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[On Cantor's work:] The finest product of mathematical genius and one of the supreme achievements of purely intellectual human activity.

David Hilbert

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David Hilbert
Age: 81 †
Born: 1862
Born: January 23
Died: 1943
Died: February 14
Mathematician
Philosopher
Physicist
University Teacher
Königsberg i. Pr.
Activity
Purely
Intellectual
Finest
Genius
Mathematical
Human
Product
Humans
Supreme
Work
Achievement
Cantor
Discovery
Epiphany
Products
Achievements

More quotes by David Hilbert

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Some people have got a mental horizon of radius zero and call it their point of view.
David Hilbert
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Mathematics is a game played according to certain simple rules with meaningless marks on paper.
David Hilbert
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Mathematical science is in my opinion an indivisible whole, an organism whose vitality is conditioned upon the connection of its parts.
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I didn't work especially hard at mathematics at school, because I knew that's what I'd be doing later.
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One must be able to say at all times--instead of points, straight lines, and planes--tables, chairs, and beer mugs
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Physics is becoming too difficult for the physicists.
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I do not see that the sex of the candidate is an argument against her admission as a Privatdozent. After all, the Senate is not a bathhouse. Objecting to sex discrimination being the reason for rejection of Emmy Noether's application to join the faculty at the University of Gottingen.
David Hilbert
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The art of doing mathematics consists in finding that special case which contains all the germs of generality.
David Hilbert
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No other question has ever moved so profoundly the spirit of man no other idea has so fruitfully stimulated his intellect yet no other concept stands in greater need of clarification than that of the infinite.
David Hilbert
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Every mathematical discipline goes through three periods of development: the naive, the formal, and the critical.
David Hilbert
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The further a mathematical theory is developed, the more harmoniously and uniformly does its construction proceed, and unsuspected relations are disclosed between hitherto separated branches of the science.
David Hilbert
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Galileo was no idiot. Only an idiot could believe that science requires martyrdom - that may be necessary in religion, but in time a scientific result will establish itself.
David Hilbert
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The infinite! No other question has ever moved so profoundly the spirit of man.
David Hilbert
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Is mathematics doomed to suffer the same fate as other sciences that have split into separate branches?... Mathematics is, in my opinion, an indivisible whole... May the new century bring with it ingenious champions and many zealous and enthusiastic disciples.
David Hilbert
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Before beginning [to try to prove Fermat's Last Theorem] I should have to put in three years of intensive study, and I haven't that much time to squander on a probable failure.
David Hilbert
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Indignant reply to the blatent sex discrimination expressed in a colleague's opposition when Hilbert proposed appointing Emmy Noether as the first woman professor at their university.
David Hilbert
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We do not master a scientific theory until we have shelled and completely prised free its mathematical kernel.
David Hilbert
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Geometry is the most complete science.
David Hilbert
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Sometimes it happens that a man's circle of horizon becomes smaller and smaller, and as the radius approaches zero it concentrates on one point. And then that becomes his point of view.
David Hilbert
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Mathematics knows no races or geographic boundaries for mathematics, the cultural world is one country.
David Hilbert