Quotes from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“The amazing thing is that every atom in your body came from a star that exploded. And, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than your right hand. It really is the most poetic thing I know about physics: You are all stardust. You couldn’t be here if stars hadn’t exploded, because the elements - the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, iron, all the things that matter for evolution - weren’t created at the beginning of time. They were created in the nuclear furnaces of stars, and the only way they could get into your body is if those stars were kind enough to explode. So, forget Jesus. The stars died so that you could be here today.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“In 5 billion years, the expansion of the universe will have progressed to the point where all other galaxies will have receded beyond detection. Indeed, they will be receding faster than the speed of light, so detection will be impossible. Future civilizations will discover science and all its laws, and never know about other galaxies or the cosmic background radiation. They will inevitably come to the wrong conclusion about the universe......We live in a special time, the only time, where we can observationally verify that we live in a special time.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“If we wish to draw philosophical conclusions about our own existence, our significance, and the significance of the universe itself, our conclusions should be based on empirical knowledge. A truly open mind means forcing our imaginations to conform to the evidence of reality, and not vice versa, whether or not we like the implications.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Forget Jesus, the stars died so you could be born.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“The universe is the way it is , whether we like
it or not. The existence or nonexistence of a creator is independent
of our desires . A world without God or purpose may seem harsh
or pointless, but that alone doesn ' t require God to actually exist.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“I like to say that while antimatter may seem strange, it is strange in the sense that Belgians are strange. They are not really strange; it is just that one rarely meets them.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“[I]n science we have to be particularly cautious about 'why' questions. When we ask, 'Why?' we usually mean 'How?' If we can answer the latter, that generally suffices for our purposes. For example, we might ask: 'Why is the Earth 93 million miles from the Sun?' but what we really probably mean is, 'How is the Earth 93 million miles from the Sun?' That is, we are interested in what physical processes led to the Earth ending up in its present position. 'Why' implicitly suggests purpose, and when we try to understand the solar system in scientific terms, we do not generally ascribe purpose to it.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Of course, supernatural acts are what miracles are all about. They are, after all, precisely those things that circumvent the laws of nature. A god who can create the laws of nature can presumably also circumvent them at will. Although why they would have been circumvented so liberally thousands of years ago, before the invention of modern communication instruments that could have recorded them, and not today, is still something to wonder about.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Now, almost one hundred years later, it is difficult to fully appreciate how much our picture of the universe has changed in the span of a single human lifetime.

As far as the scientific community in 1917 was concerned, the universe was static and eternal, and consisted of a one single galaxy, our Milky Way, surrounded by vast, infinite, dark, and empty space.

This is, after all, what you would guess by looking up at the night sky with your eyes, or with a small telescope, and at the time there was little reason to suspect otherwise.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“One of the most poetic facts I know about the universe is that essentially every atom in your body was once inside a star that exploded. Moreover, the atoms in your left hand probably came from a different star than did those in your right. We are all, literally, star children, and our bodies made of stardust.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Metaphysical speculation is independent of the physical validity of the Big Bang itself and is irrelevant to our understanding of it.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“I should point out, nevertheless, that even though incomplete data can lead to a false picture, this is far different from the (false) picture obtained by those who choose to ignore empirical data to invent a picture of reality (young earthers, for example), or those who instead require the existence of something for which there is no observable evidence whatsoever (like divine intelligence) to reconcile their view of creation with their a priori prejudices, or worse still, those who cling to fairly tales about nature that presume the answers before questions can even be asked.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“I don’t mind not knowing. It doesn’t scare me. —RICHARD FEYNMAN”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“The universe is the way it is, whether we like it or not. The existence or nonexistence of a creator is independent of our desires. A world without God or purpose may seem harsh or pointless, but that alone doesn’t require God to actually exist.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Dream or nightmare, we have to live our experience as it is, and we have to live it awake.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Edwin Hubble, who continues to give me great faith in humanity, because he started out as a lawyer and then became an astronomer.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“A truly open mind means forcing our imaginations to conform to the evidence of reality, and not vice versa, whether or not we like the implications.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“We live at a very special time . . . the only time when we can observationally verify that we live at a very special time!”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“nature is more imaginative than we are.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“There are known knowns. These are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say, there are things that we know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we don’t know we don’t know. —DONALD RUMSFELD”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“I don’t make any claims to answer any questions that science cannot answer, and I have tried very carefully within the text to define what I mean by “nothing” and “something.” If those definitions differ from those you would like to adopt, so be it. Write your own book. But don’t discount the remarkable human adventure that is modern science because it doesn’t console you.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“In this sense, science, as physicist Steven Weinberg has emphasized, does not make it impossible to believe in God, but rather makes it possible to not believe in God. Without science, everything is a miracle. With science, there remains the possibility that nothing is. Religious belief in this case becomes less and less necessary, and also less and less relevant.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“the universe is big and old and, as a result, rare events happen all the time. Go out some night into the woods or desert where you can see stars and hold up your hand to the sky, making a tiny circle between your thumb and forefinger about the size of a dime. Hold it up to a dark patch of the sky where there are no visible stars. In that dark patch, with a large enough telescope of the type we now have in service today, you could discern perhaps 100,000 galaxies, each containing billions of stars. Since supernovae explode once per hundred years per, with 100,000 galaxies in view, you should expect to see, on average, about three stars explode on a given night.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“For, after all, in science one achieves the greatest impact (and often the greatest headlines) not by going along with the herd, but by bucking against it.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Once you assume a creator and a plan, it makes humans objects in a cruel experiment whereby we are created to be sick and commanded to be well. —CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Whenever one asks “Why?” in science, one actually means “How?”. “Why?” is not really a sensible question in science because it usually implies purpose and, as anyone who has been the parent of a small child knows, one can keep on asking “Why?” forever, no matter what the answer to the previous question. Ultimately, the only way to end the conversation seems to be to say “Because!”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Our modern conception of the universe is so foreign to what even scientists generally believed a mere century ago that it is a tribute to the power of the scientific method and the creativity and persistence of humans who want to understand it.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“In this sense, science, as physicist Steven Weinberg has emphasized, does not make it impossible to believe in God, but rather makes it possible to not believe in God.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

“Andromeda was discovered to be another island universe, another spiral galaxy almost identical to our own, and one of the more than 100 billion other galaxies that, we now know, exist in our observable universe.”
― Lawrence M. Krauss, quote from A Universe from Nothing: Why There Is Something Rather Than Nothing

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“Melinda Pratt rides city bus number twelve to her cello lesson, wearing her mother's jean jacket and only one sock. Hallo, world, says Minna. Minna often addresses the world, sometimes silently, sometimes out loud. Bus number twelve is her favorite place for watching, inside and out. The bus passes cars and bicycles and people walking dogs. It passes store windows, and every so often Minna sees her face reflection, two dark eyes in a face as pale as a winter dawn. There are fourteen people on the bus today. Minna stands up to count them. She likes to count people, telephone poles, hats, umbrellas, and, lately, earrings. One girl, sitting directly in front of Minna, has seven earrings, five in one ear. She has wisps of dyed green hair that lie like forsythia buds against her neck.

There are, Minna knows, a king, a past president of the United States, and a beauty queen on the bus. Minna can tell by looking. The king yawns and scratches his ear with his little finger. Scratches, not picks. The beauty queen sleeps, her mouth open, her hair the color of tomatoes not yet ripe. The past preside of the United States reads Teen Love and Body Builder's Annual.

Next to Minna, leaning against the seat, is her cello in its zippered canvas case. Next to her cello is her younger brother, McGrew, who is humming. McGrew always hums. Sometimes he hums sentences, though most often it comes out like singing. McGrew's teachers do not enjoy McGrew answering questions in hums or song. Neither does the school principal, Mr. Ripley. McGrew spends lots of time sitting on the bench outside Mr. Ripley's office, humming.

Today McGrew is humming the newspaper. First the headlines, then the sports section, then the comics. McGrew only laughs at the headlines.

Minna smiles at her brother. He is small and stocky and compact like a suitcase. Minna loves him. McGrew always tells the truth, even when he shouldn't. He is kind. And he lends Minna money from the coffee jar he keeps beneath his mattress.

Minna looks out the bus window and thinks about her life. Her one life. She likes artichokes and blue fingernail polish and Mozart played too fast. She loves baseball, and the month of March because no one else much likes March, and every shade of brown she has ever seen. But this is only one life. Someday, she knows, she will have another life. A better one. McGrew knows this, too. McGrew is ten years old. He knows nearly everything. He knows, for instance, that his older sister, Minna Pratt, age eleven, is sitting patiently next to her cello waiting to be a woman.”
― Patricia MacLachlan, quote from The Facts and Fictions of Minna Pratt

“Honest, hopelessly romantic old-fashioned gentleman seeks lady friend who enjoys elegant dining, dancing and the slow bloom of affection.”
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“The evenings grew longer; kitchen windows stayed open after dinner and peepers could be heard in the marsh. Isabelle, stepping out to sweep her porch steps, felt absolutely certain that some wonderful change was arriving in her life. The strength of this belief was puzzling; what she was feeling, she decided, was really the presence of God.”
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“Love's empire is this globe and all mankind; the most refined and the most degraded, the cleverest and the most stupid, are all liable to become his faithful subjects. He can alike command the devotion of an archbishop and a South-Sea Islander, of the most immaculate maiden lady (whatever her age) and of the savage Zulu girl. From the pole to the equator, and from the equator to the further pole, there is no monarch like Love.”
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BookQuoters is a community of passionate readers who enjoy sharing the most meaningful, memorable and interesting quotes from great books. As the world communicates more and more via texts, memes and sound bytes, short but profound quotes from books have become more relevant and important. For some of us a quote becomes a mantra, a goal or a philosophy by which we live. For all of us, quotes are a great way to remember a book and to carry with us the author’s best ideas.

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