Popular quotes about Math! Wisdom and inspiration are here! | page 23
There's a tendency for adults to label the math that they can do (such as identifying patterns, choosing between competing offers in a supermarket, and challenging statistics published by the government) as "common sense" and labeling everything they can't do as "math" - so that being bad at math becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.
Robert EastawayYou know, students who major in elementary education - they're going to be grade school teachers - they have the highest rates of math anxiety of any college major. And they bring that into the classroom. So you find students being introduced to math concepts by teachers who may have not only a lack of training but also a lack of enthusiasm about math.
Anya KamenetzThere is an idea that a mind is wasted on the arts unless it makes you good in math or science. There is some evidence that the arts might help you in math and science.
Wynton MarsalisWith the Holy Mother as the centre of inspiration, a Math is to be established on the eastern bank of the Ganga. . . . On the other side of the Ganga a big plot of land will be acquired, where unmarried girls or Brahmacharini widows will live; devout married women will also be allowed to stay now and then. Men will have no concern with this Math.
Swami VivekanandaWhen I was growing up, no one ever said to me, "You cannot do math because you're a girl." But, there was an understanding growing up that math and science were for boys. Somebody lied to me because Katherine Johnson woman exists, all of these women existed.
Taraji P. HensonMy 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 IIIPresident Obama said he plans on training 10,000 new math and science teachers. How about teaching math to that economic team of his?
Jay LenoI was good at math, math was my thing - but I was not nearly good enough to be an astrophysicist. I was way outta my league. I realized this very quickly.
Sam TrammellWhat makes it possible to learn advanced math fairly quickly is that the human brain is capable of learning to follow a given set of rules without understanding them, and apply them in an intelligent and useful fashion. Given sufficient practice, the brain eventually discovers (or creates) meaning in what began as a meaningless game.
Keith DevlinSo, if I'm no cheerleader of sports, why write a chapter about it? Sports do have some positive impact on society. They solve problems, such as how to get inner-city kids to spend $175 on shoes. They serve as a backdrop for some of our most memorable commercials. And they remain the one and only relevant application of math. Not only that, but we have sports to thank for most of the last century's advances in manliness. The system starts in school, where gym class separates the men from the boys. Then those men are taught to be winners, or at least, losers that hate themselves.
Stephen ColbertIt's amazing to me that not only can we put a probe around Saturn and get images of its moons, but our math and physics are so freaking accurate we can say, "Hey, you know what? On this date at this time if we turn Cassini that way we'll see a moon over 2 million kilometers away pass in front of another one nearly 3 million kilometers away." Every morning, I have a 50/50 chance of finding my keys. That kinda puts things in perspective.
Phil PlaitYou could do math early, but there are no brilliant 16-year-old novelists. They don't know the human condition yet.
Neil deGrasse TysonWhen I was a child I could do math and art, so I had left- and right-brain capabilities. But I've seen my children, who are more right-brained, struggling. My son was told he wouldn't make it to college, but he dogged it through and ended up being accepted by 10 major art schools after the high school advisor said, "Please don't apply. You're going to be disappointed." That kid's an artist now.
Frank GehryThere 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 PekarThe most important thing we can do is inspire young minds and to advance the kind of science, math and technology education that will help youngsters take us to the next phase of space travel.
John GlennI prefer home-schooling because you can work at your own pace and go towards more what you're interested in, whether it be history or geography or math.
Q'orianka KilcherAnd you're a bad boy?" I asked. Ollie's grin was contagious. "Oh, I'm a bad, bad boy." Cam shot his friend a look. "Yeah, as in bad at spelling, math, english, cleaning up after yourself, talking to people, and I could go on.
J. LynnWho cares for Algebra?Who delights in solving math?I only want to live my lifeAlong the creative path.
Jennifer NivenA play that works well and is done quite a lot - I've never done the math - but it's probably more remunerative than a movie.
Tom StoppardThere was no protection, no quota system when it came to luck. It was like that moment in math when a child learns that the odds of heads or tails is always one-in-two, no matter how many times one has flipped the coin and gotten heads. Every flip, the odds are the same. Every day, you could be unlucky all over again.
Laura LippmanI'm not much of a math and science guy. I spent most of my time in school daydreaming and managed to turn it into a living. When I was making "Star Wars," I wasn't restrained by any kind of science. I simply said, "I'm going to create a world that's fun and interesting, makes sense, and seems to have a reality to it."
George LucasYes, I took a remedial algebra course in college. I struggled in math in high school and didnโt have confidence to plunge in with a for-credit algebra course. The remedial course gave me a lot of confidence so that when I took the for-credit algebra course it was fairly easy and I got a โB,โ of which I remain proud today!
Jim StaffordCollege was an experience I'll always cherish. Now I fund a scholarship at my alma mater in my late father's name-he'd laugh to know that it's a science scholarship, when I can barely do math! I also fund a nursing scholarship at the Oglala Lakota College in Kyle, South Dakota, in the name of my mother, who was a nurse.
Diana PalmerWhy don't we teach sex the way we teach math or history? It is such a deeply crucial and healing part of life and we offer no road map. I think it is core to ending violence.
Eve EnslerMy dad, a mathematician, raised me to believe that mathematics is beautiful, so math is a part of my imaginative terrain. In my late 20s I wrote several 11-line poems because I wanted to create poems that couldn't be uniformly divided into couplets, tercets, or quatrains, 11 being a prime number.
James ArthurSomehow it's O.K. for people to chuckle about not being good at math. Yet if I said, 'I never learned to read,' they'd say I was an illiterate dolt.
Neil deGrasse TysonYou can be creative in anything - in math, science, engineering, philosophy - as much as you can in music or in painting or in dance.
Ken RobinsonIf you love math, have a knack for numbers, study hard and become a successful accountant; who cares if you can't draw a straight line or sing on key?
Nick CarterDuring my McGill years, I took a number of math courses, more than other students in chemistry.
Rudolph A. MarcusMany schools today are sacrificing social studies, the arts and physical education so children can cover basic subjects like math, English and science.
Geoffrey CanadaWe expect the states to show us whether or not we're achieving simple objectives-like literacy, literacy in math, the ability to read and write.
George W. BushIn American math classes, we teach a lot of concepts poorly over many years. In the Asian systems they teach you very few concepts very well over a few years.
Bill GatesWhat's all this whining about the environment? They're always talking about 'stop the clearcuts.' I mean do the math people. If we were out of trees then we wouldn't have any clearcuts to be complaining about now would we?
George W. BushI considered law and math. My Dad was a lawyer. I think though I would have ended up in physics if I didn't end up in computer science.
Bill GatesWomen can do anything men can do. Except math, chess, running, jumping, lifting stuff, fixing things, making money, hockey, surfing, driving, making decisions, being tall, taking out the garbage, tipping, fishing, being funny (on purpose), reading a map, listening to good bands, writing, running the country, inventing anything important, or being fun to hang out with.
Daniel ToshLook, this is a man, he's got great numbers. He talks about numbers. I'm beginning to think not only did he invent the Internet, but he invented the calculator. It's fuzzy math. It's a scaring - trying to scare people in the voting booth. Under my tax plan, that he continues to criticize, I set a third - the federal government should take no more than a third of anybody's check.
George W. BushI 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 BrewerI think I was born 'in to deep,' and bad things happen every day. Sometimes I have to stab hellions. Sometimes I have to frame friends for murder, and stab evil math teachers, and watch my best friend die. Again. We deal with it, then we move on.
Rachel VincentLearning through the arts reinforces critical academic skills in reading, language arts and math, and provides students with the skills to creatively solve problems.
Michelle ObamaIt's a mistake to get too narrow too fast. Kids today, many of them will live past 100, and you cant predict what you might work on. The things you're passionate about and interested in, get experience with them by going deep on projects. I would encourage science projects, plays. Pursue science, math, writing, history - the 21st century demands a lot of cross-disciplinary thinking.
Megan Smith