Mathematical Quotes - Page 30

• Logic doesn't apply to the real world.

  Marvin Minsky

  Real, Knowledge, Math

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• Although I am almost illiterate mathematically, I grasped very early in life that any one who can count to ten can count upward indefinitely if he is fool enough to do so.

  Robertson Davies

  Math, Fool, Enough

  Robertson Davies (1949). “The Table Talk of Samuel Marchbanks”, Clarke, Irwin

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• The calculus is the greatest aid we have to the application of physical truth in the broadest sense of the word.

  William Fogg Osgood

  Truth, Math, Statistics

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• Calculus required continuity, and continuity was supposed to require the infinitely little; but nobody could discover what the infinitely little might be.

  Bertrand Russell

  Math, Littles, Statistics

  Bertrand Russell (2015). “Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays: Top Philosophy Collections”, p.51, 谷月社

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• Mathematics is the handwriting on the human consciousness of the very Spirit of Life itself.

  Claude Fayette Bragdon

  Math, Handwriting, Spirit

  Claude Fayette Bragdon (2005). “Architecture and Democracy”, p.61, Cosimo, Inc.

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• The Mandelbrot set is the most complex mathematical object known to mankind.

  Benoit Mandelbrot

  Math, Mankind, Complexes

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• Mathematics is for lazy people.

  Peter Hilton

  Math, Lazy People, People

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• Thus we can get the correct answer for the probability of partial reflection by imagining (falsely) that all reflection comes from only the front and back surfaces. In this intuitively easy analysis, the 'front surface' and 'back surface' arrows are mathematical constructions that give us the right answer, whereas .... a more accurate representation of what is really going on: partial reflection is the scattering of light by electrons inside the glass.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Reflection, Arrows, Glasses

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• Mathematics may be defined as the economy of counting. There is no problem in the whole of mathematics which cannot be solved by direct counting.

  Ernst Mach

  Math, May, Problem

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• Arithmetic is where numbers fly like pigeons in and out of your head.

  Carl Sandburg

  Math, Numbers, Pigeons

  Carl Sandburg, Frances Schoonmaker Bolin (1995). “Carl Sandburg”, p.17, Sterling Publishing Company, Inc.

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• I imagine that whenever the mind perceives a mathematical idea, it makes contact with Plato's world of mathematical concepts... When mathematicians communicate, this is made possible by each one having a direct route to truth, the consciousness of each being in a position to perceive mathematical truths directly, through the process of 'seeing'.

  Roger Penrose

  Plato, Ideas, Mind

  Roger Penrose (1999). “The Emperor's New Mind: Concerning Computers, Minds, and the Laws of Physics”, p.554, OUP Oxford

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• He'd met other prodigies in mathematical competitions. In fact he'd been thoroughly trounced by competitors who probably spent literally all day practising maths problems and who'd never read a science-fiction book and who would burn out completely before puberty and never amount to anything in their future lives because they'd just practised known techniques instead of learning to think creatively.

  Eliezer Yudkowsky

  Book, Math, Thinking

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• Many persons who are not conversant with mathematical studies imagine that because the business of [Babbage’s Analytical Engine] is to give its results in numerical notation, the nature of its processes must consequently be arithmetical and numerical, rather than algebraical and analytical. This is an error. The engine can arrange and combine its numerical quantities exactly as if they were letters or any other general symbols; and in fact it might bring out its results in algebraical notation, were provisions made accordingly.

  Ada Lovelace

  Errors, Giving, Letters

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• Not only in geometry, but to a still more astonishing degree in physics, has it become more and more evident that as soon as we have succeeded in unraveling fully the natural laws which govern reality, we find them to be expressible by mathematical relations of surprising simplicity and architectonic perfection. It seems to me to be one of the chief objects of mathematical instruction to develop the faculty of perceiving this simplicity and harmony.

  Hermann Weyl

  Beauty, Art, Reality

  Hermann Weyl (1950). “Space, Time, Matter”, p.23, Courier Corporation

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• This ambiguity is another example of a growing problem with mathematical notation: There aren't enough squiggles to go around.

  Jim Blinn

  Example, Growing, Problem

  Jim Blinn (1998). “Jim Blinn's Corner: Dirty Pixels”, p.94, Morgan Kaufmann

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• [On Cantor's work:] The finest product of mathematical genius and one of the supreme achievements of purely intellectual human activity.

  David Hilbert

  Discovery, Achievement, Intellectual

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• The solution of the difficulties which formerly surrounded the mathematical infinite is probably the greatest achievement of which our age has to boast.

  Bertrand Russell

  Discovery, Achievement, Age

  Bertrand Russell, Kenneth Blackwell (1985). “The Collected Papers of Bertrand Russell: Contemplation and action, 1902-14”, Allen & Unwin Australia

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• Probably no branch of mathematics has experienced a more surprising growth than has... topology... Considered as a most specialized and abstract subject in the early 1920's, it is today [1938] an indispensable equipment for the investigation of modern mathematical theories.

  Raymond Louis Wilder

  Growth, Experience, Branches

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• In the broad light of day mathematicians check their equations and their proofs, leaving no stone unturned in their search for rigour. But, at night, under the full moon, they dream, they float among the stars and wonder at the miracle of the heavens. They are inspired. Without dreams there is no art, no mathematics, no life.

  Michael Atiyah

  Inspirational, Life, Dream

  Michael Atiyah (2014). “Michael Atiyah Collected Works: 2002-2013”, p.267, Oxford University Press, USA

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• Fraulein Noether was the most significant creative mathematical genius thus far produced since the higher education of women began.

  Albert Einstein

  Creative, Genius, Significant

  "Obituary for Emmy Noether". Letter to the Editor of The New York Times, www-history.mcs.st-andrews.ac.uk. May 5, 1935.

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• Show me the manner in which a nation or a community cares for its dead and I will measure with mathematical exactness the tender sympathies of its people, their respect for the laws of the land and their loyalty to high ideals.

  William E. Gladstone

  Loyalty, Law, Land

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• There are two versions of math in the lives of many Americans: the strange and boring subject that they encountered in classrooms and an interesting set of ideas that is the math of the world, and is curiously different and surprisingly engaging. Our task is to introduce this second version to today's students, get them excited about math, and prepare them for the future.

  Jo Boaler

  Education, Teacher, Math

  Jo Boaler (2015). “What's Math Got to Do with It?: How Teachers and Parents Can Transform Mathematics Learning and Inspire Success”, p.5, Penguin

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• Perhaps there will be prattlers who, although completely ignorant of mathematics, nevertheless take it upon themselves to pass judgment on mathematical questions, and on account of some passage in Scripture, badly distorted to their purpose, will dare to censure and assail what I have presented here.

  Nicolaus Copernicus

  God, Faith, Hope

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• The explorer is the person who is lost.

  Tim Cahill

  Lost, Persons, Explorers

  Tim Cahill (1987). “Jaguars ripped my flesh: adventure is a risky business”, Bantam Dell Pub Group

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  To make a great dream come true, the first requirement is a great capacity to dream; the second is persistence.

  Cesar Chavez

  Dream, Persistence, Requirements

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