Gerald Feinberg

Gerald Feinberg (27 May 1933 – 21 April 1992) was a Columbia University physicist, futurist and popular science author. Known for his prediction of the existence of the muon neutrino, he was the author of four books, a co-author of a book (with the chemist Robert Shapiro), and the co-editor of a book (with Jeremy Bernstein).

Quotes

  • Developments in the 20th century have made the future of life, especially human life, on earth somewhat more uncertain than it previously was. I refer of course to the possiblity of all-out nuclear war. and to the possibility of environmental disaster on a global scale.
    • Consequences of Growth: The Prospects for a Limitless Future (Seabird Press, 1977), ISBN 9780816493265, pp. 24-25

Solid Clues: Quantum Physics, Molecular Biology, and the Future of Science (1985)

A Touchstone Book, Simon & Schuster, ISBN 9780671456085
  • To determine what science will be in the future, we need a conception of what science is. I define science as "the systematic effort to understand natural phenomena."
    • p. 16
  • The influence of the methods of calculation on the results that scientists obtain is so profound that particular methods take on a life of their own; they may shape the overall picture that scientists have of some fields as much as or more than the basic ideas. In the late 1940s the American physicist Richard Feynman introduced a mathematical method for dealing with some of the equations of quantum field theory. His method involves a systematic use of certain pictures, now called Feynman diagrams, as a guide to how the calculations are done.
    • p. 24

Quotes about Gerald Feinberg

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