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Home > Dictionary of Science Quotations > Scientist Names Index P > Wolfgang Pauli Quotes

Thumbnail of Wolfgang Pauli (source)
Wolfgang Pauli
(25 Apr 1900 - 15 Dec 1958)

Austrian-American physicist who established the Pauli exclusion principle.

Short biography of Wolfgang Pauli >>

Science Quotes by Wolfgang Pauli (7 quotes)

After reading a paper by a young theoretical scientist, Pauli, shaking his head sadly, commented:
Das ist nicht einmal falsch.
That is not even wrong.
— Wolfgang Pauli
Attributed.
Science quotes on:  |  Wrong (32)

I confess, that very different from you, I do find sometimes scientific inspiration in mysticism … but this is counterbalanced by an immediate sense for mathematics.
— Wolfgang Pauli
Letter to Niels Bohr (1955). Quoted in Robert J. Scully, The Demon and the Quantum (2007), 7.
Science quotes on:  |  Mathematics (318)  |  Mysticism (3)

Physics is very muddled again at the moment; it is much too hard for me anyway, and I wish I were a movie comedian or something like that and had never heard anything about physics.
— Wolfgang Pauli
Letter to R. Kronig (21 May 1925). Quoted in R. Kronig, 'The Turning Point', in M. Fierz and V. F. Weisskopf (eds.), Theoretical Physics in the Twentieth Century. A Memorial Volume to Wolfgang Pauli (1960),as trans. in M. Klein, Letters on Wave Mechanics, x.
Science quotes on:  |  Hard (12)  |  Hearing (17)  |  Movie (3)  |  Physics (142)

The fact that XY thinks slowly is not serious, but that he publishes faster than he thinks is inexcusable.
— Wolfgang Pauli
Quoted in R. Desper, The Human Side of Scientists (1975), 154.
Science quotes on:  |  Fast (8)  |  Publishing (2)  |  Seriousness (6)  |  Slow (6)  |  Thinking (140)

The natural scientist is concerned with a particular kind of phenomena … he has to confine himself to that which is reproducible … I do not claim that the reproducible by itself is more important than the unique. But I do claim that the unique exceeds the treatment by scientific method. Indeed it is the aim of this method to find and test natural laws…
— Wolfgang Pauli
In Aufsätze und Vorträge über Physik und Erkenntnistheorie (1961), 94. Quoted in Erhard Scheibe and Brigitte Falkenburg (ed), Between Rationalism and Empiricism: Selected Papers in the Philosophy of Physics (2001), 276
Science quotes on:  |  Law (243)  |  Scientific Method (88)

There can never be two or more equivalent electrons in an atom, for which in a strong field the values of all the quantum numbers n, k1, k2 and m are the same. If an electron is present, for which these quantum numbers (in an external field) have definite values, then this state is ‘occupied.’
— Wolfgang Pauli
Quoted by M. Fierz, in article ‘Wolfgang Pauli’, in C. C. Gillispie (ed.), Dictionary of Scientific Biography (1974), Vol. 10, 423.
Science quotes on:  |  Atom (157)  |  Electron (40)  |  Equivalence (2)  |  Field (52)  |  Nomenclature (93)  |  Strength (22)  |  Value (50)

What really matters for me is … the more active role of the observer in quantum physics … According to quantum physics the observer has indeed a new relation to the physical events around him in comparison with the classical observer, who is merely a spectator.
— Wolfgang Pauli
Letter to Niels Bohr (1955). Quoted in Robert J. Scully, The Demon and the Quantum (2007), 22.
Science quotes on:  |  Observation (239)  |  Quantum Physics (15)


See also:
  • todayinsci icon 25 Apr - short biography, births, deaths and events on date of Pauli's birth.
  • book icon No Time to be Brief: A Scientific Biography of Wolfgang Pauli, by Charles P. Enz. - book suggestion.


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