Quote

The extreme sophistication of modern technology - wonderful though its benefits are - is, ironically, an impediment to engaging young people with basics: with learning how things work.

Martin Rees

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Martin Rees
Age: 82
Born: 1942
Born: June 23
Astronomer
Astrophysicist
Cosmologist
Physicist
Politician
University Teacher
Jórvík
Baron Rees of Ludlow
Martin John Rees
Baron Rees of Ludlow
OM
FRS
FREng
FMedSci
Lord Martin Rees
Professor Martin John Rees
Baron Rees of Ludlow
Things
Benefits
Impediment
People
Learning
Impediments
Technology
Ironically
Modern
Sophistication
Wonderful
Basics
Though
Engaging
Young
Extreme
Work
Extremes

More quotes by Martin Rees

Image
God invented space so that not everything had to happen in Princeton.
Martin Rees
Image
Indeed, our everyday world presents intellectual challenges just as daunting as those of the cosmos and the quantum, and that is where 99 per cent of scientists focus their efforts. Even the smallest insect, with its intricate structure, is far more complex than either an atom or a star.
Martin Rees
Image
The U.S., France, Germany and Canada have all responded to the financial crisis by boosting rather than cutting their science funding. The U.K. has not.
Martin Rees
Image
I have no religious belief myself, but I don't think we should fight about it. In particular, I think that we should not rubbish moderate religious leaders like the Archbishop of Canterbury because I think we all agree that extreme fundamentalism is a threat, and we need all the allies we can muster against it.
Martin Rees
Image
I'm not myself religious but have no wish to insult or denigrate those who are.
Martin Rees
Image
The universe is still a place of mystery and wonder.
Martin Rees
Image
In the beginning there were only probabilities. The universe could only come into existence if someone observed it. It does not matter that the observers turned up several billion years later. The universe exists because we are aware of it.
Martin Rees
Image
Scientists surely have a special responsibility. It is their ideas that form the basis of new technology. They should not be indifferent to the fruits of their ideas. They should forgo experiments that are risky or unethical.
Martin Rees
Image
I suspect there could be life and intelligence out there in forms that we can't conceive. And there could, of course, be forms of intelligence beyond human capacity-beyond as much as we are beyond a chimpanzee.
Martin Rees
Image
I would support peaceful co-existence between religion and science because they concern different domains. Anyone who takes theology seriously knows that it's not a matter of using it to explain things that scientists are mystified by.
Martin Rees
Image
I think a few hundred years from now we'll start having the 'posthuman' era of different species.
Martin Rees
Image
The important point there is that when people talk about a mean temperature rise of say two, three or four degrees that's a sort of global average which really is a signature of large scale change in climatic patterns.
Martin Rees
Image
In the case of climate change, the threat is long-term and diffuse and requires broad international action for the benefit of people decades in the future. And in politics, the urgent always trumps the important, and that is what makes it a very difficult and challenging issue.
Martin Rees
Image
Science isn't just for scientists - it's not just a training for careers.
Martin Rees
Image
Campaigning against religion can be socially counter-productive. If teachers take the uncompromising line that God and Darwinism are irreconcilable, many young people raised in a faith-based culture will stick with their religion and be lost to science.
Martin Rees
Image
Scientists habitually moan that the public doesn't understand them. But they complain too much: public ignorance isn't peculiar to science. It's sad if some citizens can't tell a proton from a protein. But it's equally sad if they're ignorant of their nation's history, can't speak a second language, or can't find Venezuela or Syria on a map.
Martin Rees
Image
I think all countries need to aim to cut the CO2 emissions per person, taking account of externalities like imports and exports.
Martin Rees
Image
Science is a part of culture. Indeed, it is the only truly global culture because protons and proteins are the same all over the world, and it's the one culture we can all share.
Martin Rees
Image
In this century, not only has science changed the world faster than ever, but in new and different ways. Targeted drugs, genetic modification, artificial intelligence, perhaps even implants into our brains - may change human beings themselves.
Martin Rees
Image
Crucial to science education is hands-on involvement: showing, not just telling real experiments and field trips and not just virtual reality.
Martin Rees