Richard Feynman
Theoretical physicist; Nobel laureate in Physics, 1965
For example, I was a little surprised when I was talking to a friend who was going to go on the radio. He does work on cosmology and astronomy, and he wondered how he would explain what the applications of this work were. "Well," I said, "there aren't any." He said, "Yes, but then we won't get support for more research of this kind." I think that's kind of dishonest. If you're representing yourself as a scientist, then you should explain to the layman what you're doing—and if they don't want to support you under those circumstances, then that's their decision.
Recorded
Caltech commencement address, Pasadena, California, Caltech Engineering and Science (Caltech Library archive), 1 June 1974
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