Robert B. Laughlin Quotes

Time travel used to be thought of as just science fiction, but Einstein's general theory of relativity allows for the possibility that we could warp space-time so much that you could go off in a rocket and return before you set out.

In my relativity theory I set up a clock at every point in space, but in reality I find it difficult to provide even one clock in my room.

We have to have a combination of general relativity that describes the warping of space and time, and quantum physics, which describes the uncertainties in that warping and how they change.

Einstein's theory of relativity does a fantastic job for explaining big things. Quantum mechanics is fantastic for the other end of the spectrum - for small things.

Relativity challenges your basic intuitions that you've built up from everyday experience. It says your experience of time is not what you think it is, that time is malleable. Your experience of space is not what you think it is; it can stretch and shrink.

Before 1915, space and time were thought of as a fixed arena in which events took place, but which was not affected by what happened in it. Space and time are now dynamic quantities... space and time not only affect but are also affected by everything that happens in the universe.

It is theoretically possible to warp spacetime itself, so you're not actually moving faster than the speed of light, but it's actually space that's moving.

Today we say that the law of relativity is supposed to be true at all energies, but someday somebody may come along and say how stupid we were.

The real reason why general relativity is widely accepted is because it made predictions that were borne out by experimental observations.

In Einstein's general relativity the structure of space can change but not its topology. Topology is the property of something that doesn't change when you bend it or stretch it as long as you don't break anything.

… theoretical physics is actual philosophy. It has revolutionized fundamental concepts, e.g., about space and time (relativity), about causality (quantum theory), and about substance and matter (atomistics), and it has taught us new methods of thinking (complementarity) which are applicable far beyond physics.

I am not enough of a mathematician to be able to judge either the well-foundedness or the limits of relativity in physics.

Einstein had two new predictions from general relativity. One was that light would bend. That was tested in 1919, and basically, he was proven right. The second prediction was gravitational waves, which took us 100 years to prove. The theory itself, which is thought by most to be rather obscure, you use every day, probably.

I heard that in relativity theory, space and time are the same thing. Einstein discovered this when he kept showing up three miles late for his meetings.

I'd have given ten conversations with Einstein for a first meeting with a pretty chorus girl.

The Theory of Relativity confers an absolute meaning on a magnitude which in classical theory has only a relative significance: the velocity of light. The velocity of light is to the Theory of Relativity as the elementary quantum of action is to the Quantum Theory: it is its absolute core.

Ultimately, my Ph.D. is in mathematical physics, focusing on quantum field theory and curved space-time, and I worked with Stephen Hawking.

I've always really been into science, and in the last five years I've gotten into theoretical physics and the origins of the universe.

Since Einstein developed his theory of relativity, and Rutherford and Bohr revolutionised physics, our picture of the world has radically changed.

Quantum Mechanics and General Relativity are both accepted as scientific fact even though they're mutually exclusive. Albert Einstein spent the second half of his life searching for a unifying truth that would reconcile the two.

If you are in a spaceship that is traveling at the speed of light, and you turn on the headlights, does anything happen?

It’s all right that you do not understand my Theory of Relativity. I do not understand your Theory of Normalcy.

Einstein’s relativity work is a magnificent mathematical garb which fascinates, dazzles and makes people blind to the underlying errors. The theory is like a beggar clothed in purple whom ignorant people take for a king... its exponents are brilliant men but they are metaphysicists rather than scientists.

Relativity was a highly technical new theory that gave new meanings to familiar concepts and even to the nature of the theory itself. The general public looked upon relativity as indicative of the seemingly incomprehensible modern era, educated scientists despaired of ever understanding what Einstein had done, and political ideologues used the new theory to exploit public fears and anxieties—all of which opened a rift between science and the broader culture that continues to expand today.

The whole idea of gravity curling up space, that is the epitome of what is going on in a black hole. I would've loved to have seen Einstein's face if he were presented with the data that we actually discovered such a thing, because he himself probably didn't believe in much of it.