Quotations about Mathematicians

1. The good Christian should beware of Mathematicians and all those who make empty prophesies. The danger already exists that the Mathematicians have made a covenant with the Devil to darken the spirit and to confine man in the bonds of Hell.

—De Genesi ad Litteram, Book II, xviii, 37, Saint Augustine(354-430)

2. Six is a number perfect in itself, and not because God created the world in six days; rather the contrary is true. God created the world in six days because this number is perfect, and it would remain perfect, even if the work of the six days did not exist

—The City of God, Saint Augustine(354-430)

3. If I am given a formula, and I am ignorant of its meaning, it cannot teach me anything, but if I already know it what does the formula teach me?

—De Magistro ch X, 23, Saint Augustine(354-430)

4. I have no fault to find with those who teach geometry. That science is the only one which has not produced sects; it is founded on analysis and on synthesis and on the calculus; it does not occupy itself with probable truth; moreover it has the same method in every country.

—Fredrick the Great

5. In my opinion a mathematician, in so far as he is a mathematician, need not preoccupy himself with philosophy—an opinion, moreover, which has been expressed by many philosophers.

—Lebesgue

6. He is unworthy of the name of MAN who is ignorant of the fact that the diagonal of a square is incommensurable with its side.

—Plato

7. Mathematics is an obscure field, an abstruse science, complicated and exact; yet so many have attained perfection in it that we might conclude almost anyone who seriously applied himself would achieve a measure of success.

—Cicero

8. So far as theories of mathematics are about reality; they are not certain; so far as they are certain, they are not about reality.

—Einstein

9. Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they translate into their own language and forthwith it is something entirely different.

—Goethe

10. The study of non-Euclidean Geometry brings nothing to students but fatigue, vanity, arrogance, and imbecility.

… “Non-Euclidean” space is the false invention of demons, who gladly furnish the dark understanding of the “non-Euclideans” with false knowledge. … The “Non-Euclideans,” like the ancient sophists, seem unaware that their understandings have become obscured by the promptings of the evil spirits.

—Matthew Ryan (1905)

11. The reason that every large University has a Department of Mathematics is that it is cheaper to hire them than to have them institutionalized.

—Anonymous