Quotes from Disturbing the Universe

Freeman Dyson ·  304 pages

Rating: (589 votes)


“It is characteristic of all deep human problems that they are not to be
approached without some humor and some bewilderment.”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe


“Sanity is, in essence, nothing more than the ability to live in harmony with nature's laws.”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe


“I do not feel like an alien in this universe. The more I examine the universe and study the details of its architecture, the more evidence I find that the universe is some sense must have known that we were coming”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe


“It is impossible to make real progress in technology without gambling.”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe


“Nonviolence is often the path of wisdom, but not always. Love and passive resistance are wonderfully effective weapons against some kinds of tyranny, but not against all.”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe



“It is important for long-range stability that peaceful countries be well armed and well organized in self-defense.”
― Freeman Dyson, quote from Disturbing the Universe


About the author

Freeman Dyson
Born place: in Crowthorne, Berkshire, The United Kingdom
Born date December 15, 1923
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Popular quotes

“Our society does reward beauty on the outside over health on the inside. Women must not be blamed for choosing short-term beauty "fixes" that harm our long-term health, since our life spans are inverted under the beauty myth, and there is no great social or economic incentive for women to live a long time. A thin young woman with precancerous lungs [who smokes to stay thin] is more highly rewarded socially that a hearty old crone. Spokespeople sell women the Iron Maiden [an intrinsically unattainable standard of beauty used to punish women for their failure to achieve and conform to it]and name her "Health": if public discourse were really concerned with women's health, it would turn angrily upon this aspect of the beauty myth.”
― Naomi Wolf, quote from The Beauty Myth


“He slowed his pace a little. He was thirty and there was grey in his hair, yet he had a queer feeling that he had only just grown up. It occured to him that he was merely repeating the destiny of every human being. Everyone rebels against the money-code, and everyone sooner or later surrenders. He had kept up his rebellion a little longer than most, that was all. And he had made such a wretched failure of it!”
― George Orwell, quote from Keep the Aspidistra Flying


“Good-bye, Cadan,' I said, backing out the door.
'If I hear anything new, I’ll come to you.'
'Be careful,' I warned. 'My guard dog bites.'
He grinned, and that impish gleam returned to his eyes. 'And you don’t?'
'Wouldn’t you like to know.'
'Don’t get me excited.”
― Courtney Allison Moulton, quote from Wings of the Wicked


“If you even think about touching her, I swear to God I will rip your heart out." - Chayse Pierce”
― Jalpa Williby, quote from Chaysing Dreams


“The backwards-moving electron when viewed with time moving forwards appears the same as an ordinary electron, except it's attracted to normal electrons-we say it has a "positive charge." (Had I included the effects of polarization, it would be apparent why the sign of j for the backwards-moving electron appears reversed, making the charge appear positive.) For this reason it's called a "positron." The positron is a sister particle to the electron, and is an example of an "anti-particle."

This phenomenon is general. Every particle in Nature has an amplitude to move backwards in time, and therefore has an anti-particle. When a particle and its anti-particle collide, they annihilate each other and form other particles. (For positrons and electrons annihilating, it is usually a photon or two.) And what about photons? Photons look exactly the same in all respects when they travel backwards in time-as we saw earlier-so they are their own anti-particles. You see how clever we are at making an exception part of the rule!”
― Richard Feynman, quote from QED: The Strange Theory of Light and Matter


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