# Quote — David Deutsch, The Fabric of Reality

> To say that prediction is the purpose of a scientific theory is to confuse means with ends. It is like saying that the purpose of a spaceship is to burn fuel. … Passing experimental tests is only one of many things a theory has to do to achieve the real purpose of science, which is to explain the world.

- Author: [David Deutsch](https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch.md)
- Book: [The Fabric of Reality](https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch/the-fabric-of-reality.md)
- Source: [Wikiquote](https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/David_Deutsch#The_Fabric_of_Reality_(1997)) ([CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/))
- Quote page: https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch/the-fabric-of-reality/to-say-that

## More from this book

> The next chapter is likely to provoke many mathematicians. This can't be helped. Mathematics is not what they think it is.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch/the-fabric-of-reality/the-next-chapter.md)

> The quantum theory of parallel universes is not the problem, it is the solution. It is not some troublesome, optional interpretation emerging from arcane theoretical considerations. It is the explanation—the only one that is tenable—of a remarkable and counter-intuitive reality.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch/the-fabric-of-reality/the-quantum-theory.md)

> Reality contains not only evidence, but also the means (such as our minds, and our artefacts) of understanding it. There are mathematical symbols in physical reality. The fact that it is we who put them there does not make them any less physical.

[Quote page](https://www.leafyquotes.com/david-deutsch/the-fabric-of-reality/reality-contains-not.md)