Demarcate Quotes (1 quote)
I believe that the laws of physics such as they are, such as they have been taught to us, are not the inevitable truth. We believe in the laws, or we experiment* with them each day, yet I believe it is possible to consider the existence of a universe in which these laws would be extended, changed a very tiny bit, in a precisely demarcated way. Consequently we immediately achieve extraordinary results, different yet certainly not far from the truth. After all, every century or two a new scientist comes along who changes the laws of physics, isn’t that so? After Newton there were many who did, and there were even more after Einstein, right? We have to wait to see how the laws in question will change over time, then… In any case, without being a scientist myself I can still hope to reach parallel results, if you will, in art.
Epigraph, in James Housefield, Playing with Earth and Sky: Astronomy, Geography, and the Art of Marcel Duchamp (2016), ix. As modified by James Housefield, from Guy Viau interview of Marcel Duchamp on Canadian Radio Television (17 July 1960), 'Simply Change Your Name', translated by Sarah Skinner Kilborne in Tout-Fait: the Marcel Duchamp Studies Online Journal 2, no. 4 (2002). [*Note: Where the Housefield in the Epigraph uses the word “experiment”, the original French gives “expérimentons”, which in the unmodified translation by Sarah Skinner Kilborne is written more correctly as “experience.” —Webmaster]
In science it often happens that scientists say, 'You know that's a really good argument; my position is mistaken,' and then they would actually change their minds and you never hear that old view from them again. They really do it. It doesn't happen as often as it should, because scientists are human and change is sometimes painful. But it happens every day. I cannot recall the last time something like that happened in politics or religion.
(1987) -- 
