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Some dreamers demand that scientists only discover things that can be used for good. That is impossible. Science gives us a powerful vocabulary, and it is impossible to produce a vocabulary with which one can only say nice things.

Scientists who play by someone else's rules don't have much chance of making discoveries.

We especially need imagination in science.

It is a profound and necessary truth that the deep things in science are not found because they are useful: they are found because it was possible to find them.

It is a profound and necessary truth that the deep things in science are not found because they are useful; they were found because it was possible to find them.

The very nature of science is discoveries, and the best of those discoveries are the ones you don't expect.

My own beliefs are that the road to a scientific discovery is seldom direct and that it does not necessarily require great expertise. In fact, I am convinced that often a newcomer to a field has a great advantage because he is ignorant and does not know all the complicated reasons why a particular experiment should not be attempted.

Science is the refusal to believe on the basis of hope.

Throughout history, people have studied pure science from a desire to understand the universe rather than practical applications for commercial gain. But their discoveries later turned out to have great practical benefits.