Albert Szent-Györgyi Quotes

22 Sourced Quotes

Discovery consists of seeing what everybody has seen and thinking what nobody has thought.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Through the ages, man's main concern was life after death. Today, for the first time, we find we must ask questions about whether there will be life before death.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Every biologist has at some time asked "What is life?" and none has ever given a satisfactory answer. Science is built on the premise that Nature answers intelligent questions intelligently; so if no answer exists, there must be something wrong with the question.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
A living cell requires energy not only for all its functions, but also for the maintenance of its structure. Without energy life would be extinguished instantaneously, and the cellular fabric would collapse.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Somehow, problems get into my blood and they don't give me peace, they torture me. I have to get them out of my system, and there is but one way to get them out — by solving them. A problem solved is no problem at all, it just disappears.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Knowledge is a sacred cow, and my problem will be how we can milk her while keeping clear of her horns.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
In the great struggle between ignorance, distrust and brutality on one side, knowledge, understanding and peace on the other the scientist must stand fearlessly on the side of the latter, strengthening link between man and man and preaching that the only effective weapon of self-defense is good-will to others.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
What drives life is thus a little electric current, kept up by the sunshine. All the complexities of intermediary metabolism are but the lacework around this basic fact.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Discovery consists of looking at the same thing as everyone else and thinking something different.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
If any student comes to me and says he wants to be useful to mankind and go into research to alleviate human suffering, I advise him to go into charity instead. Research wants real egotists who seek their own pleasure and satisfaction, but find it in solving the puzzles of nature.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
[When I joined the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton] I did this in the hope that by rubbing elbows with those great atomic physicists and mathematicians I would learn something about living matters. But as soon as I revealed that in any living system there are more than two electrons, the physicists would not speak to me. With all their computers they could not say what the third electron might do. The remarkable thing is that it knows exactly what to do. So that little electron knows something that all the wise men of Princeton don't, and this can only he something very simple.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Research means going out into the unknown with the hope of finding something new to bring home.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
The real scientist... is ready to bear privation and, if need be, starvation rather than let anyone dictate to him which direction his work must take.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
I am not religious, but I am a pious man... A religious man has a definite religion. He says "God is there" or "God is there," "God is there." "Your god is not my god, and that's all." But the pious man, he just looks out with awe, and says, "where is God?" And "well, I don't understand it and I would like to know what this creation really means." That is a pious man, who is really touched by the greatness of nature and of the creation.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
When I received the Nobel Prize, the only big lump sum of money I have ever seen, I had to do something with it. The easiest way to drop this hot potato was to invest it, to buy shares. I knew that World War II was coming and I was afraid that if I had shares which rise in case of war, I would wish for war. So I asked my agent to buy shares which go down in the event of war. This he did. I lost my money and saved my soul.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Research is to see what everybody has seen and think what nobody has thought.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Why does man behave like perfect idiot? This is the problem I wish to deal with.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
With rare exceptions people are really interested in one thing only: themselves. Everybody, by necessity, is the centre of his own universe.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Water is life's mater and matrix, mother and medium. There is no life without water.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
Life is water, dancing to the tune of macro molecules.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
I called it ignose, not knowing which carbohydrate it was. This name was turned down by my editor. 'God-nose' was not more successful, so in the end 'hexuronic acid' was agreed upon. To-day the substance is called 'ascorbic acid' and I will use this name.

Albert Szent-Györgyi
It is impossible to encircle the hips of a girl with my right arm and hold her smile in my left hand, then proceed to study the two items separately. Similarly, we can not separate life from living matter, in order to study only living matter and its reactions. Inevitably, studying living matter and its reactions, we study life itself.

Albert Szent-Györgyi