Popular quotes about Math! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 13
I think we need more math majors who don't become mathematicians. More math major doctors, more math major high school teachers, more math major CEOs, more math major senators. But we won't get there unless we dump the stereotype that math is only worthwhile for kid geniuses.
Jordan EllenbergMathematical thinking is not the same as doing mathematics - at least not as mathematics is typically presented in our school system. School math typically focuses on learning procedures to solve highly stereotyped problems. Professional mathematicians think a certain way to solve real problems, problems that can arise from the everyday world, or from science, or from within mathematics itself. The key to success in school math is to learn to think inside-the-box. In contrast, a key feature of mathematical thinking is thinking outside-the-box - a valuable ability in today's world.
Keith DevlinI never made a career decision based solely on my desire to be an astronaut. I attended the Naval Academy because I wanted to be a Navy pilot. I majored in math because math had always come pretty easily to me and I liked it.
John L. PhillipsMy mother was an English teacher who decided to become a math teacher, and she used me as a guinea pig at home. My father had been a math teacher and then went to work at a steel mill because, frankly, he could make more money doing that.
Freeman A. Hrabowski IIIMindset changes are not happening from change in legislation. Like desegregation. We legally got rid of legal segregation, but schools are still segregated. You can demand people have better math understanding, but it depends how you interpret math understanding, and what you want it for, and if you think everybody can and should have that.
Deborah MeierAnimation wasn't my love, but drawing was. I loved drawing, and when it came time to graduate from high school, I looked around and it was like, "Wow, I don't really want to study math. I don't really want to study science. I don't really want to study literature. Is there a place where I can go and draw cartoons?"
Harland WilliamsMy character, Taylor McKessie, is a little bit brighter in the math and science department than I am... okay, a lot.
Monique ColemanJust as I had long suspected, a person didn't really need math for anything anyway. Maybe some people did. Some limited people.
Augusten BurroughsIn colleges, there are no gender separations in courses of study, and students can freely choose their majors. There are no male and female math classes. But women generally choose college courses that pay less in the labor market. Those are the choices that women themselves make. Those choices contribute to the pay gap.
Phyllis SchlaflyIf the Lord wills, we shall make this Math a great centre of harmony. Our Lord is the visible embodiment of the harmony of all ideals. He will be established on earth if we keep alive that spirit of harmony here. We must see to it that people of all creeds and sects, from the Brahmana down to the Chandala, may come here and find their respective ideals manifested.
Swami VivekanandaDad claims that library science is the foundation of all sciences just as math is the key -- and we will survive or founder, depending on how well the librarians do their jobs. Librarians didn't look glamorous to me but maybe Dad had hit on a not very obvious truth.
Robert A. HeinleinThe ways in which acquired savants show up are usually the same ways that congenital, or non-acquired, savant syndrome shows up. They tend to show up in the same areas: music, art, math, visual, spatial skills, and calendar calculating, although calendar calculating probably isn't quite as prominent in that group. They tend to show up quite quickly, or sort of explode on the scene and they then tend to have an obsessive sort of forceful quality about them in the same way as savant skills. So they tend to show up in the same ways.
Darold TreffertThere was a survey done a few years ago that affected me greatly. it was discovered that intelligent people either estimate their intelligence accurately or slightly underestimate themselves, but stupid people overestimate their intelligence and by huge margins. (And these were things like straight up math tests, not controversial IQ tests.)
Harvey PekarI always loved science and math growing up. I was born in Iran; I grew up there and then came to the United States when I was about 16 years old. And I thought that this was my opportunity to get involved with something really cool and great.
Anousheh AnsariAmerica ranks 21st when it comes to math education. We rank 25th when it comes to science. We used to be number one in the proportion of college graduates. We now rank ninth. And at an age where knowledge, skills, are the determinant of how successful we're going to be, unless we reverse that we're going to keep slipping behind economically to a lot of other countries.
Barack ObamaMany young women are less whole and androgynous than they were at age ten. They are more appearance-conscious and sex-conscious. They are quieter, more fearful of holding strong opinions, more careful what they say and less honest. They are more likely to second-guess themselves and to be self-critical. They are bigger worriers and more effective people pleasers. They are less likely to play sports, love math and science and plan on being president. They hide their intelligence. Many must fight for years to regain all the territory they lost.
Mary PipherYou know when you're a kid and you think, 'Oh no, I've got double math, this is never gonna end,' but then it ends, and it's like it never happened? That's like life.
Craig FergusonI think there are dozens or hundreds of different forms of creativity. Pondering science and math problems for years is different from improvising jazz. Something which seems to me remarkable is how unconscious the creative process is. You encounter a problem, but can't solve it.
Oliver SacksAnything we were studying in school, like math, or understanding somebody's behavior outside of school, kind of worked its way into something I could understand by way of a musical experience I'd had or something I'd heard.
Blake MillsI started in a business background, but then it was like, 'you know, I can't do math,' so I changed it to a liberal arts degree and got my Bachelor of Arts in Communications and it made sense.
Jeff DunhamIn ninth grade, I came up with a new form of rebellion. I hadn't been getting good grades, but I decided to get all A's without taking a book home. I didn't go to math class, because I knew enough and had read ahead, and I placed within the top 10 people in the nation on an aptitude exam.
Bill GatesTheir Internet usage is growing very rapidly, and even they can do the math: If everyone in China needed an IPv4 address - just one - this country would use up one third of the entire public IP address space.
Vinton CerfI was born into a working class Irish Catholic family at the brutal bottom of the Great Depression. I suppose this early imprinting and conditioning made me a life-long radical. My education was mostly scientific, majoring in electrical engineering and applied math. Those imprints made me a life-long rationalist. I have become increasingly skeptical about, or detached from, the assumption that radicalism and rationalism are the only correct perspectives with which to view life, but they remain my favorite perspectives.
Robert Anton WilsonI've actually become much, much dumber through being married and having these children. I find that I'm not half as sharp that I once was. I can't even help them with their 4th and 5th grade vocabulary and math work at this point.
Patrick WarburtonI was horrible at science and math. I couldn't pass a test to save my life! I'm surprised that it didn't take me until I was 20 to graduate. That's why my role is so cool - Grissom is the complete opposite of me.
William PetersenSeeing and playing with physical objects can enable access to symbolic ideas. When I studied physics and math at university it was all done through equations and textbooks whereas artists go to art school and start making stuff; they fling paint at the walls, they dance and bash things together with giant bits of metal. Our society has come to think of science as being a very abstractified thing, and art as being a materialized thing.
Margaret WertheimThis will sound like I grew up on another planet, except for those people who are past 55, 60 maybe. When I was growing up, my mother and her generation basically felt that you should only work as a way of passing time until you got married and had at least two children. And the only careers that were open for women at the time was teacher or nurse - which are fantastic careers, I mean fantastic and I actually am a former math teacher.
Sherry LansingEnvironment-based education produces student gains in social studies, science, language arts, and math; improves standardized test scores and grade-point averages; and develops skills in problem-solving, critical thinking, and decision-making.
Richard LouvCommunity is essential when it comes to successfully living out the Christian walk in a day-to-day context. So the math is simple: More community = More disciples.
Ed StetzerLearning improves in school environments where there are comprehensive music and arts programs. They increase the ability of young people to do math. They increase the ability of young people to read. And most important of all, they're a lot of fun.
William J. ClintonI got into writing and thinking about politics because I was told there would be no math.
Jeff GreenfieldEarlier today, President Bush said Kerry will be a tough and hard-charging opponent. That explains why Bush's nickname for Kerry is math.
Conan O'BrienIf you're a waiter and you're waiting on me, you might get five percent, you might get seventy percent. It depends on how bad my math skills are that day.
Kelly RipaWe believed we could prepare our kids for a more competitive world. And today, our younger students have earned the highest math and reading scores on record. Our high school graduation rate has hit an all-time high. And more Americans finish college than ever before.
Barack ObamaMath can explain the reason there's one out of four chance that I'd have blue eyes. But it doesn't explain why me.
HeidiI'd always been the confident guy in school. I was good in math and English, but I was still shy. I couldn't get up and speak in front of people. I was asked to do it when I was 10 years old and I burst out crying.
Chris VanceWomen, girls and young ladies tend to be as good or better at math than boys, but you didn't think that either.
Sallie KrawcheckAs convenient as that would be to make it easier to communicate with more prolific musicians, I don't want to think of music like a math equation.
Blake JuddMath was always my bad subject. I couldn't convince my teachers that many of my answers were meant ironically.
Calvin TrillinChildren need far more than basic skills in reading, writing, and math, as important as those might be. Children also need to learn how to think for themselves, how to find meaning in what they learn, and how to work and live together.
Marshall B. RosenbergI liked math - that was my favorite subject - and I was very interested in astronomy and in physical science.
Sally RideWhen will it begin, anyway?" Sirus held his gaze for a moment, his eyes full of concern- a concern that Joss didn't understand. "Probably sooner than you're ready for." "When's that?" "Well." Sirus sighed, as if doing the math in his head."It'll take us about three minutes to gather this stuff and get to the cabin, and another two or three for Abraham to realize you're here. So I'd say you have about seven more minutes of freedom left.
Heather Brewer