“Wheeler wasn’t the first to point out that quantum mechanics slips into paradox the minute you introduce a second observer. The Nobel Prize–winning physicist Eugene Wigner, for one, had emphasized it with a Schrödinger’s-cat-style thought experiment that became known as… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share
“Despite his mellow, Zen-like demeanor, the appearance of that bookcase betrayed an urgency. A hunger. This thing meant something to him. Of course I had always known that, but there was something about seeing it rendered in rich mahogany that gave it weight—not only the weight of the wood or the tomes on its shelves, but the weight of his… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share
“Einstein had been only four or five years old when his father gave him that compass. It was one of those small tokens that… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
“Wheeler wasn’t the first to point out that quantum mechanics slips into paradox the minute you introduce a second observer. The Nobel Prize–winning physicist Eugene Wigner, for one, had emphasized it with a Schrödinger’s-cat-style thought experiment that became known as “Wigner’s friend.” It went something like this: Inside a lab, Wigner’s friend sets up an experiment in which an atom… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share
“Science journalism’s express goal was to hang over the writer’s mind a veil so opaque that the reader would mistake the writer’s thoughts about… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
“Watching the way an invisible force always guided the compass needle north had convinced Einstein that “something deeply hidden had to be behind things.”… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
“On an average trip he brought two physics books, a few philosophy books, several volumes of poetry, and one thesaurus” — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
“This was London, after all. I had read somewhere that wherever you stand in the entire city, you’re never more than twenty yards from… — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
“Scientific progress isn’t a parade of miraculously wrong theories—it’s an optimistic snowball, gathering the structure of reality as it rolls.” — Amanda Gefter Copy Share Image
