G. H. Hardy Quotes

I count Maxwell and Einstein, Eddington and Dirac, among "real" mathematicians. The great modern achievements of applied mathematics have been in relativity and quantum mechanics, and these subjects are at present at any rate, almost as "useless" as the theory of numbers.

There is no branch of mathematics, however abstract, which may not some day be applied to phenomena of the real world

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

There was a time when the newspapers said that only twelve men understood the theory of relativity. I do not believe there ever was such a time ... On the other hand, I think I can safely say that nobody understands quantum mechanics.

No matter how hard you try to teach your cat general relativity, you're going to fail.

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.

When modern physics exerts itself to establish the world's formula, what occurs thereby is this: the being of entities has resolved itself into the method of the totally calculable.

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

Einstein is an analytical mathematician seeking to give a physical interpretation to the conclusions of his mathematical process. In this he is hampered by a load of contradictory and absurd assumptions. The whole Relativity theory is as easy to follow as the path of a bat in the air at night.

By far the most important consequence of the conceptual revolution brought about in physics by relativity and quantum theory lies not in such details as that meter sticks shorten when they move or that simultaneous position and momentum have no meaning, but in the insight that we had not been using our minds properly and that it is important to find out how to do so

So much of what we said sounded crazy, yet none of it was false... as if two theoretical physicists stood on stage to say that when we travel near lightspeed, we get younger than nontravellers; that a mile of space next to the sun is differnt than a mile of space next to the earth because the sun-mile space is curved more than the the earth-mile. Silly ideas, worth the admission price in smiles, but they're true. Is high-energy physics interesting because it's true or because it's crazy?

Formerly, people thought that if matter disappeared from the universe, space and time would remain. Relativity declares that space and time would disappear with matter.

Why is it that we entertain the belief that for every purpose odd numbers are the most effectual?

My opinion about Miller's experiments is the following. ... Should the positive result be confirmed, then the special theory of relativity and with it the general theory of relativity, in its current form, would be invalid. Experimentum summus judex. Only the equivalence of inertia and gravitation would remain, however, they would have to lead to a significantly different theory.

The special theory of relativity owes its origins to Maxwell's equations of the electromagnetic field.

In the beginning God said, the four-dimensional divergence of an antisymmetric, second rank tensor equals zero, and there was light, and it was good. And on the seventh day he rested.

It followed from the special theory of relativity that mass and energy are both but different manifestations of the same thing...

It is almost impossible to have a baseless snobbish opinion of the General Theory of Relativity.

Only Numbers. Pure math. You have to accustom yourself to thinking that way.

In abstract mathematics, of course operations alter those particular relations which are involved in the considerations of number and space, and the results of operations are those peculiar results which correspond to the nature of the subjects of operation.

On quantum theory I use up more brain grease (rough translation of German idiom) than on relativity.

Relativity is inherently convergent, though convergent toward a plurality of centers of abstract truths.

We went to the moon using just Newton's laws of motion and gravity. Newtonian dynamics we call it. So then we find out, "Well, this works because there's certain regimes we've never tested it in." Had we done so, we would show that it didn't work: For example, at very high speeds, very high gravity, Newton's laws fail. They just fail. You need Einstein's laws of motion and gravity. Those would be his special theory of relativity and general theory of relativity. Now you invoke those and it works.

It took Einstein ten years of groping through the fog to get the theory of special relativity, and he was a bright guy.

Carnal embrace is sexual congress, which is the insertion of the male genital organ into the female genital organ for purposes of procreation and pleasure. Fermat’s last theorem, by contrast, asserts that when x, y and z are whole numbers each raised to power of n, the sum of the first two can never equal the third when n is greater than 2.