A Quote by Richard P. Feynman

So my antagonist said, "Is it impossible that there are flying saucers? Can you prove that it's impossible?" "No," I said, "I can't prove it's impossible. It's just very unlikely." At that he said, "You are very unscientific. If you can't prove it impossible then how can you say that it's unlikely?" But that is the way that is scientific. It is scientific only to say what is more likely and what less likely, and not to be proving all the time the possible and impossible.

Richard P. Feynman

Quote Topics

Antagonist Flying Flying Saucers How Impossible Just Less Likely More Only Possible Possible And Impossible Prove Prove It Proving Said Say Scientific Then Time Unlikely Very Way

Quote Author

Richard P. Feynman
American - Physicist
May 11, 1918 - February 15, 1988

It is scientific only to say what is more likely and what less likely, and not to be proving all the time the possible and impossible.

Richard P. Feynman

Often-times it's madness, not genius that moves the world forward. Who else but the mad would reach so far, stretching for the impossible and, in so doing, prove the impossible possible!

James Rollins

Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary. Impossible is nothing

Muhammad Ali

If the objective of testing were to prove that a program is free of bugs, then not only would testing be practically impossible, but it would also be theoretically impossible.

Boris Beizer

Listen, running against Senator Graham is indeed a tough climb, but it is equally a hill worth climbing. I've faced things people have deemed impossible my entire life, and this is yet another journey where I prove that in America, the impossible is always possible.

Jaime Harrison

But there's a world beyond what we can see and touch, and that world lives by its own laws. What may be impossible in this very ordinary world is very possible there, and sometimes the boundaries between the two worlds disappear, and then who can say what is possible and impossible?

David Eddings

It's not the cost (although that pinches), or the time (though that grinds). After a while, it's the sheer galling indignity of being asked to prove, pay, and prove all over again that you're a worthy parent. Any true parent will tell you that that is impossible to prove in advance.

Scott Simon

A professional knows what's impossible. If you know it's impossible, it is impossible. But if you don't know it's impossible, suddenly it is possible.

Yossi Ghinsberg

I don't listen to people who say my dreams are impossible; I just work to prove them wrong.

Liya Kebede

It's impossible for a Democrat to be a failure. It's impossible for a Democrat to be a reprobate. It's impossible for a Democrat to be a mess. It just isn't possible, as far as the mind-set of the media is concerned.

Rush Limbaugh

And make no mistake: irony tyrannizes us. The reason why our pervasive cultural irony is at once so powerful and so unsatisfying is that an ironist is impossible to pin down. All U.S. irony is based on an implicit "I don’t really mean what I’m saying." So what does irony as a cultural norm mean to say? That it’s impossible to mean what you say? That maybe it’s too bad it’s impossible, but wake up and smell the coffee already? Most likely, I think, today’s irony ends up saying: "How totally banal of you to ask what I really mean.

David Foster Wallace

Maybe one of the jobs of theory or philosophy is to elevate principles that seem impossible, or that have the status of the impossible, to stand by them and will them, even when it looks highly unlikely that they'll ever be realised. But that's ok, it's a service.

Judith Butler

You go through big chunks of time where you're just thinking, 'this is impossible - oh,this is impossible'. And then you just keep going and keep going, and you sort of do the impossible.