My best teachers were not the ones who knew all the answers, but those who were deeply excited by questions they couldn't answer.
Brian GreeneRead
Quantum mechanics broke the mold of the previous framework, classical mechanics, by establishing that the predictions of science are necessarily probabilistic.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Quantum mechanics introduced a new way of understanding the natural world that contrasts with classical mechanics, highlighting uncertainty in predictions.
This quote by Brian Greene emphasizes the revolutionary shift brought about by quantum mechanics in the field of physics. Unlike classical mechanics, which depended on deterministic predictions about physical systems, quantum mechanics reveals that nature is fundamentally probabilistic, meaning that outcomes cannot be precisely determined but are instead described in terms of likelihoods. This change not only transformed scientific thought but also deepened our understanding of the underlying principles governing the universe.
Themes
Quantum MechanicsProbabilityScienceClassical MechanicsUncertainty
In practice
Example use cases
In a lecture about the impact of quantum mechanics on modern technology.
More from Brian Greene
All quotes βAll mathematics is is a language that is well tuned, finely honed, to describe patterns; be it patterns in a star, which has five points that are regularly arranged, be it patterns in numbers like 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 that follow very regular progression.
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According to inflation, the more than 100 billion galaxies, sparkling throughout space like heavenly diamonds, are nothing but quantum mechanics writ large across the sky. To me, this realization is one of the greatest wonders of the modern scientific age.
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So: if you buy the notion that reality consists of the things in your freeze-frame mental image right now, and if you agree that your now is no more valid than the now of someone located far away in space who can move freely, then reality encompasses all of the events in spacetime.
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Physicists are more like avant-garde composers, willing to bend traditional rules... Mathematicians are more like classical composers.
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