If someone were to propose that the planets go around the sun because all planet matter has a kind of tendency for movement, a kind of motility, let us call it an oomph, this theory could explain a number of other phenomena as well. So this is a good theory, is it not? No. It is nowhere near as good as the proposition that the planets move around the sun under the influence of a central force which varies exactly inversely as the square of the distance from the center. The second theory is better because it is so specific; it is so obviously unlikely to be the result of chance. It is so definite that the barest error in the movement can show that it is wrong; but the planets could wobble all over the place, and, according to the first theory, you could say, Well, that is the funny behavior of the oomph.
About This Quote
About Richard Feynman
Richard Feynman was a 20th-century American theoretical physicist. Richard Phillips Feynman was an American theoretical physicist. He shared the 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics with Julian Schwinger and Shin'ichirÅ Tomonaga "for their fundamental work in quantum electrodynamics (QED), with deep-ploughing consequences for the physics of elementary particles". Read more on Wikipedia →
Themes
- Imagination — The creative power of the mind and visionary thinking
- Science — Discovery, inquiry, and the wonders of the natural world