Arthur Eddington
Arthur Eddington
Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington OM FRSwas an English astronomer, physicist, and mathematician of the early 20th century who did his greatest work in astrophysics. He was also a philosopher of science and a popularizer of science. The Eddington limit, the natural limit to the luminosity of stars, or the radiation generated by accretion onto a compact object, is named in his honor...
NationalityBritish
ProfessionScientist
Date of Birth28 December 1882
perfect impossible physics
It is impossible to trap modern physics into predicting anything with perfect determinism because it deals with probabilities from the outset.
cat would-be physics
To the pure geometer the radius of curvature is an incidental characteristic - like the grin of the Cheshire cat. To the physicist it is an indispensable characteristic. It would be going too far to say that to the physicist the cat is merely incidental to the grin. Physics is concerned with interrelatedness such as the interrelatedness of cats and grins. In this case the "cat without a grin" and the "grin without a cat" are equally set aside as purely mathematical phantasies.
science verbs physics
In the most modern theories of physics probability seems to have replaced aether as "the nominative of the verb 'to undulate'."
science thinking path
[When thinking about the new relativity and quantum theories] I have felt a homesickness for the paths of physical science where there are ore or less discernible handrails to keep us from the worst morasses of foolishness.
science bottles atoms
The electron, as it leaves the atom, crystallises out of Schrödinger's mist like a genie emerging from his bottle.
falling-in-love love-is men
Falling in love is one of the activities forbidden that tiresome person, the consistently reasonable man.
reality
The word reality frightens me.
science atoms levels
But it is necessary to insist more strongly than usual that what I am putting before you is a model-the Bohr model atom-because later I shall take you to a profounder level of representation in which the electron instead of being confined to a particular locality is distributed in a sort of probability haze all over the atom.
science causes force
Electrical force is defined as something which causes motion of electrical charge; an electrical charge is something which exerts electric force.
grace events happens
Events do not happen; they are just there, and we come across them.
thinking two study
We often think that when we have completed our study of one we know all about two, because 'two' is 'one and one.' We forget that we still have to make a study of 'and.'
past law differences
There is only one law of Nature-the second law of thermodynamics-which recognises a distinction between past and future more profound than the difference of plus and minus. It stands aloof from all the rest. ... It opens up a new province of knowledge, namely, the study of organisation; and it is in connection with organisation that a direction of time-flow and a distinction between doing and undoing appears for the first time.
smart writing people
On one occasion when [William] Smart found him engrossed with his fundamental theory, he asked Eddington how many people he thought would understand what he was writing-after a pause came the reply, 'Perhaps seven.'
matter may genocide
Probably the simplest hypothesis... is that there may be a slow process of annihilation of matter.