“Pythagoras is said to have discovered the fact that two similar strings under the same tension and differing only in length, when sounded together give an effect that is pleasant to the ear if the lengths of the strings are in the ratio of two small integers. If the lengths are as one is to two, they then correspond to the octave in music. If the lengths are as two is to three, they correspond to the interval between C and G, which is called a fifth. These intervals are generally accepted as ‘pleasant’ sounding chords. Pythagoras was so impressed by this discovery that he made it the basis of a school—Pythagoreans they were called—which held mystic beliefs in the great powers of numbers. It was believed that something similar would be found out about the planets—or ‘spheres.’ We sometimes hear the expression: ‘the music of the spheres.’ The idea was that there would be some numerical relationships between the orbits of the planets or between other things in nature. People usually think that this is just a kind of superstition held by the Greeks. But is it so different from our own scientific interest in quantitative relationships? Pythagoras’ discovery was the first example, outside geometry, of any numerical relationship in nature. It must have been very surprising to suddenly discover that there was a fact of nature that involved a simple numerical relationship. Simple measurements of lengths gave a prediction about something which had no apparent connection to geometry—the production of pleasant sounds. This discovery led to the extension that perhaps a good tool for understanding nature would be arithmetic and mathematical analysis. The results of modern science justify that point of view. Pythagoras could only have made his discovery by making an experimental observation. Yet this important aspect does not seem to have impressed him. If it had, physics might have had a much earlier start. (It is always easy to look back at what someone else has done and to decide what he should have done!) We might remark on a third aspect of this very interesting discovery: that the discovery had to do with two notes that sound pleasant to the ear. We may question whether we are any better off than Pythagoras in understanding why only certain sounds are pleasant to our ear. The general theory of aesthetics is probably no further advanced now than in the time of Pythagoras. In this one discovery of the Greeks, there are the three aspects: experiment, mathematical relationships, and aesthetics. Physics has made great progress on only the first two parts.” – Richard P. Feynman, The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Vol. I (emphases in the original)