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J. L. Synge
(23 Mar 1897 - 30 Mar 1995)
Irish mathematician and theoretical physicist who is known for his work on the geometry of relativity, but also had an international career that included ballistics research for the U.S. Army.
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Science Quotes by J. L. Synge (11 quotes)
[The intellectual] is not religious in the sense of the ordinary man is religious, for the religion of the ordinary man is man-centred and takes faith as its cornerstone. The intellectual is sparing of faith, reserving it for those things which seem, for the time at least, to be scientifically demonstrated, such as the results of repeatable experiments or natural laws tested many times. But in another sense the intellectual is more religious than the ordinary man, because he is passionately interested in the nature of things. He wants to take everything in pieces, actually or figuratively, in order to discover the plan according to which it was constructed. If an active wonder with regard to the universe is a criterion for religion, then the intellectual is very religious indeed.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 28.
Any modern schoolboy, wrestling joyously and earnestly with some problem in the geometry of the triangle, is far closer to Euclid than he could possibly get by studying any history of Greek mathematics.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 23.
Can it be that all great scientists of the past were really playing a game, a game in which the rules are written not by man but by God? . . . When we play we do not ask why we are playing—we just play. Play serves no moral code except that strange code which for some unknown reason, imposes itself on the play. . . . You will search in vain through scientific literature for hints of motivation. And as for the strange moral code observed by scientists, what could be stranger than an abstract regard for truth in a world which is full of concealment, deception, and taboos…? . . . In submitting to your consideration the idea that the human is at its best when playing, I am myself playing, and that makes me feel that what I am saying may have in it an element of truth.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 40-41.
Does not human decency demand that we study with respect and admiration the great men whose labours laid the foundations of modern science? … Commonsense and emotion, hand in hand, shout derision on anyone so foolish as to raise objections against the study of the history of science.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 20.
I believe that until comparatively recent times, say a hundred years ago, few scientists would have regarded the word useful as applicable to their work. … If Euclid and Newton did scoff at utility, how useful their work now appears! Where would modern technology be without geometry, without dynamics, without the differential calculus?
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 31-32.
I recall words spoken by the late Professor H. N. Russell, the Princeton astronomer: the pursuit of an idea is as exciting as the pursuit of a whale, but when the problem has been solved, the work of writing up your paper is as hard and monotonous as cutting up blubber.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 41.
In submitting to your consideration the idea that the human mind is at best when playing, I am myself playing, and that makes me feel that what I am saying may have in it an element of truth.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 42.
Really great figures in science cast long shadows. During the eighteenth century men said: ‘That’s not the way Newton looked at it!’ And to-day men may say: ‘That’s not how Einstein looked at it!’ Authority is built up, and history takes the place of thought.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 22.
Stripping down to essentials is the essence of mathematics. … Reduction to essentials is what makes…a mathematician. … He doesn’t need roughage in his diet if he is a mathematician.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 25.
The northern ocean is beautiful, ... and beautiful the delicate intricacy of the snowflake before it melts and perishes, but such beauties are as nothing to him who delights in numbers, spurning alike the wild irrationality of life and baffling complexity of nature’s laws.
— J. L. Synge
In Kandelman's Krim: A Realistic Fantasy (1957), 101.
To me the intellectual must be a scientist, for only a scientist can appreciate to the full the cosmic triviality of man. Your so-called intellectual in author or playwright is no true intellectual in the present sense—he is only an ordinary man gone astray, still thinking about man, even if he thinks pessimistically about him.
— J. L. Synge
From Lecture (28 Nov 1957) in the Queen’s University, Belfast, 'Is the Study of its History a Brake on the Progress of Science', printed in Hermethena (1958), 19, 27.
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) -- 
