We all know that there are these exemplars who can take the toughest students, and they'll teach them two-and-a-half years of math in a single year.
I think that we should give visas to people - green cards, rather, to people who graduate with skills that we need. People around the world with accredited degrees in science and math get a green card stapled to their diploma, come to the U. S. of A. We should make sure our legal system works.
Rigour is to the mathematician what morality is to men.
How happy the lot of the mathematician. He is judged solely by his peers, and the standard is so high that no colleague or rival can ever win a reputation he does not deserve.
The highest form of pure thought is in mathematics.
If we drop money, we are usually very sad if the money is big. But for example, if we drop 310 dollars, we can relax, because this is very small in the 3-adics.
The real irony is that the view of infinity as some forbidden zone or road to insanity - which view was very old and powerful and haunted math for 2000+ years - is precisely what Cantor's own work overturned. Saying that infinity drove Cantor mad is sort of like mourning St. George's loss to the dragon: it's not only wrong but insulting.
It's amazing to me that not only can we put a probe around Saturn and get images of its moons, but our math and physics are so freaking accurate we can say, "Hey, you know what? On this date at this time if we turn Cassini that way we'll see a moon over 2 million kilometers away pass in front of another one nearly 3 million kilometers away. " Every morning, I have a 5050 chance of finding my keys. That kinda puts things in perspective.
Math is the only place where truth and beauty mean the same thing.
The science of pure mathematics, in its modern developments, may claim to be the most original creation of the human spirit.
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. Leave the dude alone and he'll figure it out.
Most of the arts, as painting, sculpture, and music, have emotional appeal to the general public. This is because these arts can be experienced by some one or more of our senses. Such is not true of the art of mathematics; this art can be appreciated only by mathematicians, and to become a mathematician requires a long period of intensive training. The community of mathematicians is similar to an imaginary community of musical composers whose only satisfaction is obtained by the interchange among themselves of the musical scores they compose.
I was very good in math and physics. In the Soviet time, we had a lot of Olympic-style competitions for different disciplines: I was always winning in my region.
Mathematics is like draughts in being suitable for the young, not too difficult, amusing, and without peril to the state.
Since the mathematicians have invaded the theory of relativity I do not understand it myself any more.
Mathematics is as much an aspect of culture as it is a collection of algorithms.
The truth of a theory is in your mind, not in your eyes.
Math is easy; design is hard.
Those who are accustomed to judge by feeling do not understand the process of reasoning, because they want to comprehend at a glance and are not used to seeking for first principles. Those, on the other hand, who are accustomed to reason from first principles do not understand matters of feeling at all, because they look for first principles and are unable to comprehend at a glance.
My character, Taylor McKessie, is a little bit brighter in the math and science department than I am. . . okay, a lot.
