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Every word or concept, clear as it may seem to be, has only a limited range of applicability.

Werner Heisenberg

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Werner Heisenberg
Age: 74 †
Born: 1901
Born: December 5
Died: 1976
Died: February 1
Academic
Mathematician
Mountaineer
Non-Fiction Writer
Nuclear Physicist
Physicist
Theoretical Physicist
University Teacher
Kreisfreie Stadt Würzburg
Werner Karl Heisenberg
Heisenberg
Werner K. Heisenberg
Range
Concepts
Seem
Clear
Word
Seems
Applicability
May
Limited
Every
Concept

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Quantum theory provides us with a striking illustration of the fact that we can fully understand a connection though we can only speak of it in images and parables.
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Unless you stake your life, life will not be won.
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The discontinuous 'reduction of the wave packets' which cannot be derived from Schroedinger's equation is ... a consequence of the transition from the possible to the actual.
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Whenever we proceed from the known to the unkown we may hope to understand, but we may have to learn at the same time a new meaning of the word 'understanding'
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Where no guiding ideals are left to point the way, the scale of values disappears and with it the meaning of our deeds and sufferings, and at the end can lie only negation and despair. Religion is therefore the foundation of ethics, and ethics the presupposition of life.
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A consistent pursuit of classical physics forces a transformation in the very heart of that physics.
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Science no longer is in the position of observer of nature, but rather recognizes itself as part of the interplay between man and nature. The scientific method ... changes and transforms its object: the procedure can no longer keep its distance from the object.
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The more precise the measurement of position, the more imprecise the measurement of momentum, and vice versa.
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Both matter and radiation possess a remarkable duality of character, as they sometimes exhibit the properties of waves, at other times those of particles. Now it is obvious that a thing cannot be a form of wave motion and composed of particles at the same time - the two concepts are too different
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In my paper the fact the XY was not equal to YX was very disagreeable to me. I felt this was the only point of difficulty in the whole scheme...and I was not able to solve it.
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I think that the discovery of antimatter was perhaps the biggest jump of all the big jumps in physics in our century.
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Many people will tell you that an expert is someone who knows a great deal about the subject. To this I would object that one can never know much about any subject. I would much prefer the following definition: an expert is someone who knows some of the worst mistakes that can be made in the subject, and how to avoid them.
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The one who insists on never uttering an error must remain silent.
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I believe that the existence of the classical path can be pregnantly formulated as follows: The path comes into existence only when we observe it.
Werner Heisenberg
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Thus, the more precisely the position is determined, the less precisely the momentum is known, and conversely.
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The reality we can put into words is never reality itself.
Werner Heisenberg
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The existing scientific concepts cover always only a very limited part of reality, and the other part that has not yet been understood is infinite.
Werner Heisenberg
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The problems of language here are really serious. We wish to speak in some way about the structure of the atoms. But we cannot speak about atoms in ordinary language.
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Nature allows only experimental situations to occur which can be described within the framework of the formalism of quantum mechanics
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Even for the physicist the description in plain language will be a criterion of the degree of understanding that has been reached.
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