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A visitor to Niels Bohr's country cottage, noticing a horseshoe hanging on the wall, teasing the eminent scientist about this ancient superstition. Can it be true that you, of all people, believe it will bring you luck?' 'Of course not,' replied Bohr, 'but I understand it brings you luck whether you believe it or not.'

Niels Bohr

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Niels Bohr
Age: 77 †
Born: 1885
Born: October 7
Died: 1962
Died: November 18
Association Football Player
Chemist
Nuclear Physicist
Philosopher Of Science
Physicist
University Teacher
København
Niels Henrik David Bohr
Nicholas Baker
N. Bohr
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Horseshoe
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Superstition
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True
Wall
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More quotes by Niels Bohr

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We are trapped by language to such a degree that every attempt to formulate insight is a play on words.
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If quantum mechanics hasn't profoundly shocked you, you haven't understood it yet.
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Einstein, stop telling God what to do!
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In physics we deal with states of affairs much simpler than those of psychology and yet we again and again learn that our task is not to investigate the essence of things-we do not at all know what this would mean&mashbut to develop those concepts that allow us to speak with each other about the events of nature in a fruitful manner.
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No paradox, no progress.
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Rutherford is a man you can rely on he comes regularly and enquires how things are going and talks about the smallest details - Rutherford is such an outstanding man and really interested in the work of all the people around him.
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Address to Albert Einstein: You are not thinking. You are merely being logical.
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It is difficult to predict, especially the future.
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If you have a correct statement, then the opposite of a correct statement is of course an incorrect statement, a wrong statement. But when you have a deep truth, then the opposite of a deep truth may again be a deep truth.
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Physics is the belief that a simple and consistent description of nature is possible.
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The very nature of the quantum theory ... forces us to regard the space-time coordination and the claim of causality, the union of which characterizes the classical theories, as complementary but exclusive features of the description, symbolizing the idealization of observation and description, respectively.
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An independant reality in the ordinary physical sense can neither be ascribed to the phenomenon nor to the agencies of observation.
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The meaning of life consists in the fact that it makes no sense to say that life has no meaning.
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Some subjects are so serious that one can only joke about them.
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Our task is not to penetrate the essence of things, the meaning of which we do not know anyway, but rather to develop concepts which allow us to talk in a productive way about phenomena in nature
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Anyone who can contemplate quantum mechanics without getting dizzy hasn't understood it.
Niels Bohr
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It is very difficult to make an accurate prediction, especially about the future.
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Opposites are not contradictory but complementary.
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How wonderful that we have met with a paradox. Now we have some hope of making progress.
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Your theory is crazy, but it's not crazy enough to be true.
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