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I've just finished reading some of my early papers, and you know, when I'd finished I said to myself, 'Rutherford, my boy, you used to be a damned clever fellow.' (1911)

Ernest Rutherford

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Ernest Rutherford
Age: 66 †
Born: 1871
Born: August 30
Died: 1937
Died: October 19
Chemist
Nuclear Physicist
Physicist
Politician
Professor
Nelson
New Zealand
Ernest Lord Rutherford
E. Rutherford
Ernest Rutherford
primer barón Rutherford. de Nelson
Ernest
Lord Rutherford
Fellows
Finished
Early
Rutherford
Paper
Damned
Boys
Biographies
Reading
Papers
Science
Fellow
Used
Clever

More quotes by Ernest Rutherford

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Radioactivity is shown to be accompanied by chemical changes in which new types of matter are being continually produced. .... The conclusion is drawn that these chemical changes must be sub-atomic in character.
Ernest Rutherford
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If your experiment needs statistics, you ought to have done a better experiment.
Ernest Rutherford
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A good scientific theory should be explicable to a barmaid.
Ernest Rutherford
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Gentlemen, now you will see that now you see nothing. And why you see nothing you will see presently.
Ernest Rutherford
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An alleged scientific discovery has no merit unless it can be explained to a barmaid.
Ernest Rutherford
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Gentlemen, we have run out of money. It is time to start thinking.
Ernest Rutherford
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You know, I am sorry for the poor fellows that haven't got labs to work in.
Ernest Rutherford
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All of physics is either impossible or trivial. It is impossible until you understand it, and then it becomes trivial.
Ernest Rutherford
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Splitting the atom is like trying to shoot a gnat in the Albert Hall at night and using ten million rounds of ammunition on the off chance of getting it. That should convince you that the atom will always be a sink of energy and never a reservoir of energy.
Ernest Rutherford
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Now I know what the atom looks like.
Ernest Rutherford
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Should a young scientist working with me come to me after two years of such work and ask me what to do next, I would advise him to get out of science. After two years of work, if a man does not know what to do next, he will never make a real scientist.
Ernest Rutherford
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I am a great believer in the simplicity of things and as you probably know I am inclined to hang on to broad & simple ideas like grim death until evidence is too strong for my tenacity.
Ernest Rutherford
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I have to keep going, as there are always people on my track. I have to publish my present work as rapidly as possible in order to keep in the race. The best sprinters in this road of investigation are Becquerel and the Curies.
Ernest Rutherford
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We haven't got the money, so we've got to think.
Ernest Rutherford
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The greatest contributor to the feeling of tension and fear of war arose from the power of the bombing aeroplane. If all nations would consent to abolish air bombardment . . . that would mean the greatest possible release from fear.
Ernest Rutherford
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All science is either physics or stamp collecting.
Ernest Rutherford
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Never say, I tried it once and it did not work.
Ernest Rutherford
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Don't let me catch anyone talking about the Universe in my department.
Ernest Rutherford
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When we have found how the nucleus of atoms is built up we shall have found the greatest secret of all — except life. We shall have found the basis of everything — of the earth we walk on, of the air we breathe, of the sunshine, of our physical body itself, of everything in the world, however great or however small — except life.
Ernest Rutherford
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If, as I have reason to believe, I have disintegrated the nucleus of the atom, this is of greater significance than the war.
Ernest Rutherford