The scientist is not responsible for the laws of nature. It is his job to find out how these laws operate. It is the scientist's job to find the ways in which these laws can serve the human will. However, it is not the scientist's job to determine whether a hydrogen bomb should be constructed, whether it should be used, or how it should be used. This responsibility rests with the American people and with their chosen representatives.
Interpretation
Scientists discover and explain natural laws, but ethical decisions about their applications belong to society.
In this quote, Edward Teller emphasizes the distinction between the role of scientists in understanding the natural world and the ethical responsibilities that come with the application of scientific knowledge. While scientists can elucidate how various laws of nature work, they are not accountable for the moral implications or societal decisions regarding the use of such knowledge, particularly in cases like the construction and use of weapons. That responsibility lies with society as a whole and its representatives.
In practice
In a debate about genetic engineering, one might quote this to highlight the ethical responsibilities of scientists.
In the history of physics, there have been three great revolutions in thought that first seemed absurd yet proved to be true. The first proposed that the earth, instead of being stationary, was moving around at a great and variable speed in a universe that is much bigger than it appears to our immediate perception. That proposal, I believe, was first made by Aristarchos two millenia ago ... Remarkably enough, the name Aristarchos in Greek means best beginning.
The science of today is the technology of tomorrow.
Today, nothing is unusual about a scientific discovery's being followed soon after by a technical application: The discovery of electrons led to electronics; fission led to nuclear energy. But before the 1880's, science played almost no role in the advances of technology. For example, James Watt developed the first efficient steam engine long before science established the equivalence between mechanical heat and energy.
Secrecy, once accepted, becomes an addiction.
No endeavor that is worthwhile is simple in prospect; if it is right, it will be simple in retrospect.
I tried to contribute to the defeat of the Soviets. If I contributed 1%, it is 1% of something enormous.
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.
More than two decades after the birth of Louise Brown, and all the hysteria that surrounded her 'test tube' conception, we should know that institutions, not technologies, create dystopias. Artificially conceived children are everywhere, beloved by their parents, and they haven't radically altered our world.
Even if I stumble on to the absolute truth of any aspect of the universe, I will not realise my luck and instead will spend my life trying to find flaws in this understanding - such is the role of a scientist.
We are here to celebrate the completion of the first survey of the entire human genome. Without a doubt, this is the most important, most wondrous map ever produced by human kind.
If there is anything more frightening than the threat of global nuclear war, it is the certainty that humans not only stand on the verge of producing new life forms but may soon be able to tinker with them as if they were vintage convertibles or bonsai trees.
Most discoveries even today are a combination of serendipity and of searching.
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