A Mathematician's Quotes  
"Ich kann bestätigen, daß sie [Emmy Noether] ein großer Mathematiker ist, doch daß sie eine Frau ist, kann ich nicht beschwören."
    Edmund Landau, supporting Emmy Noether, who wasn't allowed in the senate of the Universität Göttingen because of being a woman.
 
"Meine Herren, ich sehe nicht ein, warum das Geschlecht der Kandidatin [Emmy Noether] ein Argument gegen ihre Zulassung als Privatdozent sein sollte. Der Senat ist schließlich keine Badeanstalt."
    David Hilbert, supporting Emmy Noether, who wasn't allowed in the senate of the Universität Göttingen because of being a woman.
 
"A topologist is a man who doesn't know the difference between a coffee cup and a doughnut."
    Kelley.
 
"A mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems."
    Paul Erdös.
 
"When I was a child, the Earth was said to be two billion years old. Now scientists say it's four and a half billion. So that makes me two and a half billion."
    Paul Erdös.
 
"I will know I really am in trouble when I forget the name Alzheimer's."
    Paul Erdös, who wasn't very good at remembering names.
 
"Sollte ich je eine Seereise antreten müssen, werde ich vorher ein Telegramm an einen Kollegen schicken mit den Worten: 'Habe Riemannsche Vermutung bewiesen Stop Genaueres bei Rückkehr'"
    Godfrey Hardy.
 
"If I could find a proof that you were going to die in five minutes I would of course be sorry to lose you, but this sorrow would be quite outweighed by pleasure in the proof."
    Godfrey Hardy, talking to Bertrand Russell, who entirely sympathised with him and was not at all offended.
 
Bertrand Russell once claimed that he could prove anything if given that 1+1=1. So one day, some smarty-pants asked him, "Ok. Prove that you're the Pope." He thought for a while and proclaimed,
    "I am one. The Pope is one. Therefore, the Pope and I are one."
 
"God exists since mathematics is consistent, and the Devil exists since we cannot prove it."
    André Weil, commenting on Kurt Gödel's work.
 
"The good Christian should beware of mathematicians and all those who make empty prophecies. The danger already exists that mathematicians have made a covenant with the devil to darken the spirit and confine man in the bonds of Hell."
    St. Augustine did really say that, but in his time there was no difference between mathematicians and astrologists. Astrologists told the future, which was diabolic.
 
David Hilbert one day noticed that a certain student had stopped attending class. When told that the student had decided to stop mathematics to become a poet, Hilbert replied:
    "Good - he did not have enough imagination to become a mathematician."
 
"Young man, in mathematics you don't understand things, you just get used to them."
    John von Neumann.
 
    Norbert Wiener was in fact very absent minded. When he and his family moved from Cambridge to Newton, his wife, knowing that he would be absolutely useless on the move, packed him off to MIT while she directed the move. Since she was certain that he would forget that they had moved and where they had moved to, she wrote down the new address on a piece of paper, and gave it to him. Naturally, in the course of the day, an insight occurred to him. He reached in his pocket, found a piece of paper on which he furiously scribbled some notes, thought it over, decided there was a fallacy in his idea, and threw the piece of paper away. At the end of the day he went home (to the old address in Cambridge, of course). When he got there he realized that they had moved, that he had no idea where they had moved to, and that the piece of paper with the address was long gone. Fortunately inspiration struck. There was a young girl on the street and he conceived the idea of asking her where he had moved to, saying, "Excuse me, perhaps you know me. We've just moved. Would you know where we've moved to?" The young girl replied, "Yes daddy, mommy thought you would forget."
    His daughter (the girl in the story) said that this story wasn't quite true - that he never forgot who his children were! The rest of it, however, was pretty close to what actually happened...
 
    Waclaw Sierpinski once had to move to a new place for some reason. His wife wife didn't trust him very much, so when they stood down on the street with all their things, she said: Now, you stand here and watch our ten trunks, while I go and get a taxi. She left and left him there, eyes somewhat glazed and humming absently. Some minutes later she returned, presumably having called for a taxi. Says Mr. Sierpinski to his wife (possibly with a glint in his eye):
    "I thought you said there were ten trunks, but I've only counted to nine."
    "No, they're ten!"
    "No, count them: 0, 1, 2, ..."
 
"Ah, 7 times 9 is eh, uh, is uh..." (Ernst Kummer trying to compute 7*9)
"61" (one volunteering student)
"Good" (Kummer, writing 61 on the board)
"No, it's 69" (another student)
"Come, come, gentlemen, it can't be both. It must be one or the other."
 
    While Ludwig Boltzmann gave a lecture on ideal gases, he casually mentioned complicated calculations, which didn't give him any trouble. His students could not follow the fast mathematics and asked him to do the calculations on the blackboard. Boltzmann apologized and promised to do better next time.
    The next lesson he began: "Gentlemen, if we combine Boyle's law with Charles's law we get the equation pv= p₀ v₀ (1 + a t). Now it is clear that _aS^b = f(x) dx x (a), then is pv=RT and _VS f(x,y,z) dV = 0. It is so simple as one and one is two."
    At this moment he remembered his promise and dutyfully wrote "1 + 1 = 2".
    Then he continued with the complicated calculations from his bare mind.
 
"This process can check if this value is zero, and if it is, it does something child-like."
    Burkowski.
 
"Fast cars, fast women, fast algorithms... what more could a man want?"
    Mattis.
 
"As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
    Albert Einstein.
 
"Es gibt Tage, da bin ich so zerstreut, daß ich nicht weiß, ob wir Mittwoch haben oder September."
    Altgraf Bobby.
 
"Gott macht sich einen Spaß daraus, immer neue Fragen ohne Antworten zu erfinden."
    Zarko Petan.
 
    Since I have a counter, I GET A KICK OUT OF YOU: 
 
    For quotes on statistical linguistics, take a look at my Relations among Texts: Quotes - page.
 
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