#success
"These lectures have shown very clearly the difference between Roger and me. He's a Platonist and I'm a positivist. He's worried that Schrödinger's cat is in a quantum state, where it is half alive and half dead. He feels that can't correspond to reality. But that doesn't bother me. I don't demand that a theory correspond to reality because I don't know what it is. Reality is not a quality you can test with litmus paper. All I'm concerned with is that the theory should predict the results of measurements. Quantum theory does this very successfully. It predicts that the result of an observation is either that the cat is alive or that it is dead. It is like you can't be slightly pregnant: you either are or you aren't."
React to this quote
More by Stephen Hawking
See allResonant Thoughts
"translate aspects of culture never successfully recorded by the scientist, although often caught by the artist, into some form of communication sufficiently clear and sufficiently unequivocal to satis…"
— Margaret Mead
ethnology1901–1978
Explore Further
Related Quotes
"In the case of El Salvador, after the massacre in El Mozote, where a U.S.-trained battalion massacred more …"
— Allan Nairn"The function which the wing performs against the air when the air is motionless is the same as that of the …"
— Leonardo da Vinci"Miss Marple twinkled at me."
— Agatha Christie"Manufacturing is the most important...route to prosperity."
— Ha-Joon Chang"Maybe the guy drank red wine or beer with breakfast instead of milk."
— José Mourinho"I was not intrigued with the accouterments of success and fame, the furs, jewels, expensive automobiles and…"
— Sophia Loren

