Home > Work > Number: The Language of Science
1 " The letter is susceptible of operations which enables one to transform literal expressions and thus to paraphrase any statement into a number of equivalent forms. It is this power of transformation that lifts algebra above the level of a convenient shorthand. "
― , Number: The Language of Science
2 " The symbol is not a mere formality; it is the very essence of algebra. Without the symbol the object is a human perception and reflects all the phases under which the human senses grasp it; replaced by a symbol the object becomes a complete abstraction, a mere operand subject to certain indicated operations. "
3 " In the history of culture the discovery of zero will always stand out as one of the greatest single achievements of the human race. "
4 " It is not a story of brilliant achievement, heroic deeds, or noble sacrifice. It is a story of blind stumbling and chance discovery, of groping in the dark and refusing to admit the light. It is a story replete with obscurantism and prejudice, of sound judgement often eclipsed by loyalty to tradition, and of reason long held subservient to custom. In short, it is a human story "
5 " The mathematician is only too willing to admit that he is dealing exclusively with acts of the mind. To be sure, he is aware that the ingenious artifices which form his stock in trade had their genesis in the sense impressions which he identifies with crude reality, and he is not surprised to find that at times these artifices fit quite neatly the reality in which they were born. But this neatness the mathematician refuses to recognize as a criterion of his achievement: the value of the beings which spring from his creative imagination shall not be measured by the scope of their application to physical reality. No! Mathematical achievement shall be measured by standards which are peculiar to mathematics. These standards are independent of the crude reality of our senses. They are: freedom from logical contradictions, the generality of the laws governing the created form, the kinship which exists between this new form and those that have preceded it.The mathematician may be compared to a designer of garments, who is utterly oblivious of the creatures whom his garments may fit. To be sure, his art originated in the necessity for clothing such creatures, but this was long ago; to this day a shape will occasionally appear which will fit into the garment as if the garment had been made for it. Then there is no end of surprise and of delight! "
6 " To him the question: what reality shall we ascribe to number? is meaningless, because there is no reality without number, as there is no reality without space or without time. And so neither in the subjective nor yet in the objective world can we find a criterion for the reality of the number concept, because the first contains no such concept, and the second contains nothing that is free of the concept. How then can we arrive at a criterion? Not by evidence, for the dice of evidence are loaded. Not by logic, for logic has no existence independent of mathematics: it is only one phase of this multi phased necessity that we call mathematics. How then shall mathematical concepts be judged? They shall not be judged!Mathematics is the supreme judge; from its decisions there is no appeal. We cannot change the rules of the game, we cannot ascertain whether the game is fair. We can only study the player at his game; not, however, with the detached attitude of a bystander, for we are watching our own minds at play. "
