Lev Landau was a mathematician born in Azerbaijan on January 22, 1908. He made fundamental discoveries in theoretical physics and won the Nobel prize in 1962 for his theory of superfluidity. His poem, below reflects on how we can understand things that we cannot perceive directly.
We see too big
None of us has ever seen an atom,
And we do not even have any kind of inner feeling
That can help us visualize atomic events.
The discovery of quantum mechanics
and of the principle of uncertainty
has shown that man can tear himself away
from deeply rooted notions,
discover,
and accept something that is beyond his power
of visualizing.
