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The language that nature speaks is the same language that we invented for mathematics. That's just an amazing piece of luck, which we don't understand.

Freeman Dyson

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Freeman Dyson
Age: 96 †
Born: 1923
Born: December 15
Died: 2020
Died: February 28
Mathematician
Nuclear Physicist
Physicist
Professor
Theoretical Physicist
Crowthorne
Berkshire
Freeman John Dyson
Freeman J. Dyson
Nature
Mathematics
Luck
Piece
Amazing
Pieces
Language
Understand
Invented
Speak
Speaks

More quotes by Freeman Dyson

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Intelligence may indeed be a benign influence creating isolated groups of philosopher-kings far apart in the heavens... On the other hand, intelligence may be a cancer of purposeless technological exploitation, sweeping across a galaxy as irresistibly as it has swept across our own planet.
Freeman Dyson
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When I listen to the public debates about climate change, I am impressed by the enormous gaps in our knowledge, the sparseness of our observations and the superficiality of our theories.
Freeman Dyson
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You ask: what is the meaning or purpose of life? I can only answer with another question: do you think we are wise enough to read God's mind?
Freeman Dyson
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Computer models of the climate....[are] a very dubious business if you don't have good inputs.
Freeman Dyson
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Trouble arises when either science or religion claims universal jurisdiction, when either religious dogma or scientific dogma claims to be infallible. Religious creationists and scientific materialists are equally dogmatic and insensitive. By their arrogance they bring both science and religion into disrepute.
Freeman Dyson
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For me, science is just a bunch of tools - it's like playing the violin.
Freeman Dyson
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The great advances in science usually result from new tools rather than from new doctrines.
Freeman Dyson
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Plasma seems to have the kinds of properties one would like for life. It's somewhat like liquid water--unpredictable and thus able to behave in an enormously complex fashion. It could probably carry as much information as DNA does. It has at least the potential for organizing itself in interesting ways.
Freeman Dyson
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If we had a reliable way to label our toys good and bad, it would be easy to regulate technology wisely. But we can rarely see far enough ahead to know which road leads to damnation. Whoever concerns himself with big technology, either to push it forward or to stop it, is gambling in human lives.
Freeman Dyson
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Nothing is boring if you look at carefully.
Freeman Dyson
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I mean science was blamed for all the horrors of World War I, just as it's blamed today for nuclear weapons and quite rightly.
Freeman Dyson
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Of course, the English countryside is completely artificial. It was naturally a forest they chopped down the trees and made it into what it is now: really a beautiful country.
Freeman Dyson
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To me, mathematics is like playing the violin. Some people can do it - others can't. If you don't have it, then there's no point in pretending.
Freeman Dyson
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As we look out into the Universe and identify the many accidents of physics and astronomy that have worked together to our benefit, it almost seems as if the Universe must in some sense have known that we were coming.
Freeman Dyson
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I'm prejudiced about education altogether. I think it's terribly overrated.
Freeman Dyson
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CO2 is so beneficial...it would be crazy to try to reduce it
Freeman Dyson
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The history of mathematics is a history of horrendously difficult problems being solved by young people too ignorant to know that they were impossible.
Freeman Dyson
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We must be careful not to discourage our twelve-year-olds by making them waste the best years of their lives preparing for examinations.
Freeman Dyson
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Successful technologies often begin as hobbies. Jacques Cousteau invented scuba diving because he enjoyed exploring caves. The Wright brothers invented flying as a relief from the monotony of their normal business of selling and repairing bicycles.
Freeman Dyson
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It makes very little sense to believe the output of the climate models.
Freeman Dyson