Richard Feynman on Uncertainty and Not Knowing

Quantum physicist Richard Feynmanis one of my heroes. This is from an interview I re-watched last night. I transcribed this bit so I wouldn't forget it:

“You see, one thing is, I can live with doubt, and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it’s much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong.

I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of certainty about different things, but I’m not absolutely sure of anything - and there are many things I don’t know anything about, such as whether it means anything to ask why we’re here - and what the question might mean. I might think about it a little bit but if I can’t figure it out then I go into something else. But I don’t have to know an answer.

I don’t have to … I don’t feel frightened by not knowing things - by being lost in a mysterious universe without having any purpose - which is the way it really is as far as I can tell … possibly. It doesn’t frighten me.”

~ Richard Feynman

From an interview with the BBC Horizon program; “The Pleasure of Finding Things Out.” 1981

Richard was also a helluva conga drum player.