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Portrait of Freeman Dyson

Freeman Dyson

(1923–2020) Theoretical Physicist

241 quotes in 1278 categories

Freeman Dyson’s 241 statements fuse scientific rigor with imaginative speculation. His words often bridge the gap between complex ideas and everyday curiosity, perfect for a quick intellectual spark.

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Freeman Dyson was a theoretical physicist, best known for What Are You Optimistic About?.

Quick Facts About Freeman Dyson

Born: December 15, 1923
Died: February 28, 2020
Profession: Theoretical Physicist
Notable works: What Are You Optimistic About?

About Freeman Dyson

Freeman John Dyson was a British-American theoretical physicist and mathematician who worked in quantum field theory, astrophysics, random matrices, mathematical formulation of quantum mechanics, condensed matter physics, nuclear physics, and engineering. He was professor emeritus in the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton and a member of the board of sponsors of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Biography source: Wikipedia

Quotes by Freeman Dyson

Almost everything about the universe is astounding.

Astounding

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Mathematics is really an art, not a science.

Art

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A model is done when nothing else can be taken out.

Complexity

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Committees do harm merely by existing.

Committee

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Our thinking is permeated by our historical myths

Historical

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It is better to be wrong than to be vague.

Better

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You could say science also is an art.

Art

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Most of what we see in the universe is dust.

Dust

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A model is such a fascinating toy that you fall in love with your creation.

Creation

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For me, science is just a bunch of tools - it's like playing the violin.

Bunch

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There is a great satisfaction in building good tools for other people to use.

Building

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The media always tries to make everything into a disaster, but it's mostly rubbish.

Disaster

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I'm happy that I've raised six kids, and not one of them is a Ph.D.

Happy

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Boiled down to one sentence, my message is the unboundedness of life and the unboundedness of human destiny.

Destiny

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Younger people have so many opportunities. I don't see any pessimism among them.

Many

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If you start out with a tragic view of life, then anything since is just a bonus.

Anything

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That's the beautiful thing about science - that it's all about things we don't understand, not just the things we do understand.

Beautiful

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All the time worrying about pushing the children and getting them to be mathematically literate and all that stuff. It's terribly hard…

Children

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It's not going to be just humans colonizing space, it's going to be life moving out from the Earth, moving it into…

Earth

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When I listen to the public debates about climate change, I am impressed by the enormous gaps in our knowledge, the sparseness…

Change

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Mostly I'm just writing books for the public, and so I try to describe for the public what the choices are, what…

Ahead of time

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You ask: what is the meaning or purpose of life? I can only answer with another question: do you think we are…

Enough

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People who travel in China tell me that the mood there is still very upbeat, because their media is different from our…

Bad news

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In the history of science it has often happened that the majority was wrong and refused to listen to a minority that…

Global warming

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I had the good luck a few years ago to visit the archeological site of Zippori in Israel ... I could see…

Christian

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You have this world of mathematics, which is very real and which contains all kinds of wonderful stuff. And then we also…

All kinds

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The biggest breakthrough in the next 50 years will be the discovery of extraterrestrial life. We have been searching for it for…

Breakthrough

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Many of the technologies that are now racing ahead most rapidly, replacing human workers in factories and offices with machines, making stockholders…

Accentuate

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The fundamental reason why carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is critically important to biology is that there is so little of it.…

Air

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Successful technologies often begin as hobbies. Jacques Cousteau invented scuba diving because he enjoyed exploring caves. The Wright brothers invented flying as…

Bicycle

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Science is a human activity, and the best way to understand it is to understand the individual human beings who practise it.…

Accounts

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I think that the artificial-intelligence people are making a lot of noise recently, claiming that artificial intelligence is making huge progress and…

Artificial intelligence

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In the long run, the only solution I see to the problem of diversity is the expansion of mankind into the universe…

Ancient

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The most revolutionary aspect of technology is its mobility. Anybody can learn it. It jumps easily over barriers of race and language.…

Asia

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There are three reasons, . . . apart from scientific considerations, mankind needs to travel in space. The first . . .…

Abundance

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Atoms are weird stuff, behaving like active agents rather than inert substances. They make unpredictable choices between alternative possibilities according to the…

Active

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“It is remarkable that mind enters into our awareness of nature on two separate levels. At the highest level, the level of…

Consciousness

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Have felt it myself. The glitter of nuclear weapons. It is irresistible if you come to them as a scientist. To feel…

Arrogance

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From my childhood it has been my conviction that men would reach the planets in my lifetime . . . this conviction…

Belief

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Mathematics is really an art, not a science. You could say science also is an art. So I would say the difference…

Art

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Freeman Dyson by topic

Science (68) People (36) Thinking (28) World (26) Technology (24) Life (23) Ifs (22) Universe (21) Mathematics (21) Climate (21) Humans (20) Way (18) Time (15) Nature (15) Global warming (15) Looks (14) Physics (12) Giving (12) Years (11) Trying (11) Tools (11) Scientist (11) Religion (11) Mean (11) Knows (11)