Mathematical Quotes - Page 39

• The Difference Engine can in reality (as has been already partly explained) do nothing but add; and any other processes, not excepting those of simple subtraction, multiplication and division, can be performed by it only just to that extent in which it is possible, by judicious mathematical arrangement and artifices, to reduce them to a series of additions.

  Ada Lovelace

  Simple, Reality, Differences

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• The further we analyse the manner in which such an engine performs its processes and attains its results, the more we perceive how distinctly it places in a true and just light the mutual relations and connexion of the various steps of mathematical analysis; how clearly it separates those things which are in reality distinct and independent, and unites those which are mutually dependent.

  Ada Lovelace

  Independent, Reality, Light

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• It is however pretty evident, on general principles, that in devising for mathematical truths a new form in which to record and throw themselves out for actual use, views are likely to be induced, which should again react on the more theoretical phase of the subject.

  Ada Lovelace

  Views, Principles, Use

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• Russell's books should be bound in two colours, those dealing with mathematical logic in red - and all students of philosophy should read them; those dealing with ethics and politics in blue - and no one should be allowed to read them.

  Ludwig Wittgenstein

  Philosophy, Book, Mathematical Logic

  "Recollections of Wittgenstein". Book by Rush Rhees, 1984.

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• Do I use VORP? I may be using it and not even know it, and if I am, it's nobody's business. There are a lot of different criteria in judging players. I think I use, um, esoteric qualitative mathematical review times five. That's one of them.

  Ned Colletti

  Player, Thinking, Judging

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• A mathematical problem should be difficult in order to entice us, yet not completely inaccessible, lest it mock at our efforts. It should be to us a guide post on the mazy paths to hidden truths, and ultimately a reminder of our pleasure in the successful solution.

  David Hilbert

  Successful, Order, Effort

  "Mathematical Problems". Lecture delivered before the International Congress of Mathematicians at Paris, translated by Maby Winton Newson, mathcs.clarku.edu. 1900.

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• A geometrical theory in physical interpretation can never be validated with mathematical certainty ... ; like any other theory of empirical science, it can acquire only a more or less high degree of confirmation.

  Carl Gustav Hempel

  Degrees, Confirmation, Interpretation

  Carl Gustav Hempel (2001). “The Philosophy of Carl G. Hempel: Studies in Science, Explanation, and Rationality”, p.28, Oxford University Press on Demand

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• Instead of the animistic, mechanistic, or the mathematical universe, we see the genetic, organic, holistic universe.

  Jan Smuts

  Holistic, Universe

  Jan Christiaan Smuts (1941). “Greater South Africa: plans for a better world”

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• We have never pushed it far enough to know, but we decided 47 percent was the right percentage. You can quote us on that. It's very mathematical.

  Cinco Paul

  Enough, Percentages, Knows

  Source: collider.com

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• I have a name for people who went to the extreme efficient market theory-which is "bonkers". It was an intellectually consistent theory that enabled them to do pretty mathematics. So I understand its seductiveness to people with large mathematical gifts. It just had a difficulty in that the fundamental assumption did not tie properly to reality.

  Charlie Munger

  Reality, Names, Ties

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• Almost in the same way as earlier physicists are said to have found suddenly that they had too little mathematical understanding to be able to master physics; we may say that young people today are suddenly in the position that ordinary common sense no longer suffices to meet the strange demands life makes. Everything has become so intricate that for its mastery an exceptional degree of understanding is required. For it is not enough any longer to be able to play the game well; but the question is again and again: what sort of game is to be played now anyway?

  Ludwig Wittgenstein

  Games, Play, People

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• Experience has shown repeatedly that a mathematical theory with a rich internal structure generally turns out to have significant implications for the understanding of the real world, often in ways no one could have envisioned before the theory was developed.

  William Thurston

  Real, Understanding, Way

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• Religious truth is not false for being narrow any more than mathematical or scientific truth is false for the same reason.

  Max Anders

  Religious, Truth Is, Reason

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• Jonathan Coe's genial, likeable novel can only be described as a kind of lit-prog-rock concept album... Coe recreates the period with such loving accuracy that I frankly suspect him of having planted a secret microphone in the tin Oxford Mathematical Instruments box I carried around in my school days... As always with Jonathan Coe, the sheer intelligent good nature that suffuses his work makes it a pleasure to read.

  Peter Bradshaw

  School, Intelligent, Oxford

  "Boys will be boys" by Peter Bradshaw, www.theguardian.com. February 23, 2001.

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• I have concluded that most PhD economists under appraise the power of the common-stock-based "wealth effect," under current extreme conditions... "Wealth effects" involve mathematical puzzles that are not nearly so well worked out as physics theories and never can be... What has happened in Japan over roughly the last ten years has shaken up academic economics, as it obviously should, creating strong worries about recession from "wealth effects" in reverse.

  Charlie Munger

  Strong, Creating, Worry

  Charlie Munger's speech at the Breakfast Meeting of the Philanthropy Roundtable in Washington, D.C., November 10, 2000.

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• Innumeracy and pseudoscience are often associated, in part because of the ease with which mathematical certainty can be invoked, to bludgeon the innumerate into a dumb acquiescence.

  John Allen Paulos

  Dumb, Pseudoscience, Acquiescence

  John Allen Paulos (2011). “Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences”, p.74, Macmillan

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• Writing a novel is like trying to solve a very long mathematical equation. Changing anything can change everything else.

  Carl Sagan

  Writing, Mathematical Equations, Long

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• Cyberspace is the human transition into a mathematical super space where we as a collectivity become optionally a single point of view.

  Terence McKenna

  Views, Space, Transition

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• What is revealed through the psychedelic experience, I think, is a higher dimensional perspective on reality. And I use 'higher dimensional' in the mathematical sense.

  Terence McKenna

  Reality, Thinking, Perspective

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• One nonabsolute number is the given time of arrival, which is now known to be one of the most bizarre of mathematical concepts, a number whose existence can only be defined as being anything other than itself. In other words, the given time of arrival is the one moment of time at which it is impossible that any member of the party will arrive.

  Douglas Adams

  Party, Mathematical Equations, Numbers

  Douglas Adams (2010). “The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”, p.427, Del Rey

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• The perfection of mathematical beauty is such...that whatsoever is most beautiful and regular is also found to be most useful and excellent.

  D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson

  Beautiful, Perfection, Excellent

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• I was never very good at math and science, to be honest, so it's fun to play a character that is so scientific and mathematical, and whose brain functions at such a high pace. The biggest difference is that Maura is very linear in her thinking and very logical. I'm not quite like that. I'm much more laid back and not quite so type A. That's the big difference.

  Sasha Alexander

  Fun, Character, Math

  Source: collider.com

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• Photography does not form a separate, barren field of art. It is only a means of execution, uniform, rapid and sure, which serves the artist by reproducing with mathematical precision the form and effect of objects and even that poetry which at once arises from any harmonious combination.

  Charles Negre

  Photography, Art, Mean

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• To do any important work in physics a very good mathematical ability and aptitude are required. Some work in applications can be done without this, but it will not be very inspired. If you must satisfy your "personal curiosity concerning the mysteries of nature" what will happen if these mysteries turn out to be laws expressed in mathematical terms (as they do turn out to be)? You cannot understand the physical world in any deep or satisfying way without using mathematical reasoning with facility.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Law, Curiosity, Important

  Richard P. Feynman (2008). “Perfectly Reasonable Deviations from the Beaten Track: The Letters of Richard P. Feynman”, p.160, Hachette UK

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• Even with the most stupid video games, kids learn more about learning than they ever did before, because they want to learn codes and moves before other kids figure them out. They're motivated to seek out someone or search the Net for help. A student who makes a video game has to solve mathematical problems to make special effects happen on the screen.

  Seymour Papert

  Stupid, Moving, Kids

  "Sunday Interview - Seymour Papert/ Computers in the Lives of Our Children/ an Mit Mathematician and Philosopher Is Exploring How Technology Can Educate the Next Generation - and Their Parents". www.sfgate.com. February 2, 1997.

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