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Pragmatism is an intellectually safe but ultimately sterile philosophy.

J. Robert Oppenheimer

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J. Robert Oppenheimer
Age: 62 †
Born: 1904
Born: April 22
Died: 1967
Died: February 18
Art Collector
Engineer
Nuclear Physicist
Theoretical Physicist
University Teacher
New York City
New York
Julius Robert Oppenheimer
J. Robert Oppenheimer
Ultimately
Safe
Philosophy
Pragmatism
Sterile
Intellectually

More quotes by J. Robert Oppenheimer

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It is a profound and necessary truth that the deep things in science are not found because they are useful they are found because it was possible to find them.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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Both the man of science and the man of action live always at the edge of mystery, surrounded by it.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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Now I am become death, the destroyer of worlds. (quoting the Bhagavad-Gita after witnessing the first Nuclear explosion.)
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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It is not possible to be a scientist unless you believe that it is good to learn... that it is of the highest value to share your knowledge... with anyone who is interested... that the knowledge of the world, and the power which this gives, is a thing which is of intrinsic value to humanity
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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I can't think that it would be terrible of me to say - and it is occasionally true - that I need physics more than friends.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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There is something irreversible about acquiring knowledge and the simulation of the search for it differs in a most profound way from the reality.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. We know that in secrecy error, undetected, will flourish and subvert.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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In the material sciences these are and have been, and are most surely likely to continue to be heroic days.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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The atomic bomb made the prospect of future war unendurable. It has led us up those last few steps to the mountain pass and beyond there is a different country.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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You can certainly destroy enough of humanity so that only the greatest act of faith can persuade you that what's left will be human.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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Any man whose errors take ten years to correct is quite a man.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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Sometimes the answer to fear does not lie in trying to explain away the causes, sometimes the answer lies in courage.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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To the confusion of our enemies.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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The people of this world must unite or they will perish.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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Things which stimulate my curiosity are pretty far removed from the practical and therefore from classification.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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The history of science is rich in example of the fruitfulness of bringing two sets of techniques, two sets of ideas, developed in separate contexts for the pursuit of new truth, into touch with one another.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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We may be likened to two scorpions in a bottle, each capable of killing the other, but only at the risk of his own life.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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When you see something that is technically sweet, you go ahead and do it and you argue about what to do about it only after you have had your technical success. That is the way it was with the atomic bomb.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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There are no secrets about the world of nature. There are secrets about the thoughts and intentions of men.
J. Robert Oppenheimer
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The theory of our modern technic shows that nothing is as practical as theory.
J. Robert Oppenheimer