Erwin Schrödinger Quotes

The scientific world-picture vouchsafes a very complete understanding of all that happens — it makes it just a little too understandable. It allows you to imagine the total display as that of a mechanical clockwork which, for all that science knows, could go on just the same as it does, without there being consciousness, will, endeavor, pain and delight and responsibility connected with it — though they actually are. And the reason for this disconcerting situation is just this: that for the purpose of constructing the picture of the external world, we have used the greatly simplifying device of cutting our own personality out, removing it; hence it is gone, it has evaporated, it is ostensibly not needed.

Nimm an, du sitzest in einer Hochalpenlandschaft auf einer Bank am Wege. Rings um dich her Grashalden, mit Felsblöcken durchsprengt, am Talhang gegenüber ein Geröllfeld mit niedrigem Erlengestrüpp. Steil geböschtes Waldgebirge zu beiden Seiten des Tals bis hoch hinauf an die baumlosen Almmatten; und vor dir vom Talgrund aufsteigend der gewaltige firngekrönte Hochgipfel, dessen weiche Schneelenden und scharfkantige Felsgrate jetzt eben der letzte Strahl der scheidenden Sonne in zartestes Rosenrot taucht, wundervoll abgehoben von dem durchsichtig klaren, blaßblauen Firmament.

All das, was dein Auge sieht, ist - nach der bei uns gewöhnlichen Auffassung - mit geringen Veränderungen Jahrtausende lang v o r dir dagewesen. Über ein Weilchen — nicht lange — wirst du nicht mehr sein, und Wald, Fels und Himmel werden Jahrtausende n a c h dir noch unverändert dastehen.

Was ist's, das dich so plötzlich aus dem Nichts hervorgerufen, um dieses Schauspiel, das deiner nicht achtet, ein Weilchen zu genießen? Alle Bedingungen für dein Sein sind fast so alt wie der Fels. Jahrtausende lang haben Männer gestrebt, gelitten und gezeugt, haben Weiber unter Schmerzen geboren. Vor hundert Jahren vielleicht saß ein anderer an dieser Stelle, blickte gleich dir, Andacht und Wehmut im Herzen, auf zu den verglühenden Firnen. Er war vom Mann gezeugt, vom Weib geboren gleich dir. Er fühlte Schmerz und kurze Freude wie du. W a r es ein anderer? Warst du es nicht selbst? Was ist dies dein Selbst? Welche Bedingung mußte hinzutreten, damit dies Erzeugte du wurdest, gerade du, und nicht — ein anderer? Welchen klar faßbaren, n a t u r w i s s e n s c h a f t l i c h e n Sinn soll denn dieses „ein anderer“ eigentlich haben? Hätte sie, die jetzt deine Mutter ist, einem anderen beigewohnt und mit ihm einen Sohn gezeugt, und dein Vater desgleichen, wärest d u geworden? Oder lebtest du in ihnen, in deines Vaters Vater... schon seit Jahrtausenden? Und wenn auch dies, warum bist du nicht dein Bruder, dein Bru

If it were not so, if we were organisms so sensitive that a single atom, or even a few atoms, could make a perceptible impression on our senses - Heavens, what would life be like!

I am very astonished that the scientific picture of the real world around me is very deficient. It gives a lot of factual information, puts all our experience in a magnificently consistent order, but is ghastly silent about all that is really near to our heart, that really matters to us. It cannot tell us a word about red and blue, bitter and sweet, physical pain and physical delight; it knows nothing of beautiful and ugly, good or bad, God and eternity. Science sometimes pretends to answer questions in these domains, but the answers are very often so silly that we are not inclined to take them seriously.

The spread, both in and width and depth, of the multifarious branches of knowledge by during the last hundred odd years has confronted us with a queer dilemma. We feel clearly that we are only now beginning to acquire reliable material for welding together the sum total of all that is known into a whole; but, on the other hand, it has become next to impossible for a single mind fully to command more than a small specialized portion of it. I can see no other escape from this dilemma (lest our true who aim be lost for ever) than that some of us should venture to embark on a synthesis of facts and theories, albeit with second-hand and incomplete knowledge of some of them -and at the risk of making fools of ourselves.

Uma verdade matemática é intemporal, não ganha existência quando a descobrimos. Contudo, sua descoberta é um evento bem real, pode ser uma emoção, como um grande presente de uma fada.

It is by avoiding the rapid decay into the inert state of ‘equilibrium’ that an organism appears so enigmatic;

The second may well be beyond human understanding.

I am born into an environment — I know not whence I came nor whither I go nor who I am. This is my situation as yours, every single one of you. The fact that everyone always was in this same situation, and always will be, tells me nothing. Our burning question as to the whence and whither — all we can ourselves observe about it is the present environment. That is why we are eager to find out about it as much as we can. That is science, learning, knowledge; it is the true source of every spiritual endeavour of man. We try to find out as much as we can about the spatial and temporal surroundings of the place in which we find ourselves put by birth…

Thus we have come to the conclusion that an organism and all the biologically relevant processes that it experiences must have an extremely ‘many-atomic’ structure and must be safeguarded against haphazard, ‘single-atomic’ events attaining too great importance. That, the ‘naïve physicist’ tells us, is essential, so that the organism may, so to speak, have sufficiently accurate physical laws on which to draw for setting up its marvellously regular and well-ordered working.

There is obviously only one alternative, namely the unification of minds or consciousnesses. Their multiplicity is only apparent, in truth there is only one mind.

If we were bees, ants, or Lacedaemonian| warriors, to whom personal fear does not exist and cowardice is the most shameful thing in the world, warring would go on forever. But luckily we are only men — and cowards.

Like so many works that have had a great impact on human thinking, it makes points that, once they are grasped, have a ring of almost self-evident truth; yet they are still blindly ignored by a disconcertingly large proportion of people who should know better.

Science cannot tell us a word about why music delights us, of why and how an old song can move us to tears.

The reason for this is, that what we call thought (1) is itself an orderly thing, and (2) can only be applied to material, i.e. to perceptions or experiences, which have a certain degree of orderliness.