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Marie Curie

1867–1934

Polish-French physicist and chemist, the first person to win Nobel prizes in two sciences.

What they got right

Through painstaking measurement she showed radioactivity was a property of the atom itself, letting the data, not reputations, lead.

Skill it shows

Evidence and sources

Practise this skill
In science, we must be interested in things, not in persons.
Quoted as a remark she often made to reporters, in Eve Curie, Madame Curie (1937), trans. Vincent Sheean, p. 222Reported speech, English translation Source

Worth knowing

The popular line 'Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood' has no reliable source, so we don't use it. This quote is reported by her daughter rather than written by her.

Try it yourself

Next time an argument turns to who said it, steer back: what is the claim, and what is the evidence?