5 David Deutsch Quotes on Theory

David Deutsch quotes on theory

2. Our best theories are not only truer than common sense, they make more sense than common sense...

3. The truly privileged theories are not the ones referring to any particular scale of size or complexity, nor the ones situated at any particular level of the predictive hierarchy-but the ones that contain the deepest explanations.

4. The overwhelming majority of theories are rejected because they contain bad explanations, not because they fail experimental tests.

5. The quantum theory of parallel universes is not the problem, it is the solution. It is not some troublesome, optional interpretation emerging from arcane theoretical considerations. It is the explanation-the only one that is tenable-of a remarkable and counter-intuitive reality. (Ch. 2)

18. The theory of computation has traditionally been studied almost entirely in the abstract, as a topic in pure mathematics. This is to miss the point of it. Computers are physical objects, and computations are physical processes. What computers can or cannot compute is determined by the laws of physics alone, and not by pure mathematics.