Niels Bohr (1885-1962)
Niels Bohr on how he came to be a theoretical physicist:
“And now we come to the first point, namely, whether I always had thought of a career in theoretical physics . . . [My brother] was in all respects more clever than I; he also was a great mathematician you know. But I was considered something of a different character because I was from first youth able to say something about philosophical questions. For example, you have in biological science the question of teleology. It is a very odd thing that actually a tree grows so that the branches are thick enough to carry the various things. They have a very big stem and smaller and smaller and so on. But I just understood very early that this was so, that one couldn't put the question, because if the branches were not able to carry the things, there was no tree. But it is a very essential point to see in teleology is. And my father was a physiologist, and he, at any rate, understood that something was be expected from me. But I was not set for a career in theoretical physics -- that was just due to chance.”
Read the full interview here, and find this photo here in our archives.
Credit: Photograph by A. B. Lagrelius and Westphal, courtesy AIP Emilio Segre Visual Archives, W. F. Meggers Gallery of Nobel Laureates
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