~ Niels Bohr

Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future. ~ Niels Bohr

The present state of atomic theory is characterized by the fact that we not only believe the existence of atoms to be proved beyond a doubt, but also we even believe that we have an intimate knowledge of the constituents of the individual atoms. ~ Niels Bohr

Predition is risky, especially of the future. ~ Niels Bohr

A deep truth is a truth so deep that not only is it true but it's exact opposite is also true. ~ Niels Bohr

And at that age, the only boys I didn't think were gross were dead scientists – and it's not like I wanted to kiss those guys. (No offense, Niels Bohr.) ~ Sarah Cross

When it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry. The poet, too, is not nearly so concerned with describing facts as with creating images. ~ Niels Bohr

An expert is a man who has made all the mistakes which can be made in a very narrow field. ~ Niels Bohr

The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth. ~ Niels Bohr

Chinese dialectical reasoning had an impact on the physicist Niels Bohr, who was highly knowledgeable about Eastern thought. He attributed his development of quantum theory in part to the metaphysics of the East. There had been a centuries-long debate in the West about whether light consists of particles or waves. Belief in one was assumed to contradict and render impossible belief in the other. Bohr's solution was to say that light can be thought of in both ways. In quantum theory, light can be viewed either as a particle or as a wave. Just never both at the same time. ~ Richard E. Nisbett

One must always do what one really cannot. ~ Niels Bohr

In quantum mechanics...an observation here and now changes in general the 'state' of the observed system....I consider the unpredictable change of the state by a single observation...to be an abandonment of the idea of the isolation of the observer from the course of physical events outside himself. ~ Niels Bohr

Those who are not shocked when they first come across quantum theory cannot possibly have understood it. ~ Niels Bohr

Bohr's standpoint, that a space-time description is impossible, I reject a limine. Physics does not consist only of atomic research, science does not consist only of physics, and life does not consist only of science. The aim of atomic research is to fit our empirical knowledge concerning it into our other thinking. All of this other thinking, so far as it concerns the outer world, is active in space and time. If it cannot be fitted into space and time, then it fails in its whole aim and one does not know what purpose it really serves. ~ Erwin Schrodinger

All rising curves that show unwelcome trends in human affairs will approach infinity if extended far enough, but it is we who dictate the curve and not vice versa. ~ Niels Bohr

Nothing exists until it is measured. ~ Niels Bohr

We all know your idea is crazy. The question is whether it is crazy enough. ~ Niels Bohr

Our deepest description of physical reality, in quantum theory and in the four Core Theories of forces (gravitation, electromagnetism, strong and weak forces), bring in concepts that call to mind yin and yang. Niels Bohr, an influential founder of quantum theory, saw strong parallels between his concept of complementarity and the unified duality of yin-yang. He designed a coat of arms for himself, in which the yin-yang figures centrally (see figure 42, page 324). Our Core Theories center on the interplay between lightlike space filling fluids (yang) and substances (yin) they both direct and respond to. ~ Frank Wilczek

Physics is the belief that a simple and consistent description of nature is possible. ~ Niels Bohr

Some things are so serious, they can only be joked about. ~ Niels Bohr

If quantum mechanics hasn't profoundly shocked you, you haven't understood it yet. ~ Niels Bohr

A physicist visits a colleague and notices a horseshoe hanging on the wall above the entrance. 'Do you really believe that a horseshoe brings luck?' he asks. 'No,' replies the colleague, 'but I've been told that it works even if you don't believe in it.' ~ Niels Bohr

When searching for harmony in life one must never forget that in the drama of existence we are ourselves both actors and spectators. ~ Niels Bohr

You can recognize a small truth because its opposite is a falsehood. The opposite of a great truth is another truth. ~ Niels Bohr

Prediction is difficult, especially the future. ~ Niels Bohr

There are some things so serious that you have to laugh at them. ~ Niels Bohr

There's a quote from the famous physicist Niels Bohr, who posits that the way you become an expert in a field is to make every mistake possible in that field. ~ Sebastian Gutierrez

The opposite of every great idea is another great idea. ~ Niels Bohr

We are trapped by language to such a degree that every attempt to formulate insight is a play on words. ~ Niels Bohr

Niels Bohr believed that the complementarity that existed between the wave and the particle aspects of nature were indications of a much deeper complementarity in which irreconcilable pairs of opposites need not be contradictory. As he once said, "the opposite of a small truth may be a lie, but the opposite of a great truth is also a great truth." Thus the ring i may be a symbol of the reconciliation of complementary parts of the whole. ~ Fred Alan Wolf

Somebody once asked Niels Bohr why he had a horseshoe hanging above the front door of his house. Surely you, a world famous physicist, can't really believe that hanging a horseshoe above your door brings you luck? Of course not, Bohr replied, but I have been reliably informed that it will bring me luck whether I believe in it or not. ~ Arthur Koestler

I myself find the division of the world into an objective and a subjective side much too arbitrary. The fact that religions through the ages have spoken in images, parables, and paradoxes means simply that there are no other ways of grasping the reality to which they refer. But that does not mean that it is not a genuine reality. And splitting this reality into an objective and a. subjective side won't get us very far. ~ Niels Bohr

Predictions are hard, especially abot the future. ~ Niels Bohr

If you think you understand it, that only shows that you don't know the first thing about it. ~ Niels Bohr

Our task is not to penetrate the essence of things, the meaning of which we do not know anyway, but rather to develop concepts which allow us to talk in a productive way about phenomena in nature ~ Niels Bohr

Margrethe: And when all our eyes are closed, when even the ghosts have gone, what will be left of our beloved world? Our ruined and dishonoured and beloved world? ~ Michael Frayn

Niels Lyhne was tired. These repeated runnings to a leap that was never leaped had wearied him. Everything seemed to him hollow and worthless, distorted and confused, and, oh, so petty! He preferred to stop his ears and stop his mouth and to immerse himself in studies that had nothing to do with the busy everyday world, but were like an ocean apart, where he could wander peacefully in silent forests of seaweed among curious animals.

He was tired, and the root of his weariness sprang from his baffled hope of love; thence it had spread, quickly and surely, through his whole being, to all his faculties and all his thoughts. Now he was cold and passionless enough, but in the beginning, after the blow had fallen, his love had grown, day by day, with the irresistible power of a malignant fever. There had been moments when his soul was almost bursting with insane passion; it swelled like a wave in its infinite longing and frothing desire; it rose and went on rising and rising, till every fiber in his brain and every cord in his heart were strung tense to the breaking point. Then weariness had come, soothing and healing, making his nerves dull against pain, his blood too cold for enthusiasm, and his pulse too weak for action. And more than that, it had protected him against a relapse by giving him all the prudence and egoism of the convalescent. When his thoughts went back to those days in Fjordby, he had a sense of immunity akin to the feeling of a man who has just passed ~ Jens Peter Jacobsen

I shall devote all my efforts to bring light into the immense obscurity that today reigns in Analysis. It so lacks any plan or system, that one is really astonished that there are so many people who devote themselves to it - and, still worse, it is absolutely devoid of any rigor. ~ Niels Henrik Abel

Planck ... and Bohr ... have invented systems containing electrons of which the motion produces no effect upon external charges ... [N]ot only [is this] inconsistent with the accepted laws of electromagnetism, but I may add, is logically objectionable, for that state of motion which produces no physical effect whatsoever may better be called a state of rest. ~ G.N.Lewis

Today the telephone takes precedence over everything. It reaches a point of terrorism, particularly at dinnertime. ~ Niels Diffrient

There are very few theorems in advanced analysis which have been demonstrated in a logically tenable manner. Everywhere one finds this miserable way of concluding from the special to the general and it is extremely peculiar that such a procedure has led to so few of the so-called paradoxes. ~ Niels Henrik Abel

Truth is:
I was always that kind of girl.
Truth is:
they don't make dresses any whiter than
mine.
Truth is:
I am not Demeter's daughter.
I am Heisenberg's ripe tomato
I am Niels Bohr's piece on the side.
In the winter I am a particle.
In the summer I am a wave.
And I didn't get to be queen of hell
by letting folks off easy. ~ Catherynne M Valente

I think filmmaking is a strange animal because it's anti-Democratic and collective at the same time, but I think it's all about not trying to know everything better than everybody else but making the right choices. ~ Niels Arden Oplev

A. Douglas Stone, a physicist who has spent his life using quantum mechanics to explore striking new phenomena, has turned his considerable writing skills to thinking about Einstein and the quantum. What he finds and makes broadly understandable are the riches of Einstein's thinking not about relativity, not about his arguments with Bohr, but about Einstein's deep insights into the quantum world, insights that Stone shows speak to us now with all the vividness and depth they had a century ago. This is a fascinating book, lively, engaging, and strong in physical intuition. ~ Peter Galison

In his wretched life of less than twenty-seven years Abel accomplished so much of the highest order that one of the leading mathematicians of the Nineteenth Century (Hermite, 1822-1901) could say without exaggeration, 'Abel has left mathematicians enough to keep them busy for five hundred years.' Asked how he had done all this in the six or seven years of his working life, Abel replied, 'By studying the masters, not the pupils. ~ Eric Temple Bell

when does an electron know when to jump, and how does it decide where to jump? Reasonably enough, Rutherford wanted to know what underlying process controlled the quantum jumping: "Bohr's answer was remarkable. Bohr suggested that the whole process was fundamentally random, and could only be considered by statistical methods: every change in the state of an atom should be regarded as an individual process, incapable of more detailed description. We are here so far removed from a causal description that an atom may in general even be said to possess a free choice between various possible transitions. ~ Andrew Thomas

The divergent series are the invention of the devil, and it is a shame to base on them any demonstration whatsoever. By using them, one may draw any conclusion he pleases and that is why these series have produced so many fallacies and so many paradoxes. ~ Niels Henrik Abel

An immune system of enormous complexity is present in all vertebrate animals. When we place a population of lymphocytes from such an animal in appropriate tissue culture fluid, and when we add an antigen, the lymphocytes will produce specific antibody molecules, in the absense of any nerve cells. I find it astonishing that the immune system embodies a degree of complexity which suggests some more or less superficial though striking analogies with human language, and that this cognitive system has evolved and functions without assistance of the brain. ~ Niels Kaj Jerne

When you cast, you can't cast only visually; you have to cast emotionally, too. ~ Niels Arden Oplev

'Deity' will be a compelling and exciting thriller with complex and interesting characters. A neo-realistic style to story and images will take the audience deep into Calcutta's many different levels. A fascinating clash between American and Indian culture. ~ Niels Arden Oplev

Nobody's born evil. I guess that's why we're drawn to violence. We're fascinated by it, but there's a moral in how you examine it. ~ Niels Arden Oplev

It seems a miracle that young children easily learn the language of any environment into which they were born. The generative approach to grammar, pioneered by Chomsky, argues that this is only explicable if certain deep, universal features of this competence are innate characteristics of the human brain. Biologically speaking, this hypothesis of an inheritable capability to learn any language means that it must somehow be encoded in the DNA of our chromosomes. Should this hypothesis one day be verified, then lingusitics would become a branch of biology. ~ Niels Kaj Jerne

I think 'The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo' is a good example of a film where you have to juggle a whole lot of information to follow that story, and even if you haven't read the book, it seems to go pretty well. And that is a film where the characters didn't meet until 74 minutes into the film, not on page 17. ~ Niels Arden Oplev

Everett's approach, which he described as "objectively deterministic" with probability "reappearing at the subjective level," resonated with this strategy. And he was thrilled by the direction. As he noted in the 1956 draft of his dissertation, the framework offered to bridge the position of Einstein (who famously believed that a fundamental theory of physics should not involve probability) and the position of Bohr (who was perfectly happy with a fundamental theory that did). According to Everett, the Many Worlds approach accommodated both positions, the difference between them merely being one of perspective. Einstein's perspective is the mathematical one in which the grand probability wave of all particles relentlessly evolves by the Schrodinger equation, with chance playing absolutely no role. I like to picture Einstein soaring high above the many worlds of Many Worlds, watching as Schrodinger's equation fully dictates how the entire panorama unfolds, and happily concluding that even though quantum mechanics is correct, God doesn't play dice. Bohr's perspective is that of an inhabitant in one of the worlds, also happy, using probabilities to explain, with stupendous precision, those observations to which his limited perspective gives him access. ~ Brian Greene

The opposite of a plain truth, Neils Bohr liked to repeat, is a plain falsehood. But the opposite of a deep truth is another deep truth. ~ Rebecca Goldstein

He is like the fox, who effaces his tracks in the sand with his tail.

{Describing the writing style of famous mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss} ~ Niels Henrik Abel