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 BOHRAnd anyone who thinks they can talk about quantum theory without feeling dizzy hasn’t yet understood the first thing about it.
More Niels Bohr Quotes
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When it comes to atoms, language can be used only as in poetry.
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Prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future.
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It is wrong to think that the task of physics is to find out how nature is. Physics concerns what we say about nature.
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Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real.
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Truth and clarity are complementary.
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If quantum mechanics hasn’t profoundly shocked you, you haven’t understood it yet.
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Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.
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No, no, you’re not thinking; you’re just being logical.
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If you think you understand it, that only shows that you don’t know the first thing about it.
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We are trapped by language to such a degree that every attempt to formulate insight is a play on words.
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Isolated material particles are abstractions, their properties being definable and observable only through their interaction with other systems .
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It is the hallmark of any deep truth that its negation is also a deep truth.
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Address to Albert Einstein: You are not thinking. You are merely being logical.
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Anyone who can contemplate quantum mechanics without getting dizzy hasn’t understood it.
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A deep truth is a truth so deep that not only is it true but it’s exact opposite is also true.
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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.
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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
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You must come to Copenhagen to work with us. We like people who can actually perform thought experiments!
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Opposites are not contradictory but complementary.
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We all know your idea is crazy. The question is whether it is crazy enough.
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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.
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In our description of nature the purpose is not to disclose the real essence of the phenomena but only to track down, so far as it is possible, relations between the manifold aspects of our experience.
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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.
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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.
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The meaning of life consists in the fact that it makes no sense to say that life has no meaning.
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A physicist is just an atom’s way of looking at itself.
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