“If my history lesson has done nothing else, it should have reminded you that, during any given period in the evolving history of physics, the prevailing, main line, climate of opinion was likely as not to be wrong, as seen in the light of later developments. And yet, in those earlier times, with relatively few individuals involved, change did occur, but slowly… What is fundamentally different in the present day situation in high energy physics is that large numbers of workers are involved, with corresponding pressures to conformity and resistance to any deflection in direction of the main stream, and that the time scale of one scientific generation is much too long for the rapid pace of experimental discovery. I also have a secret fear that new generations may not necessarily have the opportunity to become familiar with dissident ideas.”

— Julian Schwinger

as quoted by Sameer Shah in "If you can't join 'em, beat 'em": Julian Schwinger's Conflicts in Physics. Directions in Cultural History, The UCLA Historical Journal, Volume 21, 2005-2006, p. 50

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "If my history lesson has done nothing else, it should have reminded you that, during any given period in the evolving h…" by Julian Schwinger?

Julian Schwinger photo

Julian Schwinger 3

American theoretical physicist 1918–1994

Related quotes

“When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio.(Sept. 11, 1918) Eugene V. Debs Speaks, ed. Jean Y. Tussey (1970)

“Nothing fundamental separates the course of human history from the course of physical history.”

Edward O. Wilson (1929) American biologist

Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge (1998)

“In physics, energy has a very precise definition: it is what characterises something changing in the world surrounding us. [...] Counting energy is therefore nothing else than counting how much the world has changed.”

Jean-Marc Jancovici (1962) French engineer and energy climate specialist

Source: "Energy: basic facts for an informed debate" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRAMA4mT0z0, 2012.

“[…] Abrupt climate change may be normal in the planet's history, or, to state it differently, that the earth's climate is inherently very unstable. The period in which human civilization developed has been if anything, an anomalous ten-thousand-year epoch of remarkable stability.”

James Howard Kunstler book The Long Emergency

Source: The Long Emergency (2005), Chapter 5, p. 149.

“Writing the history of the present is always a very different thing from writing the history of the distant past. The history of the distant past depends entirely on literary and documentary sources; the history of the present always involves unwritten material as well as documents. But the difference was much greater in the days of Thucydides than it is now.”

J. B. Bury (1861–1927) Irish historian and freethinker

p. 82 http://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=coo1.ark:/13960/t2g73zj2z;view=1up;seq=100
The Ancient Greek Historians (1909)

“The individual has been allowed out of his socially constructed cage. That, at least, is the contemporary myth. What is not clear, however, is what that liberation has to do with the fulfullment of individualism. The lessons of history seem relatively clear. Societies on the rise are simple, unadorned and relatively uncompromising. Those on the decline are given to open-mindedness, self-indulgence and the baroque.”

John Ralston Saul (1947) Canadian author and essayist

Voltaire's Bastards (1992)

“I believe that the main lesson of relativity and quantum theory is that the world is nothing but an evolving network of relationships.”

Lee Smolin book Three Roads to Quantum Gravity

Three Roads to Quantum Gravity (2000)

“As these remarks indicate, the Social Security program involves a transfer from the young to the old. To some extent such a transfer has occurred throughout history—the young supporting their parents, or other relatives, in old age. Indeed, in many poor countries with high infant death rates, like India, the desire to assure oneself of progeny who can provide support in old age is a major reason for high birth rates and large families. The difference between Social Security and earlier arrangements is that Social Security is compulsory and impersonal—earlier arrangements were voluntary and personal. Moral responsibility is an individual matter, not a social matter. Children helped their parents out of love or duty. They now contribute to the support of someone else’s parents out of compulsion and fear. The earlier transfers strengthened the bonds of the family; the compulsory transfers weaken them.”

Milton Friedman book Free to Choose

Source: Free to Choose (1980), Ch. 4 “Cradle to Grave”, p. 106

“The charm of history and its enigmatic lesson consist in the fact that, from age to age, nothing changes and yet everything is completely different.”

Aldous Huxley (1894–1963) English writer

“Each identity has free will and chooses its environment as a physical stance in space and time. Those involved in a given century are working on particular problems and challenges. Various races do not simply 'happen,' and diverse cultures do not just appear. The greater self 'divides' itself, manifesting in flesh as several individuals, with entirely different backgrounds, yet each embarked on the same kind of creative challenge.”

Jane Roberts (1929–1984) American Writer

Source: Psychic Politics: An Aspect Psychology Book (1976), p. 136

Related topics