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Sometimes attaining the deepest familiarity with a question is our best substitute for actually having the answer.
Brian Greene
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The boldness of asking deep questions may require unforeseen flexibility if we are to accept the answers.
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Nature does weird things. It lives on the edge. But it is careful to bob and weave from the fatal punch of logical paradox.
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The tantalizing discomfort of perplexity is what inspires otherwise ordinary men and women to extraordinary feats of ingenuity and creativity; nothing quite focuses the mind like dissonant details awaiting harmonious resolution.
Brian Greene
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To open our eyes to the true nature of the universe has always been one of physics' primary purposes.
Brian Greene
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Far from being accidental details, the properties of nature's basic building blocks are deeply entwined with the fabric of space and time.
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If string theory is right, the microscopic fabric of our universe is a richly intertwined multidimensional labyrinth within which the strings of the universe endlessly twist and vibrate, rhythmically beating out the laws of the cosmos.
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Because observations are all we have, we take them seriously. We choose hard data and the framework of mathematics as our guides, not unrestrained imagination or unrelenting skepticism, and seek the simplest yet most wide-reaching theories capable of explaining and predicting the outcome of today's and future experiments.
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Calculations that merge the equations of general relativity and those of quantum mechanic typically yield one and the same ridiculous answer: infinity. Like a sharp rap on the wrist from an old-time schoolteacher, an infinite answer is nature's way of telling us that we are doing something that is quite wrong.
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When you know the answer you want, it is often all too easy to figure out a way of getting it.
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The arrow of time, through the defining role it plays in everyday life and its intimate link with the origin of the universe, lies at a singular threshold between the reality we experience and the more refined reality cutting-edge science seeks to uncover.
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Space and time capture the imagination like no other scientific subject. For good reason. They form the arena of reality, the very fabric of the cosmos.
Brian Greene
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One measure of the depth of a physical theory is the extent to which it poses serious challenges to aspects of our worldview that had previously seemed immutable
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It took the brashness of a Newton to plant the flag of modern scientific inquiry and never turn back.
Brian Greene
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Physicists spend a large part of their lives in a state of confusion. It's an occupational hazard. To excel in physics is to embrace doubt while walking the road to clarity.
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You must allow Nature to dictate what is, and what is not, sensible.
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Black holes have the universe's most inscrutable poker faces.
Brian Greene
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Physicists are more like avant-garde composers, willing to bend traditional rules and brush the edge of acceptability in the search for solutions. Mathematicians are more like classical composers, typically working within a much tighter framework, reluctant to go to the next step until all previous ones have been established with due rigor. Each approach has its advantages as well as drawbacks; each provides a unique outlet for creative discovery. Like modern and classical music, it's not that one approach is right and the other wrong – the methods one chooses to use are largely a matter of taste and training.
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The real question is whether all your pondering and analyses will convince you that life is worth living. That's what it all comes down to.
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String theory has the potential to show that all of the wondrous happenings in the universe - from the frantic dance of subatomic quarks to the stately waltz of orbiting binary stars; from the primordial fireball of the big bang to the majestic swirl of heavenly galaxies - are reflections of one, grand physical principle, one master equation.
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Quantum mechanics—the physics of our world—requires that you hold such pedestrian complaints in abeyance.
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Assessing existence while failing to embrace the insights of modern physics would be like wrestling in the dark with an unknown opponent.
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Cosmology is among the oldest subjects to captivate our species. And it's no wonder. We're storytellers, and what could be more grand than the story of creation?
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You should never be surprised by or feel the need to explain why any physical system is in a high entropy state.
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Physicists have come to realize that mathematics, when used with sufficient care, is a proven pathway to truth.
Brian Greene
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No written law has ever been more binding than unwritten custom supported by popular opinion.
Carrie Chapman Catt
Brian Greene
Creative Commons
Born:
February 9, 1963
(age 61)
Bio:
Brian Randolph Greene is an American theoretical physicist and string theorist. He has been a professor at Columbia University since 1996 and chairman of the World Science Festival since co-founding it in 2008.
Known for:
The Elegant Universe (1999)
The Fabric of the Cosmos (2004)
The Hidden Reality (2011)
Icarus at the Edge of Time (2008)
Das elegante Universum
Most used words:
quantum
mechanics
universe
reality
entropy
modern
Brian Greene on Wikipedia
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