Mathematician Quotes

Nobody listens to mathematicians.

— Carl Sagan

Rigour is to the mathematician what morality is to men.

— Andre Weil

Mathematics is no more computation than typing is literature.

— John Allen Paulos

I still think in a parallel universe, I became a mathematician.

— Ken Liu

The great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me.

— Isaac Newton

The library is the mathematician's laboratory.

— Paul Halmos

The only way to learn mathematics is to do mathematics.

— Paul Halmos

An accomplished mathematician, i.e. a most wretched orator.

— Isaac Barrow

By peace we mean the capacity to transform conflicts with empathy, without violence, and creatively- a never-ending process

— Johan Galtung

First rate mathematicians choose first rate people, but second rate mathematicians choose third rate people.

— Andre Weil

Proof is an idol before which the mathematician tortures himself.

— Arthur Eddington

I am too good for philosophy and not good enough for physics. Mathematics is in between.

— George Polya

Logic is the hygiene the mathematician practices to keep his ideas healthy and strong.

— Hermann Weyl

It is easier to square a circle than to get round a mathematician.

— Augustus De Morgan

If only I had the Theorems! Then I should find the proofs easily enough.

— Bernhard Riemann

I knew a mathematician who said 'I do not know as much as God. But I know as much as God knew…

— Milton Shulman

Greek mathematics is the real thing. The Greeks first spoke a language which modern mathematicians can understand... So Greek mathematics is 'permanent',…

— G. H. Hardy

To every problem there is already a solution, whether you know it or not. To every sum in there is already a…

— Grenville Kleiser

The only reason psychology students don't have to do more and harder mathematics than physics students is because the mathematicians haven't yet…

— John G. Kemeny

Perhaps... some day the precision of the data will be brought so far that the mathematician will be able to calculate at…

— Antoine Lavoisier

No mathematician of equal stature has risen from our generation... Hilbert was singularly free from national and racial prejudices; in all public…

— Hermann Weyl

The last level of metaphor in the Alice books is this: that life, viewed rationally and without illusion, appears to be a…

— Martin Gardner

How happy the lot of the mathematician. He is judged solely by his peers, and the standard is so high that no…

— W. H. Auden

The human race may well become extinct before the end of the century. Speaking as a mathematician, I should say the odds…

— Bertrand Russell

Mathematicians can and do fill in gaps, correct errors, and supply more detail and more careful scholarship when they are called on…

— William Thurston

A mathematician of the first rank, Laplace quickly revealed himself as only a mediocre administrator; from his first work we saw that…

— Napoleon Bonaparte

Autism is a big continuum, going from someone who remains nonverbal, all the way up to geniuses on Silicon Valley. And some…

— Temple Grandin

Then he is a monster!" the Prince crowed, "and I must slay him at once. The Formula works!" "Your Formula must result…

— Catherynne M. Valente

I never got a pass mark in math... Just imagine - mathematicians now use my prints to illustrate their books. Funny me…

— M. C. Escher

Philosophers and psychiatrists should explain why it is that we mathematicians are in the habit of systematically erasing our footsteps. Scientists have…

— Gian-Carlo Rota

Never compare one student's test score to another's. Always measure a child's progress against her past performance. There will always be a…

— Rafe Esquith

The Mathematician's Shiva is a brilliant and compelling family saga full of warmth, pathos, history, and humor, not to mention a cast…

— Jonathan Evison

Ere many generations pass, our machinery will be driven by a power obtainable at any point of the universe. This idea is…

— Nikola Tesla

“These estimates may well be enhanced by one from F. Klein (1849-1925), the leading German mathematician of the last quarter of the…

— Eric Temple Bell

Mathematical thinking is not the same as doing mathematics - at least not as mathematics is typically presented in our school system.…

— Keith Devlin

If a mathematician wishes to disparage the work of one of his colleagues, say, A, the most effective method he finds for…

— Alfred Tarski

I hope that no one present will suspect me of offering my personal criticism of the Western system to present socialism as…

— Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

They [the mathematicians of the Enlightenment] defined their terms vaguely and used their methods loosely, and the logic of their arguments was…

— Tobias Dantzig

In geometry I find certain imperfections which I hold to be the reason why this science, apart from transition into analytics, can…

— Nikolai Lobachevsky

There is no thing as a man who does not create mathematics and yet is a fine mathematics teacher. Textbooks, course material-these…

— Alfred Adler