Quotes from Vera Rubin

In my own life, my science and my religion are separate.

We all need permission to do science, but for reasons that are deeply ingrained in history, this permission is more often given to men than to women.

I would prefer to stay up and watch the stars than sleep.

I'm Jewish, and so religion, to me, is a kind of moral code and a kind of history.

I guess to me religion is a kind of moral code.

Science is competitive, aggressive, demanding. It is also imaginative, inspiring, uplifting.

So important is this dark matter to our understanding of the size, shape, and ultimate fate of the universe that the search for it will very likely dominate astronomy for the next few decades.

My childhood bedroom - if childhood could be about ten years old - had a bed which was under windows which faced north. At about age 10, I started watching the stars just move through the night.

Does Sex Matter? Of course it does. But does it matter enough to Matter? That's a different question.

In a spiral galaxy, the ratio of dark-to-light matter is about a factor of ten. That's probably a good number for the ratio of our ignorance to knowledge. We're out of kindergarten, but only in about third grade.

Worldwide, half of all brains are in women.

I try to do my science in a moral way, and, I believe that, ideally, science should be looked upon as something that helps us understand our role in the universe.

Don't let anyone keep you down for silly reasons such as who you are.

My father was an electrical engineer. He's presently 92 and still could be holding down a job. He had a very analytical way of looking at things, and I enjoyed that very much. I think that was a very large influence.

By about age 12, I would prefer to stay up and watch the stars than go to sleep. I started learning. I started going to the library and reading. But it was initially just watching the stars from my bedroom that I really did. There was just nothing as interesting in my life as watching the stars every night.

There is no problem in science that can be solved by a man that cannot be solved by a woman.

No observational problem will not be solved by more data.

The real prize is finding something new out there.

We know very little about the universe. I personally don't believe it's uniform and the same everywhere. That's like saying the earth is flat.

Fame is fleeting. My numbers mean more to me than my name.

I knew there was a school where women could study astronomy. So... it never occurred to me that I couldn't be an astronomer.

I had the usual friends who pointed out constellations of stars. But it really was watching the stars. It was getting some sense of the motion of the earth. I found it a remarkable thing.

We need senators who have studied physics and representatives who understand ecology.

Science progresses best when observations force us to alter our preconceptions