Mathematics Quotes

• Mathematics is the language with which God has written the universe.

  Galileo Galilei

  Learning, Science, Discovery

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• Mathematics is concerned only with the enumeration and comparison of relations.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Math, Relation, Concerned

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• Where there is matter, there is geometry.

  Johannes Kepler

  Math, Science, Matter

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• Mathematics knows no races or geographic boundaries; for mathematics, the cultural world is one country.

  David Hilbert

  Country, Math, Race

  "Mathematical Circles Revisited". Book by Howard Whitley Eves, 1971.

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• One of the big misapprehensions about mathematics that we perpetrate in our classrooms is that the teacher always seems to know the answer to any problem that is discussed. This gives students the idea that there is a book somewhere with all the right answers to all of the interesting questions, and that teachers know those answers. And if one could get hold of the book, one would have everything settled. That's so unlike the true nature of mathematics.

  Leon Henkin

  Teacher, Book, Math

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• In mathematics, the art of asking questions is more valuable than solving problems.

  Georg Cantor

  Education, Art, Math

  Doctoral thesis, 1867.

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• I tell them that if they will occupy themselves with the study of mathematics they will find in it the best remedy against the lusts of the flesh.

  Thomas Mann

  Math, Lust, Flesh

  Thomas Mann (1992). “The Magic Mountain”

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• The only way to learn mathematics is to do mathematics.

  Paul Halmos

  Learning, Math, Way

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  A man is like a fraction whose numerator is what he is and whose denominator is what he thinks of himself. The larger the denominator, the smaller the fraction.

  Leo Tolstoy

  Math, Men, Thinking

  graf Leo Tolstoy (2006). “Leo Tolstoy: Spiritual Writings”

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• The highest form of pure thought is in mathematics.

  Plato

  Math, Form, Pure

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• In the pure mathematics we contemplate absolute truths which existed in the divine mind before the morning stars sang together, and which will continue to exist there when the last of their radiant host shall have fallen from heaven.

  Edward Everett Hale

  Morning, Stars, Math

  "Mathematics, Queen and Servant of Science". Book by Eric Temple Bell (p. 21), 1952.

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  It is not knowledge, but the act of learning, not possession but the act of getting there, which grants the greatest enjoyment.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Mathematical, Possession, Enjoyment

  Letter to Farkas Bolyai, September 02, 1808.

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• Mathematics is the supreme judge; from its decisions there is no appeal.

  Tobias Dantzig

  Math, Judging, Decision

  Tobias Dantzig (2005). “Number: The Language of Science”, Dutton Juvenile

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• Mathematics is the science which uses easy words for hard ideas.

  Edward Kasner

  Math, Ideas, Use

  Edward Kasner, James Newman (2013). “Mathematics and the Imagination”, p.4, Courier Corporation

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• A mathematician is a device for turning coffee into theorems.

  Paul Erdos

  Witty, Humorous, Coffee

  84 Copy quote

• Mathematics is as little a science as grammar is a language.

  Ernst Mayr

  Society, Littles, Language

  Ernst Mayr (1982). “The Growth of Biological Thought: Diversity, Evolution, and Inheritance”, p.41, Harvard University Press

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• The understanding of mathematics is necessary for a sound grasp of ethics.

  Socrates

  Understanding, Sound, Ethics

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• If people do not believe that mathematics is simple, it is only because they do not realize how complicated life is.

  John von Neumann

  Believe, Math, Simple

  John von Neumann's remarks as keynote speaker at the first national meeting of the Association for Computing Machinery (1947) as quoted in "Archaeology of computers: Reminiscences, 1945-1947" by Franz L. Alt, Communications of the ACM, Volume 15, Issue 7, special issue: Twenty-fifth anniversary of the Association for Computing Machinery (p. 694), July 1972.

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• What is best in mathematics deserves not merely to be learnt as a task, but to assimilated as a part of daily thought, and brought again and again before the mind with ever-renewed encouragement.

  Bertrand Russell

  Encouragement, Learning, Science

  Bertrand Russell (1985). “Contemplation and Action, 1902-14”, p.86, Psychology Press

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• Geometry is the science of correct reasoning on incorrect figures.

  George Polya

  Education, Math, Figures

  30 Copy quote

• What science can there be more noble, more excellent, more useful for men, more admirably high and demonstrative, than this of mathematics?

  Benjamin Franklin

  Education, Science, Math

  Benjamin Franklin, Jared Sparks (1836). “Works: containing several political and historical tracts not included in any former edition ...”, p.69

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• For a physicist mathematics is not just a tool by means of which phenomena can be calculated, it is the main source of concepts and principles by means of which new theories can be created.

  Freeman Dyson

  Mean, Math, Justice

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• It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer.

  Albert Einstein

  Inspirational, Motivational, Leadership

  Albert Einstein (2015). “Bite-Size Einstein: Quotations on Just About Everything from the Greatest Mind of the Twentieth Century”, p.19, St. Martin's Press

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• There is nothing mysterious, as some have tried to maintain, about the applicability of mathematics. What we get by abstraction from something can be returned.

  Raymond Louis Wilder

  Math, Mysterious, Abstraction

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• The mathematician's patterns, like the painter's or the poet's must be beautiful; the ideas, like the colours or the words must fit together in a harmonious way. Beauty is the first test: there is no permanent place in the world for ugly mathematics.

  G. H. Hardy

  Beauty, Beautiful, Math

  A Mathematician's Apology ch. 10 (1940)

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