You see, I get such fun out of thinking that I don't want to destroy this most pleasant machine that makes life such a big kick.
Interpretation
The quote expresses joy in intellectual curiosity and the importance of appreciating life.
Richard P. Feynman conveys the delight he finds in thinking and exploring ideas, suggesting that this joy is so profound that he wouldn't want to harm or diminish the 'machine'—which can be interpreted as the mind or life's experiences—that enriches his existence. It emphasizes the value of curiosity and the pleasure it brings in navigating life's complexities.
In practice
In a motivational speech about the importance of intellectual curiosity.
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.
Christ said, "Resist not evil", and we do not understand it until we discover that it is not only moral but actually the best policy, for anger is loss of energy to the man who displays it. You should not allow your minds to come into those brain-combinations of anger and hatred.
A time will come when you will find that in gaining a brief joy you have lost your peace forever.
I've always said that at the end of the day, on a legal issue, I think a wise old woman and a wise old man are going to reach the same conclusion.
They deem me mad because I will not sell my days for gold; and I deem them mad because they think my days have a price.
It is not my prayer and humility that you cause things to go as you wish, but by acquiring a knowledge of natural laws.
Many seek and never see, anyone can tell them why. O they weep and O they cry and never take until they try unless they try it in their sleep and never some until they die. I ask many, they ask me. This is a great mystery.
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