Eric Temple Bell Quotes

The only thing that might have annoyed some mathematicians was the presumption of assuming that maybe the axiom of choice could fail, and that we should look into contrary assumptions.

I like - I love calculus. I love linear algebra, probability and statistics, that kind of stuff. I just really like that.

I accept no principles of physics which are not also accepted in mathematics.

It is not of the essence of mathematics to be conversant with the ideas of number and quantity.

… mathematics may be defined as the subject in which we never know what we are talking about, nor whether what we are saying is true.

Arithmetic! Algebra! Geometry! Grandiose trinity! Luminous triangle! Whoever has not known you is without sense!

There exists, if I am not mistaken, an entire world which is the totality of mathematical truths, to which we have access only with our mind, just as a world of physical reality exists, the one like the other independent of ourselves, both of divine creation.

I am not a mathematician, but I was aware that for centuries, mathematics was considered the queen of the sciences because it claimed certainty. It was grounded on some fundamental certainties - axioms - that led to others.

As far as I know, only a small minority of mathematicians, even of those with Platonist views, accept the idea that there may be mathematical facts which are true but unknowable.

Well it was not exactly a dissertation in logic, at least not the kind of logic you would find in Whitehead and Russell's Principia Mathematica for instance. It looked more like mathematics; no formalized language was used.

For scholars and laymen alike it is not philosophy but active experience in mathematics itself that can alone answer the question: What is mathematics?

Being exposed to theory, stimulated by a basic love of concepts and mathematics, was a marvelous experience.

When I dealt with set theory, I could never make it be the music that I wanted.

Math does come easily to me, but I was always much more interested in what theorems imply about the world than in proving them.

We in science are spoiled by the success of mathematics. Mathematics is the study of problems so simple that they have good solutions.

I was a mathematics major and really into math.

Algebra is the metaphysics of arithmetic.

I have found a very great number of exceedingly beautiful theorems.

I think part of the appeal of mathematical logic is that the formulas look mysterious - You write backward Es!

There's something mathematically satisfying about music: notes fit together and harmony and all that. And mathematics has to do with abstractions and making connections.

I'm a mathematician and always have been, as far as I can remember. I don't remember when I first got involved with mathematics, but I think of myself always as a mathematician first.

There's a beauty to math. Math is so simple. It's just one step after the next.

Mathematics is the queen of the sciences.

Mathematical proofs, like diamonds, are hard and clear, and will be touched with nothing but strict reasoning.

Mathematics is entirely free in its development, and its concepts are only linked by the necessity of being consistent, and are co-ordinated with concepts introduced previously by means of precise definitions.