QuoteProject
I believe all complicated phenomena can be explained by simpler scientific principles.
Linus Pauling
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Complicated phenomena can ultimately be understood through basic scientific principles.

In this quote, Linus Pauling expresses the belief that even the most complex occurrences in nature can be broken down into simpler scientific concepts. This perspective emphasizes the importance of fundamental principles in understanding and explaining the intricacies of the world around us, suggesting that complexity does not exist without underlying simplicity.

Themes

ScienceSimplicityComplexityUnderstandingPrinciples

In practice

Example use cases

This quote can be used in a scientific lecture to inspire students to look for simplicity in complex problems.

More from Linus Pauling

Every aspect of the world today - even politics and international relations - is affected by chemistry.
Linus PaulingRead
Although physicians, as part of their training, are taught that the dosage of a drug that is prescribed for the patient must be very carefully determined and controlled, they seem to have difficulty in remembering that the same principle applies to the vitamins.
Linus PaulingRead
I like people. I like animals, too-whales and quail, dinosaurs and dodos. But I like human beings especially, and I am unhappy that the pool of human germ plasm, which determines the nature of the human race, is deteriorating.
Linus PaulingRead
Just one living cell in the human body is, more complex than New York City.
Linus PaulingRead
The way to get good ideas is to get lots of ideas and throw the bad ones away.
Linus PaulingRead
By the proper intakes of vitamins and other nutrients and by following a few other healthful practices from youth or middle age on, you can, I believe, extend your life and years of well-being by twenty-five or even thirty-five years.
Linus PaulingRead

Similar quotes

An attempt to study the evolution of living organisms without reference to cytology would be as futile as an account of stellar evolution which ignored spectroscopy.
John B. S. HaldaneRead
It is astonishing that human brains, which evolved to cope with the everyday world, have been able to grasp the counterintuitive mysteries of the cosmos and the quantum.
Martin ReesRead
Mankind will not forever remain on Earth but, in the pursuit of light and space, will first timidly emerge from the bounds of the atmosphere and then advance until he has conquered the whole of circumsolar space.
Konstantin TsiolkovskyRead
The physicist is like someone who's watching people playing chess and, after watching a few games, he may have worked out what the moves in the game are. But understanding the rules is just a trivial preliminary on the long route from being a novice to being a grand master. So even if we understand all the laws of physics, then exploring their consequences in the everyday world where complex structures can exist is a far more daunting task, and that's an inexhaustible one I'm sure.
Martin ReesRead
The nuclear approach I'm involved in is called a traveling-wave reactor, which uses waste uranium for fuel. There's a lot of things that have to go right for that dream to come true - many decades of building demo plants, proving the economics are right. But if it does, you could have cheaper energy with no CO2 emissions.
Bill GatesRead
In the past, there was active discrimination against women in science. That has now gone, and although there are residual effects, these are not enough to account for the small numbers of women, particularly in mathematics and physics.
Stephen HawkingRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.