"The theorist's method involves his using as his foundation general postulates or 'principles' from which he can deduce conclusions. His work thus falls into two parts. He must first discover his principles and then draw the conclusions which follow from them.... The first of these tasks, namely, that of establishing the principles which are to serve as the starting point of his deduction, is of an entirely different nature. Here there is no method capable of being learned and systematically applied so that it leads to the goal. The scientist has to worm these general principles out of nature by perceiving in comprehensive complexes of empirical facts certain general features which permit of precise formulation.
"Once this formulation is accomplished, inference follows on inference, often revealing unforeseen relations which extend far beyond the province of the reality from which the principles were drawn. But as long as no principles are found on which to base the deduction, the individual empirical fact is of no use to the theorist; indeed he cannot even do anything with the isolated general laws abstracted from experience. He will remain helpless in the face of separate results of empirical research, until principles which he can make the basis of deductive reasoning have revealed themselves to him....
"Planck introduced into physics the quantum hypothesis, which has since received brilliant confirmation. With this quantum hypothesis he dethroned classical physics as applied to the case where sufficiently small masses move at sufficiently low speeds and sufficiently high rates of acceleration, so that today laws of motion propounded by Galileo and Newton can only be accepted as limiting laws. In spite of assiduous efforts, however, the theorists have not yet succeeded in replacing the principles of mechanics by others which fit in with Planck's law of heat radiation or the quantum hypothesis. No matter how definitely it has been established that heat is to be explained by molecular motion, we have nevertheless to admit today that our position in regard to the fundamental laws of this motion resembles that of the astronomers before Newton in regard to the motion of the planets.
"I have just now referred to a group of facts for the theoretical treatment of which the principles are lacking. But it may equally well happen that clearly formulated principles lead to conclusions that fall entirely, or almost entirely, outside the sphere of reality accessible to our experience. In that case we need many more years of empirical research to ascertain whether theoretical principles correspond with reality. We have an instance of this in the theory of relativity."
P.221-223, IDEAS AND OPINIONS by Albert Einstein (1954, 1982)
"The theorist's method involves his using as his foundation general postulates or 'principles' from which he can deduce conclusions. His work thus falls into two parts. He must first discover his principles and then draw the conclusions which follow from them.... The first of these tasks, namely, that of establishing the principles which are to serve as the starting point of his deduction, is of an entirely different nature. Here there is no method capable of being learned and systematically applied so that it leads to the goal. The scientist has to worm these general principles out of nature by perceiving in comprehensive complexes of empirical facts certain general features which permit of precise formulation.
"Once this formulation is accomplished, inference follows on inference, often revealing unforeseen relations which extend far beyond the province of the reality from which the principles were drawn. But as long as no principles are found on which to base the deduction, the individual empirical fact is of no use to the theorist; indeed he cannot even do anything with the isolated general laws abstracted from experience. He will remain helpless in the face of separate results of empirical research, until principles which he can make the basis of deductive reasoning have revealed themselves to him....
"Planck introduced into physics the quantum hypothesis, which has since received brilliant confirmation. With this quantum hypothesis he dethroned classical physics as applied to the case where sufficiently small masses move at sufficiently low speeds and sufficiently high rates of acceleration, so that today laws of motion propounded by Galileo and Newton can only be accepted as limiting laws. In spite of assiduous efforts, however, the theorists have not yet succeeded in replacing the principles of mechanics by others which fit in with Planck's law of heat radiation or the quantum hypothesis. No matter how definitely it has been established that heat is to be explained by molecular motion, we have nevertheless to admit today that our position in regard to the fundamental laws of this motion resembles that of the astronomers before Newton in regard to the motion of the planets.
"I have just now referred to a group of facts for the theoretical treatment of which the principles are lacking. But it may equally well happen that clearly formulated principles lead to conclusions that fall entirely, or almost entirely, outside the sphere of reality accessible to our experience. In that case we need many more years of empirical research to ascertain whether theoretical principles correspond with reality. We have an instance of this in the theory of relativity."
P.221-223, IDEAS AND OPINIONS by Albert Einstein (1954, 1982)
