Feynman = Thoreau
Frank,
Yer absolutely correct. Feynman was a latter day Thoreau. But also a bongo player!
Here's a coupla quotes:
"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts."
"If we will only allow that, as we progress, we remain unsure, we will leave opportunities for alternatives.
We will not become enthusiastic for the fact, the knowledge, the absolute
truth of the day, but remain always uncertain...
In order to make progress, one must leave the door to the unknown ajar."
And here's one on being true to yerself:
(On pseudoscience) "...There is one feature I notice that is generally missing in 'cargo cult science'...
It is a kind of scientific integrity, a principle of scientific thought that corresponds to a kind of utter honesty - a kind of leaning over backwards...
For example, if you are doing an experiment, you should report everything that you think might make it invalid
- not only what you think is right about it...
Details that could throw doubt on your interpretation must be given,
if you know them."
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Not comparing. Just that these two share certain attributes and genius.
"When a man has reduced a fact of his imagination to be a fact of his understanding,
I foresee that all men will at length establish their lives on that basis." Thoreau
Ken Kifer (which see) says this of T. - some of which is true for Feynman.
"Thoreau does not hesitate to use metaphores, allusions, understatement, hyperbole, personification, irony, satire, metonymy, synecoche, and oxymorons - and he can shift from a scientific to a transcendental point of view in mid-sentence. ...
A Thoreauvian lifestyle is almost exactly the opposite of the consumer treadmill that most people find themselves running on today. ...
If you wish a boring and conventional life, devoting your days to working for someone else, your nights watching TV, your weekends to cutting grass, and your cash to purchasing one consumer product after another, THOREAU IS NOT FOR YOU. ...."
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yes, somehow Frank, I believe you have crawled out of the dragon's mouth!
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