[Ads-l] Eureka/ That's odd

[Peter Morris]

There's a quote widely attributed to Isaac Asimov:

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny ."

There's currently about 48,000 hits on Google with this attribution, but no source cited. 

A discussion of the phrase on the Quote Investigator website.

http://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/03/02/eureka-funny/#more-10726


I have found a somewhat similar quote from 1965. I can't tell from the snippet view who the author is, though.

http://tinyurl.com/njle8k8

... the popular picture of the scientist is of a man who is visited by a flash of insight and cries, in effect, "Eureka!" Or, more modestly, as a man who notices something others have ignored and mutters "That's odd."  [cartoon] To be realistic, however, the successful scientist often seizes on ... 

>From the fragment it appears that the author is disputing the notion. 

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org