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Quotes by Mathematician
"The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato."
14
"Each problem that I solved became a rule, which served afterwards to solve other problems."
14
"It would be very discouraging if somewhere down the line you could ask a computer if the Riemann hypothesis is correct and it said, 'Yes, it is true, but you won't be able to understand the proof.'"
14
"The result was that, if it happened to clear off after a cloudy evening, I frequently arose from my bed at any hour of the night or morning and walked two miles to the observatory to make some observation included in the programme."
14
"A scientist worthy of his name, about all a mathematician, experiences in his work the same impression as an artist; his pleasure is as great and of the same nature."
14
"The greatest minds are capable of the greatest vices as well as of the greatest virtues."
14
"An optimist may see a light where there is none, but why must the pessimist always run to blow it out?"
14
"Mathematical science is in my opinion an indivisible whole, an organism whose vitality is conditioned upon the connection of its parts."
13
"Astronomers are greatly disappointed when, having traveled halfway around the world to see an eclipse, clouds prevent a sight of it; and yet a sense of relief accompanies the disappointment."
13
"At the end of April I archived 'Curses' and Inform, and announced them on the newsgroups."
13
"If we knew exactly the laws of nature and the situation of the universe at the initial moment, we could predict exactly the situation of the same universe at a succeeding moment."
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"Everyone knows what a curve is, until he has studied enough mathematics to become confused through the countless number of possible exceptions."
13
"There are three signs of senility. The first sign is that a man forgets his theorems. The second sign is that he forgets to zip up. The third sign is that he forgets to zip down."
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"Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge."
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"To me there has never been a higher source of earthly honor or distinction than that connected with advances in science."
13
"If one were to bring ten of the wisest men in the world together and ask them what was the most stupid thing in existence, they would not be able to discover anything so stupid as astrology."
13
"I had not yet gotten into the world of light. But I felt as one who, standing outside, could knock against the wall and hear an answering knock from within."
13
"It is not knowledge, but the act of learning, not possession but the act of getting there, which grants the greatest enjoyment."
13
"I tried reading Hilbert. Only his papers published in mathematical periodicals were available at the time. Anybody who has tried those knows they are very hard reading."
13
"Above the cloud with its shadow is the star with its light. Above all things reverence thyself."
13
"One can measure the importance of a scientific work by the number of earlier publications rendered superfluous by it."
13
"It requires a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious."
13
"Statistics is the grammar of science."
13
"The numbers may be said to rule the whole world of quantity, and the four rules of arithmetic may be regarded as the complete equipment of the mathematician."
13
"Mathematics is the most beautiful and most powerful creation of the human spirit."
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"Speech is human nature itself, with none of the artificiality of written language."
13
"I have the capacity of being more wicked than any example that man could set me."
13
"A mathematical theory is not to be considered complete until you have made it so clear that you can explain it to the first man whom you meet on the street."
13
"There's also a sense of freedom. I was so obsessed by this problem that I was thinking about if all the time - when I woke up in the morning, when I went to sleep at night, and that went on for eight years."
13
"Simple solutions seldom are. It takes a very unusual mind to undertake analysis of the obvious."
13
"Aerial flight is one of that class of problems with which men will never have to cope."
13
"How thoroughly it is ingrained in mathematical science that every real advance goes hand in hand with the invention of sharper tools and simpler methods which, at the same time, assist in understanding earlier theories and in casting aside some more complicated developments."
13
"I don't believe Fermat had a proof. I think he fooled himself into thinking he had a proof."
13
"Just as houses are made of stones, so is science made of facts."
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"To those who ask what the infinitely small quantity in mathematics is, we answer that it is actually zero. Hence there are not so many mysteries hidden in this concept as they are usually believed to be."
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"In scientific subjects, the natural remedy for dogmatism has been found in research."
12
"It is in literature that the concrete outlook of humanity receives its expression."
12
"Tact is the art of making a point without making an enemy."
12
"In 1858 I received the degree of D. S. from the Lawrence Scientific School, and thereafter remained on the rolls of the university as a resident graduate."
12
"Whenever anyone has offended me, I try to raise my soul so high that the offense cannot reach it."
Soul,
12
"Let us consider that swearing is a sin of all others peculiarly clamorous, and provocative of Divine judgment."
12
"Facetiousness is allowable when it is the most proper instrument of exposing things apparently base and vile to due contempt."
12
"The problem of distinguishing prime numbers from composite numbers and of resolving the latter into their prime factors is known to be one of the most important and useful in arithmetic."
12
"If pushed, though, I'd say that the next stage will be reached when it it's no longer true that about 75% of the best games were written in 1980's on the way to that."
12
"I have suffered a great deal from writers who have quoted this or that sentence of mine either out of its context or in juxtaposition to some incongruous matter which quite distorted my meaning, or destroyed it altogether."
12
"Mathematical discoveries, like springtime violets in the woods, have their season which no man can hasten or retard."
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