🏅Nobel Lectures (1930-1939)

"More than one way for doing the same thing is provided by the natural constitution of the nervous system. This luxury of means of compassing a given combination seems to offer the means of restitution of an act after its impairment or loss in one of its several forms." (Charles Sherrington, "Inhibition as a Coordinative Factor", [Nobel lecture] 1932) 

"I should like here to discuss the simpler kinds of particles and to consider what can be inferred about them from purely theoretical arguments. The simpler kinds of particle are: (i) the photons or light-quanta, of which light is composed; (ii) the electrons, and the recently discovered positrons (which appear to be a sort of mirror image of the electrons, differing from them only in the sign of their electric charge) ; (iii) the heavier particles - protons and neutrons." (Paul A M Dirac, "Theory of Electrons and Positrons", [Nobel lecture] 1933) 

"If we accept the view of complete symmetry between positive and negative electric charge so far as concerns the fundamental laws of Nature, we must regard it rather as an accident that the Earth (and presumably the whole solar system), contains a preponderance of negative electrons and positive protons. It is quite possible that for some of the stars it is the other way about, these stars being built up mainly of positrons and negative protons. In fact, there may be half the stars of each kind. The two kinds of stars would both show exactly the same spectra, and there would be no way of distinguishing them by present astronomical methods." (Paul A M Dirac, "Theory of Electrons and Positrons", [Nobel lecture] 1933) 

"Matter has been found by experimental physicists to be made up of small particles of various kinds, the particles of each kind being all exactly alike. Some of these kinds have definitely been shown to be composite, that is, to be composed of other particles of a simpler nature. But there are other kinds which have not been shown to be composite and which one expects will never be shown to be composite, so that one considers them as elementary and fundamental."  (Paul A M Dirac, "Theory of Electrons and Positrons", [Nobel lecture] 1933) 

"To get an interpretation of some modern experimental results one must suppose that particles can be created and annihilated. Thus if a particle is observed to come out from another particle, one can no longer be sure that the latter is composite. The former may have been created. The distinction between elementary particles and composite particles now becomes a matter of convenience. This reason alone is sufficient to compel one to give up the attractive philosophical idea that all matter is made up of one kind, or perhaps two kinds of bricks." (Paul A M Dirac, "Theory of Electrons and Positrons", [Nobel lecture] 1933) 

"A living cell requires energy not only for all its functions, but also for the maintenance of its structure. Without energy life would be extinguished instantaneously, and the cellular fabric would collapse." (Albert Szent-Györgyi,"Oxidation, Energy Transfer, and Vitamins", [Nobel lecture] 1937) 

"The goddess of learning is fabled to have sprung full-grown from the brain of Zeus, but it is seldom that a scientific conception is born in its final form, or owns a single parent. More often it is the product of a series of minds, each in turn modifying the ideas of those that came before, and providing material for those that come after. The electron is no exception." (George P Thomson, "Electronic Waves", [Nobel lecture] 1937)

"Although the problem of transmuting chemical elements into each other is much older than a satisfactory definition of the very concept of chemical element, it is well known that the first and most important step towards its solution was made only nineteen years ago by the late Lord Rutherford, who started the method of the nuclear bombardments." (Enrico Fermi, [Nobel lecture] 1938) 

"No individual is alone responsible for a single stepping stone along the path of progress, and where the path is smooth progress is most rapid." (Ernest Lawrence, [Nobel lecture], 1939)