Formula Quotes - page 10
I also knew the formula that expresses the energy distribution in the normal spectrum. A theoretical interpretation therefore had to be found at any cost, no matter how high. It was clear to me that classical physics could offer no solution to this problem, and would have meant that all energy would eventually transfer from matter to radiation. ...This approach was opened to me by maintaining the two laws of thermodynamics. The two laws, it seems to me, must be upheld under all circumstances. For the rest, I was ready to sacrifice every one of my previous convictions about physical laws. ...[One] finds that the continuous loss of energy into radiation can be prevented by assuming that energy is forced at the outset to remain together in certain quanta. This was purely a formal assumption and I really did not give it much thought except that no matter what the cost, I must bring about a positive result.
Max Planck
Fundamental ideas play the most essential role in forming a physical theory. Books on physics are full of complicated mathematical formulae. But thought and ideas, not formulae, are the beginning of every physical theory. The ideas must later take the mathematical form of a quantitative theory, to make possible the comparison with experiment.
Albert Einstein
But we have higher mathematics, haven't we? This gives me freedom from my senses. The language of mathematics is even more inborn and universal than the language of music; a mathematical formula is crystal clear and independent of all sense organs. I therefore built a mathematical laboratory, set myself in it as if I were sitting in a car, and moved along with a beam of light.
Albert Einstein
If I hadn't an absolute faith in the harmony of creation, I wouldn't have tried for thirty years to express it in a mathematical formula. It is only man's consciousness of what he does with his mind that elevates him above the animals, and enables him to become aware of himself and his relationship to the universe.
Albert Einstein
One can find meaning in poetry as well as in science in the contemplations of a flower as well as in the grasp of an equation. We can be filled with wonder as we stand under the majestic dome of the night sky and see the myriad lights that twinkle and shine in its seemingly infinite depths. We can also be filled wit awe as we behold the meaning of the formulae that define the propagation of light in space, the formation of galaxies, the synthesis of chemical elements, and the relation of energy, mass and velocity in the physical universe. The mystical perception of oneness and the religious intuition of a Divine intelligence are as much a construction of meaning as the postulation of the universal law of gravitation.
Ervin László
Certain knowledge of what to fight for, and what to fight against, gives meaning to life and provides its own version of discipline: never give up. That kind of meaning is illusory, I now believe, and blinkered. Fealty to a mystical absolute is a formula for disaster, especially in transformative times.
Stewart Brand
