Richard Phillips Feynman (1918–88) was an American theoretical physicist known for his work in the path integral formulation of quantum mechanics, the theory of quantum electrodynamics, and the physics of the superfluidity of supercooled liquid helium, as well as in particle physics. For his contributions to the development of quantum electrodynamics, Feynman, jointly with Julian Schwinger and Sin-Itiro Tomonaga, received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1965. He developed a widely used pictorial representation scheme for the mathematical expressions governing the behavior of subatomic particles, which later became known as Feynman diagrams. During his lifetime, Feynman became one of the best-known scientists in the world. In a 1999 poll of 130 leading physicists worldwide by the British journal Physics World he was ranked as one of the ten greatest physicists of all time.
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I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of certainty about different things, but I’m not absolutely sure of anything, and many things I don’t know anything about, such as whether it means anything to ask why we’re here, and what the question might mean. I might think about it a little bit, but if I can’t figure it out, then I go on to something else. But I don’t have to know an answer…. I don’t feel frightened by not knowing things, by being lost in the mysterious universe without having any purpose, which is the way it really is, as far as I can tell, possibly. It doesn’t frighten me.
—Richard Feynman
Topics: Life
You can know the name of a bird in all the languages of the world, but when you’re finished, you’ll know absolutely nothing whatever about the bird… So let’s look at the bird and see what it’s doing — that’s what counts. I learned very early the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.
—Richard Feynman
Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in fiction, to imagine things which are not really there, but just to comprehend those things which are there.
—Richard Feynman
Is no one inspired by our present picture of the universe? Our poets do not write about it; our artists do not try to portray this remarkable thing. The value of science remains unsung by singers: you are reduced to hearing not a song or poem, but an evening lecture about it. This is not yet a scientific age.
—Richard Feynman
Topics: Science
Poets say science takes away from the beauty of the stars mere globs of gas atoms. I, too, can see the stars on a desert night, and feel them. But do I see less or more?
—Richard Feynman
What I cannot create, I do not understand.
—Richard Feynman
In this age of specialization men who thoroughly know one field are often incompetent to discuss another.
—Richard Feynman
I believe that a scientist looking at nonscientific problems is just as dumb as the next guy — and when he talks about a nonscientific matter, he will sound as naive as anyone untrained in the matter.
—Richard Feynman
Philosophy of science is about as useful to scientists as ornithology is to birds.
—Richard Feynman
There is no harm in doubt and skepticism, for it is through these that new discoveries are made.
—Richard Feynman
The worthwhile problems are the ones you can really solve or help solve, the ones you can really contribute something to. No problem is too small or too trivial if we can really do something about it.
—Richard Feynman
Listen, buddy, if I could tell you in a minute what I did, it wouldn’t be worth the Nobel Prize.
—Richard Feynman
A great deal more is known than has been proved.
—Richard Feynman
When playing Russian roulette the fact that the first shot got off safely is little comfort for the next.
—Richard Feynman
I was born not knowing and have only had a little time to change that here and there.
—Richard Feynman
God was invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand.
—Richard Feynman
I don’t know anything, but I do know that everything is interesting if you go into it deeply enough.
—Richard Feynman
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