Max Born Quotes
All attempts to adapt our ethical code to our situation in the technological age have failed.
Born was a refugee who escaped to England from Nazi Germany.
Max Born, 1882-1970, English Physicist & Nobel Laureate, My Life & My Views, 1968
Sourced by: Eigen's Political and Historical Quotations
The nation was in the midst of a long debate over whether or not new bio-technology was appropriate and desirable for use and there were various efforts to legally curtail their application. These included cloning, stem cell research, radiated foods, fish farming, hydroponic agriculture, hybrid development and cross species organ replacement.
There is an opposite school of thought which argues that because technology develops so fast, by the time you legislate about it of you understand it, it is too late to prevent major problems and abuses which can become institutionalized. Instead it is argued, legislate rapidly BEFORE you understand all the consequences and then repeal and revise very frequently as the technology develops. This school argues that Schmidt’s view is tantamount to not legislating at all as it will ALWAYS be too late if you wait till you understand the consequences.
Max Born was a German physicist and mathematician who was instrumental in the development of quantum mechanics. He also made contributions to solid-state physics and optics and supervised the work of a number of notable physicists in the 1920s and 1930s. Born won the 1954 Nobel Prize in Physics for his "fundamental research in quantum mechanics, especially in the statistical interpretation of the wave function".
