...there is no prescribed route to follow to arrive at a new idea. You have to make the intuitive leap. read more

...there is no prescribed route to follow to arrive at a new idea. You have to make the intuitive leap. But the difference is that once you've made the intuitive leap you have to justify it by filling in the intermediate steps. In my case, it often happens that I have an idea, but then I try to fill in the intermediate steps and find that they don't work, so I have to give it up.

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.

I find sitting at a specially equipped desk in front of some pretty ugly plastics and staring at a little read more

I find sitting at a specially equipped desk in front of some pretty ugly plastics and staring at a little window is a very unnatural event.

One has to be able to count if only so that at fifty one doesn't marry a girl of twenty. read more

One has to be able to count if only so that at fifty one doesn't marry a girl of twenty. - The Zykovs, 1914.

Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under read more

Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.

Guide to understanding a net.addict's day: Slow day: didn't have much to do, so spent three hours on usenet. Busy read more

Guide to understanding a net.addict's day: Slow day: didn't have much to do, so spent three hours on usenet. Busy day: managed to work in three hours of usenet. Bad day: barely squeezed in three hours of usenet.

Like the furtive collectors of stolen art, we [cell biologists] are forced to be lonely admirers of spectacular architecture, exquisite read more

Like the furtive collectors of stolen art, we [cell biologists] are forced to be lonely admirers of spectacular architecture, exquisite symmetry, dramas of violence and death, mobility, self-sacrifice and, yes, rococo sex.

Science has made us gods even before we are worthy of being men.

Science has made us gods even before we are worthy of being men.

Everything that can be invented has been invented.

Everything that can be invented has been invented.