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Unless the structure of the nucleus has a surprise in store for us, the conclusion seems plain — there is nothing in the whole system of laws of physics that cannot be deduced unambiguously from epistemological considerations.

Arthur Eddington

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Arthur Eddington
Age: 61 †
Born: 1882
Born: December 28
Died: 1944
Died: November 22
Astronomer
Astrophysicist
Philosopher
Physicist
Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington
Sir Arthur Eddington
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Unambiguously
Able
Unless
Consideration
Epistemological
Humans
System
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Deduced
Nothing
Law
Stores
Nucleus
Whole
Knowledge
Physics
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Mind
Universe
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Science
Surprise
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Cannot
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More quotes by Arthur Eddington

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The electron, as it leaves the atom, crystallises out of Schrodinger's mist like a genie emerging from his bottle.
Arthur Eddington
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There was a time when we wanted to be told what an electron is. The question was never answered. No familiar conceptions can be woven around the electron it belongs to the waiting list.
Arthur Eddington
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In any attempt to bridge the domains of experience belonging to the spiritual and physical sides of nature, time occupies the key position.
Arthur Eddington
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Who will observe the observers?
Arthur Eddington
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Our ultimate analysis of space leads us not to a here and a there, but to an extension such as that which relates here and there. To put the conclusion rather crudely-space is not a lot of points close together it is a lot of distances interlocked.
Arthur Eddington
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Whatever else there may be in our nature, responsibility toward truth is one of its attributes.
Arthur Eddington
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The mathematics is not there till we put it there.
Arthur Eddington
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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.
Arthur Eddington
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The helium which we handle must have been put together at some time and some place. We do not argue with the critic who urges that the stars are not hot enough for this process we tell him to go and find a hotter place.
Arthur Eddington
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An ocean traveler has even more vividly the impression that the ocean is made of waves than that it is made of water.
Arthur Eddington
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The idea of a universal mind or Logos would be, I think, a fairly plausible inference from the present state of scientific theory.
Arthur Eddington
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It is a primitive form of thought that things exist or do not exist.
Arthur Eddington
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Whether in the intellectual pursuits of science or in the mystical pursuits of the spirit, the light beckons ahead, and the purpose surging in our nature responds.
Arthur Eddington
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For the truth of the conclusions of physical science, observation is the supreme Court of Appeal.
Arthur Eddington
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You cannot disturb the tiniest petal of a flower without the troubling of a distant star.
Arthur Eddington
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Events do not happen they are just there, and we come across them.
Arthur Eddington
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Asked in 1919 whether it was true that only three people in the world understood the theory of general relativity, [Eddington] allegedly replied: Who's the third?
Arthur Eddington
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An electron is no more (and no less) hypothetical than a star. Nowadays we count electrons one by one in a Geiger counter, as we count the stars one by one on a photographic plate.
Arthur Eddington
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Oh leave the Wise our measures to collate. One thing at least is certain, light has weight. One thing is certain and the rest debate. Light rays, when near the Sun, do not go straight.
Arthur Eddington
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I ask you to look both ways. For the road to a knowledge of the stars leads through the atom and important knowledge of the atom has been reached through the stars.
Arthur Eddington