Harry Markowitz Quotes

I've always been interested in using mathematics to make the world work better.

My Ph.D. is in operations research. I was interested in making things work better and using mathematics to help do that. So operations research is what I studied as an undergraduate and graduate student.

Calculating does not equal mathematics. It's a subsection of it. In years gone by it was the limiting factor, but computers now allow you to make the whole of mathematics more intellectual.

Machines have the ability to assemble things faster than any human ever could, but humans possess the analytics, domain expertise, and valuable knowledge required to solve problems and optimize factory floor production.

For me, science is just a bunch of tools - it's like playing the violin. I just enjoy calculating, and it's an instrument I know how to play. It's almost an athletic performance, in a way. I was just watching the Olympics, and that's how I feel when proving a theorem.

With computers we can work everything out from the beginning.

I'm fascinated with materials, with processes, with technologies.

The computers are not replacing mathematicians; they are breeding them.

What exactly is mathematics? Many have tried but nobody has really succeeded in defining mathematics; it is always something else.

The analysis of data will not by itself produce new ideas.

Information work is thinking work.

The best thing about being a statistician is that you get to play in everyone's backyard.

Mathematics is so much easier than words mathematics makes things clear that words merely muddle and confuse and mess up.

Of course, analysis can sometimes give more accurate results than intuition but usually it’s just a lot of work. I normally do what my intuition tells me to do. Most of the time spent thinking is just to double-check.

Our problems are not with the data, itself, but arise from our interpretation of the data.

The intellectual equipment needed for the job of the future is an ability to define problems, quickly assimilate relevant data, conceptualize and reorganize the information, make deductive and inductive leaps with it, ask hard questions about it, discuss findings with colleagues, work collaboratively to find solutions and then convince others.

Algebra is the intellectual instrument which has been created for rendering clear the quantitative aspects of the world.

Writing a novel is like trying to solve a very long mathematical equation. Changing anything can change everything else.

Instruction tables will have to be made up by mathematicians with computing experience and perhaps a certain puzzle-solving ability. There need be no real danger of it ever becoming a drudge, for any processes that are quite mechanical may be turned over to the machine itself.

Mathematics is a more powerful instrument of knowledge than any other that has been bequeathed to us by human agency.

Mathematics may be defined as the economy of counting. There is no problem in the whole of mathematics which cannot be solved by direct counting.

Intelligence takes chances with limited data in an arena where mistakes are not only possible but also necessary.

At root what is needed for scientific inquiry is just receptivity to data, skill in reasoning, and yearning for truth. Admittedly, ingenuity can help too.

All science requires mathematics.

Methods for predicting the future: 1) read horoscopes, tea leaves, tarot cards, or crystal balls . . . collectively known as "nutty methods;" 2) put well-researched facts into sophisticated computer . . . commonly referred to as "a complete waste of time."