Edward Witten: Quotes about thinking

Edward Witten is American theoretical physicist. Explore interesting quotes on thinking.

Edward Witten: 40 quotes1 like

“I think one has to regard it as a long term process. One has to remember that String theory, if you choose to date it from the Veneziano model, is already eighteen years old”

Edward Witten

"Edward Witten" interview, Superstrings: A Theory of Everything? (1992) ed. P.C.W. Davies, Julian Brown
Context: I think one has to regard it as a long term process. One has to remember that String theory, if you choose to date it from the Veneziano model, is already eighteen years old... that quantum electrodynamic theory towards which Planck was heading [in 1900], took fifty years to emerge.

“Most people who haven't been trained in physics probably think of what physicists do as a question of incredibly complicated calculations, but that's not really the essence of it. The essence of it is that physics is about concepts, wanting to understand the concepts, the principles by which the world works.”

Edward Witten

"Edward Witten" interview, Superstrings: A Theory of Everything? (1992) ed. P.C.W. Davies, Julian Brown

“I don't think that any physicist would have been clever enough to have invented string theory on purpose… Luckily, it was invented by accident.”

Edward Witten

as quoted by K.C. Cole, "A Theory of Everything" New York Times Magazine (1987) Oct.18