Max Planck

"Science is the belief in the incompetence of experts."

"The scientist only imposes two things, namely truth and sincerity, imposes them rigorously."

"To any action there is always an equal and opposite reaction."

"The philosophical interpretations of quantum mechanics differ from each other by the metaphysical assumptions they rest upon."

"All religious statements regarding the supernatural however appear arbitrary without such a foundation."

"We cannot get behind consciousness. Everything that we talk about, everything that we regard as existing, postulates consciousness."

"If I had to live my life over again, I would want it to be exactly the same."

"The elementary laws necessary and sufficient for the mathematical treatment of a large part of physics, chemistry and biology are thus completely known."

"We are now reaping the fruits of the research of past generations, and we are preparing the seed for the future."

"God does not play dice."

"The task is not so much to see what no one has yet seen, but to think what nobody has yet thought about that which everybody sees."

"Any man who claims to have found truth should look closely at how he found it and why he thought he had found it."

"Every man who has thought deeply about existence recognizes that it is a kind of mystery."

"The fact that we can describe nature with mathematical laws shows that we perceive a world of rationality and order."

"Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns."

"Anybody who has been seriously engaged in scientific work of any kind realizes that over the entrance to the gates of the temple of science are written the words: 'You must have faith.' It is a quality which the scientist cannot dispense with."

"Men are not concerned with the same things throughout their lives."

"All truth passes through three stages. First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. Third, it is accepted as being obvious."

"The task of science, moreover, is not only to obtain a knowledge of the elementary particles, but also to discover their interrelationships."

"I believe the most important hypothesis in biology, for instance, is that everything that animals do, plants do too."

"The result of my whole study of this matter is that a belief in the absolute truth of science is a delusion."

"The new scientific truth does not triumph because it convinces its opponents, but because they die out."

"There can never be any real opposition between religion and science; for the one is the complement of the other."

"My life has been entirely devoted to the most clear-headed science."

"If you wish to find the secrets of the universe, think in terms of energy, frequency and vibration."

"The man does not belong to himself, but to the law of the universe."

"It is better to be able to look at a moment of experience than to have seen or experienced many things in a confused way."

"There is an instinctive reaction to reject something that one cannot understand."

"Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth."

"Science cannot solve the ultimate mystery of nature because in the final analysis we ourselves are part of nature and therefore part of the mystery that we are trying to solve."