Niels Bohr (1885–1962,) fully Niels Hendrik David Bohr, was a Danish physicist and pioneer in quantum physics. This winner of the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physics was a towering figure of 20th-century physics.
Born in Copenhagen, Bohr was the first to apply quantum theory in a consistent framework to explain the arrangement of electrons in the atom. He proposed that atoms were composed of a small, dense nucleus that is orbited by electrons at a fixed distance from the nucleus and that elements are determined by the number of electrons in the outer orbits of their atoms. When electrons move from one energy level to another, they emit discrete quanta of energy.
Bohr’s model accounted for the chemical properties of the elements and the main features in their spectra. Bohr’s theory has become the foundation of modern quantum-mechanical models. Bohr also developed the revolutionary principle of complementarity: that things like light or electrons can have a dual nature—as a particle and a wave, for example—but we can only experience one aspect of their nature at a time.
Bohr escaped from German-occupied Denmark in 1943 and helped Britain and the U.S. develop the atom bomb. He later became concerned about the implications of atomic weapons and stressed the need to study the peaceful applications of atomic energy.
Bohr’s notable written works include The Philosophical Writings of Niels Bohr (1931) and Atomic Physics and Human Knowledge (1961.)
In 1954, Bohr helped establish CERN, the European particle physics facility. His son, Aage Niels Bohr (1922–2009,) was also an atomic physicist nucleus and a winner of the 1975 Nobel Prize in Physics.
More: Wikipedia • READ: Works by Niels Bohr
Every valuable human being must be a radical and a rebel, for what he must aim at is to make things better than they are.
—Niels Bohr
A physicist is just an atom’s way of looking at itself.
—Niels Bohr
Never express yourself more clearly than you are able to think.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Thoughts, Thought, Thinking
An expert is someone who knows some of the worst mistakes, which can be made, in a very narrow field.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Experts
There are two kinds of truth, small truth and great truth. You can recognize a small truth because its opposite is a falsehood. The opposite of a great truth is another truth.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Truth
The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Truth, Wisdom
Of course I don’t believe in it. But I understand that it brings you luck whether you believe in it or not.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Belief
Every great and deep difficulty bears in itself its own solution. It forces us to change our thinking in order to find it.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Difficulty, Thinking
Opposites are not contradictory but complementary.
—Niels Bohr
Prediction is very difficult, especially about the future.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Prophecy
If anybody says he can think about quantum physics without getting giddy, that only shows he has not understood the first thing about them.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Science, Scientists
An expert is a person who has found out by his own painful experience all the mistakes that one can make in a very narrow field.
—Niels Bohr
An expert is a person who has found out by his own painful experience all the mistakes that one can make in a very narrow field.
—Niels Bohr
Attack life, it’s going to kill you anyway.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Living, Courage, Life
There are trivial truths and the great truths. The opposite of a trivial truth is plainly false. The opposite of a great truth is also true.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Truth, Technology
There are some things so serious you have to laugh at them.
—Niels Bohr
Topics: Laughter
We all agree that your theory is crazy, but is it crazy enough?
—Niels Bohr
Technology has advanced more in the last thirty years than in the previous two thousand. The exponential increase in advancement will only continue.
—Niels Bohr
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