Gravitation is, so far, not understandable in terms of other phenomena.
Interpretation
Gravitation is a fundamental force that cannot be fully explained by other known physical phenomena.
In this quote, Richard P. Feynman highlights the enigmatic nature of gravitation, suggesting that it stands alone as a fundamental force of nature, not easily relatable to other physical laws. This acknowledgment of its complexity underscores the importance of gravitation in understanding the universe and reflects on the limits of our current scientific knowledge.
In practice
In a science lecture discussing the fundamental forces of nature.
The philosophical question before us is, when we make an observation of our track in the past, does the result of our observation become real in the same sense that the final state would be defined if an outside observer were to make the observation?
We seem gradually to be groping toward an understanding of the world of subatomic particles, but we really do not know how far we have yet to go in this task.
The first principle is that you must not fool yourself and you are the easiest person to fool.
It has not yet become obvious to me that there's no real problem. I cannot define the real problem; therefore, I suspect there's no real problem, but I'm not sure there's no real problem.
For far more marvelous is the truth than any artists of the past imagined it. Why do the poets of the present not speak of it? What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if he were a man, but if he is an immense spinning sphere of methane and ammonia must be silent?
Science is a way to teach how something gets to be known, what is not known, to what extent things are known (for nothing is known absolutely), how to handle doubt and uncertainty, what the rules of evidence are, how to think about things so that judgments can be made, how to distinguish truth from fraud, and from show.
Sometimes I had to spend a whole day mixing a boiling mass with a heavy iron rod nearly as large as myself. I would be broken with fatigue at the day's end. Other days, on the contrary, the work would be a most minute and delicate fractional crystallization, in the effort to concentrate the radium.
Brain studies of mental workouts in which you sustain a single, chosen focus show that the more you detach from what's distracting you and refocus on what you should be paying attention to, the stronger this brain circuitry becomes.
The facts will eventually test all our theories, and they form, after all, the only impartial jury to which we can appeal.
On Friday the 13th, April 2029, an asteroid large enough to fill the Rose Bowl as though it were an egg cup will fly so close to Earth that it will dip below the altitude of our communication satellites. We did not name this asteroid Bambi. Instead, we named it Apophis, after the Egyptian god of darkness and death.
The scientific spirit is of more value than its products, and irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.
We have to understand the ubiquity of energy in everything we do. Energy is core to our economy and it brings with it environmental challenges, and it's core to our security challenges.
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