Mathematics Quotes - Page 35

• At first it seems obvious, but the more you think about it the stranger the deductions from this axiom seem to become; in the end you cease to understand what is meant by it.

  Bertrand Russell

  Math, Thinking, Understanding

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• Education is like a diamond with many facets: It includes the basic mastery of numbers and letters that give us access to the treasury of human knowledge, accumulated and refined through the ages; it includes technical and vocational training as well as instruction in science, higher mathematics, and humane letters.

  Ronald Reagan

  Science, Numbers, Giving

  Reagan, Ronald (1988). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1986”, p.490, Best Books on

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• If the NSF had never existed, if the government had never funded American mathematics, we would have half as many mathematicians as we now have, and I don't see anything wrong with that.

  Paul Halmos

  Science, Government, Half

  Paul Richard Halmos, John Ewing, F.W. Gehring (1991). “PAUL HALMOS Celebrating 50 Years of Mathematics: Celebrating 50 Years of Mathematics”, p.14, Springer Science & Business Media

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• For hundreds of pages the closely-reasoned arguments unroll, axioms and theorems interlock. And what remains with us in the end? A general sense that the world can be expressed in closely-reasoned arguments, in interlocking axioms and theorems.

  Michael Frayn

  Math, World, Pages

  Michael Frayn (2009). “Constructions: Making Sense of Things”, Faber & Faber

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• In the physical world, one cannot increase the size or quantity of anything without changing its quality. Similar figures exist only in pure geometry.

  Paul Valery

  Math, Quality, World

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• Thou shalt not answer questionnaires Or quizzes upon world affairs, Nor with compliance Take any test. Thou shalt not sit with statisticians nor commit A social science.

  W. H. Auden

  Math, Tests, Answers

  W.H. Auden (2016). “Canción de cuna y otros poemas”, p.219, DEBOLS!LLO

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• Geometry enlightens the intellect and sets one's mind right. All of its proofs are very clear and orderly. It is hardly possible for errors to enter into geometrical reasoning, because it is well arranged and orderly. Thus, the mind that constantly applies itself to geometry is not likely to fall into error. In this convenient way, the person who knows geometry acquires intelligence.

  Ibn Khaldun

  Fall, Math, Errors

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• Therefore, O students, study mathematics and do not build without foundations.

  Leonardo da Vinci

  Science, Engineering, Foundation

  Leonardo Da Vinci (1938). “The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci”

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• Being a language, mathematics may be used not only to inform but also, among other things, to seduce.

  Benoit Mandelbrot

  Science, Engineering, May

  "Fractals: Form, Chance and Dimension". Book by Benoit Mandelbrot, 1977.

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• I will be sufficiently rewarded if when telling it to others you will not claim the discovery as your own, but will say it was mine.

  Thales

  Math, Science, Discovery

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• One would have to have completely forgotten the history of science so as to not remember that the desire to know nature has had the most constant and the happiest influence on the development of mathematics.

  Henri Poincare

  Desire, Development, Remember

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• This book is about physics and its about physics and its relationship with mathematics and how they seem to be intimately related and to what extent can you explore this relationship and trust it.

  Roger Penrose

  Relationship, Book, Physics

  "Secrets of the Old One". "Groks Science" with Frank Ling, grokscience.wordpress.com. January 18, 2009.

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• I tried to fit it in with some previous broad conceptual understanding of some part of mathematics that would clarify the particular problem I was thinking about.

  Andrew Wiles

  Thinking, Understanding, Problem

  "Andrew Wiles on Solving Fermat". NOVA Interview, www.pbs.org. November 1, 2000.

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• It's fine to work on any problem, so long as it generates interesting mathematics along the way - even if you don't solve it at the end of the day.

  Andrew Wiles

  Work, Long, Interesting

  "Andrew Wiles on Solving Fermat". NOVA Interview, www.pbs.org. November 1, 2000.

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• We sometimes think of being good at mathematics as an innate ability. You either have "it" or you don't. But to Schoenfeld, it's not so much ability as attitude. You master mathematics if you are willing to try.

  Malcolm Gladwell

  Inspirational, Motivational, Attitude

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• I do not remember having felt, as a boy, any passion for mathematics, and such notions as I may have had of the career of a mathematician were far from noble. I thought of mathematics in terms of examinations and scholarships: I wanted to beat other boys, and this seemed to be the way in which I could do so most decisively.

  G. H. Hardy

  Passion, Science, Boys

  G. H. Hardy (2012). “A Mathematician's Apology”, p.15, Cambridge University Press

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• It may be true that people who are merely mathematicians have certain specific shortcomings; however that is not the fault of mathematics, but is true of every exclusive occupation. Likewise a mere linguist, a mere jurist, a mere soldier, a mere merchant, and so forth. One could add such idle chatter that when a certain exclusive occupation is often connected with certain specific shortcomings, it is on the other hand always free of certain other shortcomings.

  Carl Friedrich Gauss

  Science, Hands, People

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• We know that mathematicians care no more for logic than logicians for mathematics. The two eyes of science are mathematics and logic; the mathematical set puts out the logical eye, the logical set puts out the mathematical eye; each believing that it sees better with one eye than with two. Note that De Morgan, himself, only had sight with only one eye.

  Augustus De Morgan

  Believe, Eye, Science

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• [I was advised] to read Jordan's 'Cours d'analyse'; and I shall never forget the astonishment with which I read that remarkable work, the first inspiration for so many mathematicians of my generation, and learnt for the first time as I read it what mathematics really meant.

  G. H. Hardy

  Inspiration, Science, Firsts

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• I cannot judge my work while I am doing it. I have to do as painters do, stand back and view it from a distance, but not too great a distance. How great? Guess.

  Blaise Pascal

  Work, Distance, Math

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• The reader will find no figures in this work. The methods which I set forth do not require either constructions or geometrical or mechanical reasonings: but only algebraic operations, subject to a regular and uniform rule of procedure.

  Joseph-Louis Lagrange

  Work, Math, Uniforms

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• I propose to put forward an apology for mathematics; and I may be told that it needs none, since there are now few studies more generally recognized, for good reasons or bad, as profitable and praiseworthy.

  G. H. Hardy

  Apology, Science, Needs

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• If all of mathematics disappeared, physics would be set back by exactly one week.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Would Be, Physics, Week

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• To the pure geometer the radius of curvature is an incidental characteristic - like the grin of the Cheshire cat. To the physicist it is an indispensable characteristic. It would be going too far to say that to the physicist the cat is merely incidental to the grin. Physics is concerned with interrelatedness such as the interrelatedness of cats and grins. In this case the "cat without a grin" and the "grin without a cat" are equally set aside as purely mathematical phantasies.

  Arthur Eddington

  Cat, Math, Would Be

  Arthur Eddington (1933). “The Expanding Universe: Astronomy's 'Great Debate', 1900-1931”, p.103, Cambridge University Press

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• Physics is much too hard for physicists.

  David Hilbert

  Math, Physics, Physicist

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