Re: Michaelson quote (was Re: End of Science)

[PPARKER@TWSUVM.UC.TWSU.EDU]

> Date: Tue, 30 Jul 96 14:42:05 CDT
> From: rick_strickert@pc.radian.com
>
>
> > George, it would be interesting to have a citation for this.
>
> Here's one Michaelson quote:
>
>       "Physical discoveries in the future are a matter of the sixth
>        decimal place."
>
>          Albert Michaelson (1852-1956)
>          taken from _A Dictionary of Scientific Quotations_, Alan L.
>          Mackay, Adam Hilger/IOP Publishing Ltd., Bristol, 1991.
>
>     Unfortunately, Mackay doesn't list a primary reference for this
>     quote.

> From Bartlett's 14th edition (omitted from 15th and 16th), citing
Michaelson's address at the dedication ceremony for the Ryerson
Physical Laboratory at the University of Chicago in 1894: "The more
important fundamental laws and facts of physical science have all
been discovered, and these are now so firmly established that the
possibility of their ever being supplanted in consequence of new
discoveries is exceedingly remote. ... Our future discoveries must
be looked for in the sixth place of decimals."
   Sure sounds like Horgan, doesn't it? Too bad for us he didn't read
some history first, difficult as that might have been.

------------------------------
Random quote for this second:
  In judging others, folks will work overtime for no pay.
  ---Charles Edwin Carruthers