Max Planck
Originated quantum theory with energy quanta
Most quoted
"The quantum theory is a theory of the elementary quanta of the cosmos and the chaos, the light and the darkness, the good and the evil, the life and the death, the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, the past, the present, and the future, the here and the now, the everywhere and the always, the visible and the invisible, the known and the unknown, the finite and the infinite, the possible and the impossible, the necessary and the contingent, the universal and the particular, the general and the specific, the abstract and the concrete, the simple and the complex, the whole and the part, the one and the many, the same and the different, the identity and the difference, the unity and the multiplicity, the order and the chaos, the harmony and the discord, all things and nothing, being and non-being, existence and non-existence, reality and unreality, truth and falsehood, knowledge and ignorance, wisdom and folly, beauty and ugliness, good and evil, morality and immorality, ethics and unethics, religion and irreligion, spirituality and materialism, God and atheism, the universe and the void."
— from The Origin and Development of the Quantum Theory, 1920
"The quantum theory is a theory of the elementary quanta of the cosmos and the chaos, the light and the darkness, the good and the evil, the life and the death, the beginning and the end, the alpha and the omega, the past, the present, and the future, the here and the now, the everywhere and the always, the visible and the invisible, the known and the unknown, the finite and the infinite, the possible and the impossible, the necessary and the contingent, the universal and the particular, the general and the specific, the abstract and the concrete, the simple and the complex, the whole and the part, the one and the many, the same and the different, the identity and the difference, the unity and the multiplicity, the order and the chaos, the harmony and the discord."
— from The Origin and Development of the Quantum Theory, 1920
"My original decision to devote myself to science was a direct result of the discovery which has never ceased to fill me with enthusiasm since my early youth - the comprehension of the far from obvious fact that the laws of human reasoning coincide with the laws governing the sequences of the impressions we receive from the world about us; that, therefore, pure reasoning can enable man to gain an insight into the mechanism of the latter. In that sense, it is obvious that science cannot be neutral, and cannot be isolated from life."
— from Scientific Autobiography, 1949
All quotes by Max Planck (661)
I regard the quantum of action as a positive advance in physics, which will prove to be of the greatest importance for the further development of the theory.
The assumption of the quantum of action was a purely formal one and I really did not think much about it.
The quantum hypothesis was a desperate act of despair.
Physical science is a creation of the human mind, and it is a creation of the human mind in its most profound and most subtle aspects.
The world is not a collection of things, but a collection of processes.
What is real is not what we see, but what we infer from what we see.
The scientist needs a vivid imagination, but he must also be a severe critic of his own imagination.
The progress of science is not a straight line, but a zigzag course.
The most important task of science is to find the universal laws of nature.
The true scientist is not one who knows everything, but one who knows what he does not know.
The value of a scientific discovery is not measured by its immediate practical application, but by its contribution to the understanding of nature.
The scientist must be a man of faith, for he must believe in the existence of a rational order in the universe.
The ultimate goal of science is to arrive at a unified description of the physical world.
The classical physics is a limiting case of the quantum physics.
The quantum of action is a universal constant of nature.
The energy of a harmonic oscillator can only take on discrete values.
The quantum hypothesis is incompatible with the classical theory of radiation.
The quantum theory is not a complete theory, but it is a step in the right direction.
The quantum theory has opened up new avenues of research in physics.
The quantum theory has had a profound impact on our understanding of the atom and its structure.
Contemporaries of Max Planck
Other Physicss born within 50 years of Max Planck (1858–1947).