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Hermann von Helmholtz Biography

Hermann von Helmholtz

Hermann Ludwig Ferdinand von Helmholtz (August 31, 1821 – September 8, 1894) was a German physician and physicist who made significant contributions in several scientific fields. The largest German association of research institutions, the Helmholtz Association, is named after him.

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Hermann von Helmholtz Quotes

Black is real sensation, even if it is produced by entire absence of light. The sensation of black is distinctly different from the lack of all sensations.

Black, Lack, Light, Real, Sensation

A raised weight can produce work, but in doing so it must necessarily sink from its height, and, when it has fallen as deep as it can fall, its gravity remains as before, but it can no longer do work.

Deep, Fall, Height, Remains, Weight

When young Galileo, then a student at Pisa, noticed one day during divine service a chandelier swinging backwards and forwards, and convinced himself, by counting his pulse, that the duration of the oscillations was independent of the arc through which it moved, who could know that this discovery would eventually put it in our power, by means of the pendulum, to attain an accuracy in the measurement of time till then deemed impossible, and would enable the storm-tossed seaman in the most distant oceans to determine in what degree of longitude he was sailing?

Backwards, Eventually, Mean, Ocean, Service, Time

During the first half of the present century we had an Alexander von Humboldt, who was able to scan the scientific knowledge of his time in its details, and to bring it within one vast generalization. At the present juncture, it is obviously very doubtful whether this task could be accomplished in a similar way, even by a mind with gifts so peculiarly suited for the purpose as Humboldt's was, and if all his time and work were devoted to the purpose.

Alexander, Gifts, Juncture, Knowledge, Mind, Science

The quantity of force which can be brought into action in the whole of Nature is unchangeable, and can neither be increased nor diminished.

Action, Brought, Diminished, Force, Quantity

As you are aware, no perceptions obtained by the senses are merely sensations impressed on our nervous systems. A peculiar intellectual activity is required to pass from a nervous sensation to the conception of an external object, which the sensation has aroused. The sensations of our nerves of sense are mere symbols indicating certain external objects, and it is usually only after considerable practice that we acquire the power of drawing correct conclusions from our sensations respecting the corresponding objects.

Conclusions, Correct, Drawing, Intellectual, Practice, Symbols

The most startling result of Faraday's Law is perhaps this. If we accept the hypothesis that the elementary substances are composed of atoms, we cannot avoid concluding that electricity also, positive as well as negative, is divided into definite elementary portions, which behave like atoms of electricity.

Definite, Law, Negative, Result, Science

In speaking of the work of machines and of natural forces we must, of course, in this comparison eliminate anything in which activity of intelligence comes into play. The latter is also capable of the hard and intense work of thinking, which tries a man just as muscular exertion does.

Forces, Latter, Men, Play, Thinking

Just as a physicist has to examine the telescope and galvanometer with which he is working; has to get a clear conception of what he can attain with them, and how they may deceive him; so, too, it seemed to me necessary to investigate likewise the capabilities of our power of thought.

Capabilities, Deceive, May, Science, Seemed, Telescopes

The originator of a new concept. . . finds, as a rule, that it is much more difficult to find out why other people do not understand him, than it was to discover the new truth.

Concepts, Difficult, Discover, People, Rule, Understand

A metaphysical conclusion is either a false conclusion or a concealed experimental conclusion.

Conclusion, Experimental, Metaphysical, Science, Theory

The smallest quantity of alcohol scares away novel ideas.

Alcohol, Ideas, Novel, Scare, Scares

Music stands in a much closer connection with pure sensation than any of the other arts.

Art, Connections, Music, Sensation, Stands

I then endeavoured to show that it is more especially in the thorough conformity with law which natural phenomena and natural products exhibit, and in the comparative ease with which laws can be stated, that this difference exists.

Conformity, Differences, Ease, Endeavoured, Law, Products

There is a kind, I might almost say, of artistic satisfaction, when we are able to survey the enormous wealth of Nature as a regularly ordered whole a kosmos, an image of the logical thought of our own mind.

Able, Artistic, Kind, Might, Mind, Wealth

Whoever, in the pursuit of science, seeks after immediate practical utility, may generally rest assured that he will seek in vain.

Immediate, May, Pursuit, Science, Utility, Vain

Music strikes the ear as a perfectly undisturbed uniform sound which remains unaltered as long as it exists.

Ears, Long, Remains, Sound, Undisturbed

A moving body whose motion was not retarded by any resisting force would continue to move to all eternity.

Body, Eternity, Motion, Move, Moving, Retarded

What we see is the solution to a computational problem, our brains compute the most likely causes from the photon absorptions within our eyes.

Absorptions, Brain, Causes, Compute, Eye, Solution

Heat can also be produced by the impact of imperfectly elastic bodies as well as by friction. This is the case, for instance, when we produce fire by striking flint against steel, or when an iron bar is worked for some time by powerful blows of the hammer.

Blow, Fire, Imperfectly, Instance, Powerful, Time

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