Ernest Rutherford

The scattering of charged particles by matter may provide a method of investigating the structure of atoms.

It is a poor sort of memory that only works backwards.

The electron: it may be necessary to abolish it.

The energy of the atom will not be available for a long time, and then only if a method can be found to release it.

In science there is only physics; all the rest is stamp collecting.

I have sometimes been asked what is the use of these experiments. I have never made one of any use, nor do I expect to.

The atom is not a static structure, but a dynamic one.

The day when the scientist, no matter how devoted, may make significant progress alone and without material help is past.

The history of science shows that the progress of science has constantly been hampered by the tyrannical influence of certain conceptions that finally came to be considered as dogma.

The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the ‘social sciences’ is: some do, some don’t.

We are all agreed that your theory is crazy. The question which divides us is whether it is crazy enough to have a chance of being correct.

The time will come when the man in the street will be able to help himself to atomic energy as he helps himself to a lump of coal.

I have seen my death!

The work of the experimenter consists in asking questions of nature in the form of experiments.

The atom is a world of its own, with its own laws.

It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data.

The energy of the sun is maintained by a sub-atomic process which is not yet understood.

The disintegration of the atom is a process which, once started, tends to go on of itself.

The atom is not a hard, rigid body, but is largely composed of empty space.

The only way to learn experimental physics is to do experiments.