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Max Born

28 quotesNon-fiction Writer · Born Dec 11, 1882 · Died Jan 5, 1970 · Germany · Male

Max Born (German: [bɔɐ̯n]; 11 December 1882 – 5 January 1970) was a German physicist and mathematician who was instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics. He also made contributions to solid-state physics and optics and supervised the work of a number of notable physicists in the 1920s and 1930s. Born won the 1954 Nobel Prize in Physics for his "fundamental research in Quantum Mechanics, especially in the statistical interpretation of the wave function". Born in 1882 in Breslau, then in Germany, now in Poland and known as Wrocław, Born entered the University of Göttingen in 1904, where he found the three renowned mathematicians, Felix Klein, David Hilbert and Hermann Minkowski. He wrote his Ph.D. thesis on the subject of "Stability of Elastica in a Plane and Space", winning the University's Philosophy Faculty Prize. In 1905, he began researching special relativity with Minkowski, and subsequently wrote his habilitation thesis on the Thomson model of the atom. A chance meeting with Fritz Haber in Berlin in 1918 led to discussion of the manner in which an ionic compound is formed when a metal reacts with a halogen, which is today known as the Born–Haber cycle. In the First World War, after originally being placed as a radio operator, he was moved to research duties regarding sound ranging due to his specialist knowledge. In 1921, Born returned to Göttingen, arranging another chair for his long-time friend and colleague James Franck. Under Born, Göttingen became one of the world's foremost centres for physic

All Science (10)Philosophy (5)physics (4)God (3)Intellect (2)Truth (2)West (2)trial and error (2)Scientific Method (2)Hiroshima (2)Evil (2)Creation (1)bombs (1)Logic (1)Power (1)

From “Quantum Bliss”

Something which is against natural laws seems to me rather out of the question because it would be a depressive idea about God. It would make God smaller than he must be assumed. When he stated that these laws hold, then they hold, and he wouldn't make exceptions. This is too human an idea. Humans…

Natural Unnatural God

From “Move First, Think Later”

I believe there is no philosophical high-road in science, with epistemological signposts. No, we are in a jungle and find our way by trial and error, building our road behind us as we proceed.

Philosophy Science trial and error

The human race has today the means for annihilating itself—either in a fit of complete lunacy, i.e., in a big war...or by the careless handling of atomic technology, through a slow process of poisoning and of deterioration in its genetic structure.

human race Nuclear Annihilation Lunacy

Those who say that the study of science makes a man an atheist, must be rather silly people.

atheism Science

In combination with other infernal contraptions, like rockets to deliver bombs at large distances, chemical, biological and radioactive poisons, such a war must mean a degree of human suffering and degradation which is beyond the power of imagination. No country would be immune, but those with…

bombs Radiation Sovereignty self-preservation Warfare

It is true that many scientists are not philosophically minded and have hitherto shown much skill and ingenuity but little wisdom.

Science Philosophy Ingenuity Wisdom

America has grown by expansion in a practical vacuum; the pioneers of the West had to overcome terrific natural obstacles, but negligible human resistance. The Russia of today had to conquer not only natural but human difficulties: she had to break up the rotten system of the Czars and to assimilate…

Philosophy Science Conflict Ethics Marx

Truth is what the scientist aims at. He finds nothing at rest, nothing enduring, in the universe. Not everything is knowable, still less predictable. But the mind of man is capable of grasping and understanding at least a part of Creation; amid the flight of phenomena stands the immutable pole of…

Truth Creation physics Phenomena

The belief that there is only one truth and that oneself is in possession of it, seems to me the deepest root of all that is evil in the world.

Truth Evil Moral Certainty

The dance of atoms, electrons and nuclei, which in all its fury is subject to God's eternal laws, has been entangled with another restless Universe which may well be the Devil's: the human struggle for power and domination, which eventually becomes history. My optimistic enthusiasm about the…

God devil Good Evil Alchemy

There are metaphysical problems, which cannot be disposed of by declaring them meaningless. For, as I have repeatedly said, they are ‘beyond physics’ indeed and demand an act of faith. We have to accept this fact to be honest. There are two objectionable types of believers: those who believe the…

physics Metaphysics Belief Scientific Method

Can we call something with which the concepts of position and motion cannot be associated in the usual way, a thing, or a particle? And if not, what is the reality which our theory has been invented to describe? The answer to this is no longer physics, but philosophy.…Here I will only say that I am…

Particle Physics Mathematics

I must give some attention to the delicate question of religion, on which I have touched already. In my father's generation this question still was discussed with passion. Since then a sort of truce has existed in the countries of the West, while in the communist states of the East atheism has been…

West east Science Communism Religion

The continuity of our science has not been affected by all these turbulent happenings, as the older theories have always been included as limiting cases in the new ones.

Science Theory Adversity

I am now convinced that theoretical physics is actually philosophy. It has revolutionized fundamental concepts, e.g., about space and time (relativity), about causality (quantum theory), and about substance and matter (atomistics). It has taught us new methods of thinking (complementarity), which…

physics Philosophy Quantum Physics

Intellect distinguishes between the possible and the impossible; reason distinguishes between the sensible and the senseless. Even the possible can be senseless.

Intellect Reason Possible impossible

I believe there is no philosophical high-road in science, with epistemological signposts. No, we are in a jungle and find our way by trial and error, building our road behind us as we proceed. We do not find signposts at crossroads, but our own scouts erect them, to help the rest.

Science Philosophy trial and error

If God has made the world a perfect mechanism, He has at least conceded so much to our imperfect intellect that in order to predict little parts of it, we need not solve innumerable differential equations, but can use dice with fair success.

Intellect God Predictive Behavior

One would have to have been brought up in the ‘spirit of militarism’ to understand the difference between Hiroshima and Nagasaki on the one hand, and Auschwitz and Belsen on the other. The usual reasoning is the following: the former case is one of warfare, the latter of cold-blooded slaughter. But…

Hiroshima Nagasaki Auschwitz

We have reached the end of our journey into the depths of matter. We have sought for firm ground and found none. The deeper we penetrate, the more restless becomes the universe…: all is rushing about and vibrating in a wild dance.

Matter dance

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