Enrico Fermi famous quotes

03-23-2025

Experimental confirmation of a prediction is merely a measurement. An experiment disproving a prediction is a discovery.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Discovery #Measurement #Confirmation
There are two possible outcomes: if the result confirms the hypothesis, then you've made a measurement. If the result is contrary to the hypothesis, then you've made a discovery.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Science #Discovery #Two
Ignorance is never better than knowledge
-- Enrico Fermi

#Ignorance
Some people stick with the traditional, feeling struck by the epic beauty or blown away by the insane scale of the universe. Personally, I go for the old "existential meltdown followed by acting weird for the next half hour. But everyone feels something.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Epic #People #Feelings
Whatever Nature has in store for mankind, unpleasant as it may be, men must accept, for ignorance is never better than knowledge.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Ignorance #Knowledge #Men
I remember my friend Johnny von Neumann used to say, 'with four parameters I can fit an elephant and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk.'
-- Enrico Fermi

#Elephants #Four #Remember
Never underestimate the joy people derive from hearing something they already know.
-- Enrico Fermi

#People #Joy #Hearing
Where is everybody? Humans could theoretically colonize the galaxy in a million years or so, and if they could, astronauts from older civilizations could do the same. So why haven't they come to Earth?
-- Enrico Fermi

#Spring #Years #Civilization
An experiment disproving a prediction is discovery.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Discovery #Predictions #Experiments
Young man, if I could remember the names of these particles, I would have been a botanist.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Science #Men #Names
Before I came here I was confused about this subject. Having listened to your lecture I am still confused. But on a higher level.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Confused #Levels #Statistics
When asked what characteristics Nobel prize winning physicists had in common Ø› I cannot think of a single one, not even intelligence
-- Enrico Fermi

#Winning #Thinking #Common
When asked what he meant by a miracle: Oh, anything with a probability of less than 20%.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Miracle #Probability
I hope it won't take long.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Long #Last Words
One might be led to question whether the scientists acted wisely in presenting the statesmen of the world with this appalling problem. Actually there was no choice. Once basic knowledge is acquired, any attempt at preventing its fruition would be as futile as hoping to stop the earth from revolving around the sun.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Choices #Fruition #World
The fact that no limits exist to the destructiveness of this weapon [the 'Super', i.e. the hydrogen bomb] makes its very existence and the knowledge of its construction a danger to humanity as a whole. It is necessarily an evil thing considered in any light. For these reasons, we believe it important for the President of the United States to tell the American public and the world what we think is wrong on fundamental ethical principles to initiate the development of such a weapon.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Believe #Thinking #Light
It is not good to try to stop knowledge from going forward. Ignorance is never better than knowledge.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Positive #Ignorance #Science
The fundamental point in fabricating a chain reacting machine is of course to see to it that each fission produces a certain number of neutrons and some of these neutrons will again produce fission.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Numbers #Ties #Machines
Although the problem of transmuting chemical elements into each other is much older than a satisfactory definition of the very concept of chemical element, it is well known that the first and most important step towards its solution was made only nineteen years ago by the late Lord Rutherford, who started the method of the nuclear bombardments.
-- Enrico Fermi

#Years #Important #Steps

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