Freeman Dyson Quotes (90 quotes, page 2)

“The bottom line for mathematicians is that the architecture has to be right. In all the mathematics that I did, the essential point was to find the right architecture. It's like building a bridge. Once the main lines of the structure are right, then the details miraculously fit. The problem is the overall design.”

Freeman Dyson

"Freeman Dyson: Mathematician, Physicist, and Writer". Interview with Donald J. Albers, The College Mathematics Journal, vol 25, no. 1, (January 1994)

Mathematics , Problem

“The laws of nature are constructed in such a way as to make the universe as interesting as possible.”

Freeman Dyson

Imagined Worlds (1997)

Law , Way , Nature , Universe

“It is a curious paradox that several of the greatest and most creative spirits in science, after achieving important discoveries by following their unfettered imaginations, were in their later years obsessed with reductionist philosophy and as a result became sterile. Hilbert was a prime example of this paradox. Einstein was another.”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Imagination , Science

“Nobody knows what dark matter is. It is another deep mystery waiting to be explored. We know only that it is there, and that it weighs more than the stuff that we can see.”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Waiting

“Gödel's theorem shows conclusively that in pure mathematics reductionism does not work. To decide whether a mathematical statement is true, it is not sufficient to reduce the statement to marks on paper and to study the behavior of the marks. Except in trivial cases, you can decide the truth of a statement only by studying its meaning and its context in the larger world of mathematical ideas.”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Truth , World , Behavior , Mathematics

“I had the good luck a few years ago to visit the archeological site of Zippori in Israel … I could see here displayed the Greek culture that Jesus decisively rejected, the same Greek culture that infiltrated the Christian religion soon after his death and has dominated Christianity ever since.”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Death , Religion , Decision

“Anyone who compares the bibliography with the reprinted papers will notice that mathematics and physics have not been given equal treatment. There is a strong bias in favor of mathematics. The bias arises from the fact that mathematical papers, provided that are correct and not trivial, have permanent value, whereas most papers in physics journals are ephemeral. For this reason, it is customary to publish complete collected works of mathematicians but only selected works of physicists.”

Freeman Dyson

Selected Papers of Freeman Dyson with Commentary. https://books.google.com/books?id=nnyNUidX1OMC&pg=PA1 American Mathematical Soc. (1996) p. 1

Mathematics , Strong

“Sharing the food is to me more important than arguing about beliefs. Jesus, according to the gospels, thought so too.”

Freeman Dyson

Progress In Religion (2000)

Food

“As we look out into the Universe and identify the many accidents of physics and astronomy that have worked together to our benefit, it almost seems as if the Universe must in some sense have known that we were coming.”

Freeman Dyson

As quoted in The Anthropic Cosmological Principle (1986) by John D. Barrow and Frank J. Tipler, p. 318

Sense , Universe

“Unfortunately a large number of people in many countries are strongly opposed to green technology, for reasons having little to do with the real dangers. It is important to treat the opponents with respect, to pay attention to their fears, to go gently into the new world of green technology so that neither human dignity nor religious conviction is violated. If we can go gently, we have a good chance of achieving within a hundred years the goals of ecological sustainability and social justice that green technology brings within our reach.”

Freeman Dyson

Progress In Religion (2000)

People , World , Fear , Justice

“The great question for our time is, how to make sure that the continuing scientific revolution brings benefits to everybody rather than widening the gap between rich and poor. To lift up poor countries, and poor people in rich countries, from poverty, to give them a chance of a decent life, technology is not enough. Technology must be guided and driven by ethics if it is to do more than provide new toys for the rich.”

Freeman Dyson

Progress In Religion (2000)

Life , People , Question , Chance

“An awareness of our smallness may help to redeem us from the arrogance which is the besetting sin of the scientists.”

Freeman Dyson book Infinite in All Directions

Source: Infinite in All Directions (1988), Ch. 1 : In Praise of Diversity

Help

“It has been generally believed that only the complex numbers could legitimately be used as the ground field in discussing quantum-mechanical operators. Over the complex field, Frobenius' theorem is of course not valid; the only division algebra over the complex field is formed by the complex numbers themselves. However, Frobenius' theorem is relevant precisely because the appropriate ground field for much of quantum mechanics is real rather than complex.”

Freeman Dyson

[The threefold way: algebraic structure of symmetry groups and ensembles in quantum mechanics, Jour. Math. Phys., 3, 1962, 1199–1215, https://books.google.com/books?id=nnyNUidX1OMC&pg=PA410] (p. 1200)

“It is more difficult for a modern scientist to be a serious Christian, like Polkinghorne, than to be a serious Muslim, like the Nobel Prize-winning physicisit Abdus Salam. Salam happily proclaimed his Muslim faith but did not feel any need to write books about it. For Salam, the idea of a conflict between his faith and his science was ludicrous. Muslim faith has nothing to do with science. But Polkinghorne writes books to prove to himself and to us that his theology and his science can live together harmoniously..”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Books , Faith , Feeling , Idea

“The common root of modern science and Christian theology was Greek philosophy. The historical accident that caused the Christian religion to become heavily theological was the fact that Jesus was born in the Eastern part of the Roman Empire at the time when the prevailing culture was profoundly Greek.”

Freeman Dyson

The Scientist As Rebel (2006)

Religion , Science , Time , Parting

“In the little town of Princeton where I live, we have more than twenty churches and at least one synagogue, providing different forms of worship and belief for different kinds of people. They do more than any other organizations in the town to hold the community together. Within this community of people, held together by religious traditions of human brotherhood and sharing of burdens, a smaller community of professional scientists also flourishes.”

Freeman Dyson

Progress In Religion (2000)

People , Communication

“I am neither a saint nor a theologian. To me, good works are more important than theology. We all know that religion has been historically, and still is today, a cause of great evil as well as great good in human affairs. We have seen terrible wars and terrible persecutions conducted in the name of religion. We have also seen large numbers of people inspired by religion to lives of heroic virtue, bringing education and medical care to the poor, helping to abolish slavery and spread peace among nations. Religion amplifies the good and evil tendencies of individual souls. Religion will always remain a powerful force in the history of our species. To me, the meaning of progress in religion is simply this, that as we move from the past to the future the good works inspired by religion should more and more prevail over the evil.”

Freeman Dyson

Progress In Religion (2000)

Soul , Peace , Religion , History

“... the most important questions and insights and goals are unpredictable.”

Freeman Dyson

email sent to David Brown, 1 January 2020, quoted in [Freeman Dyson - Science and Religion (151/157) (comments section), 27 July 2016, YouTube, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwoVrSICaTA] (published by Web of Stories - Life Stories of Remarkable People)

Question

“God is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.”

Freeman Dyson book Infinite in All Directions

Source: Infinite in All Directions (1988), Ch. 6 : How Will it All End?

God