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Point set topology is a disease from which the human race will soon recover.

Henri Poincare

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Henri Poincare
Age: 58 †
Born: 1854
Born: April 29
Died: 1912
Died: July 17
Astronomer
Engineer
Mathematician
Philosopher
Philosopher Of Science
Physicist
Researcher
Topologist
University Teacher
Le Cateau
Jules Henri Poincaré
Poincaré
Henri Poincare
Jules Henri Poincare
Poincare
Humans
Topology
Recover
Soon
Disease
Race
Point
Human

More quotes by Henri Poincare

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Geometry is the art of correct reasoning from incorrectly drawn figures.
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How is error possible in mathematics?
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In the old days when people invented a new function they had something useful in mind. Now, they invent them deliberately just to invalidate our ancestors' reasoning, and that is all they are ever going to get out of them.
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Guessing before proving! Need I remind you that it is so that all important discoveries have been made?
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What is it indeed that gives us the feeling of elegance in a solution, in a demonstration?
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Doubting everything and believing everything are two equally convenient solutions that guard us from having to think
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But for harmony beautiful to contemplate, science would not be worth following.
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Pure logic could never lead us to anything but tautologies it can create nothing new not from it alone can any science issue.
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Just as houses are made of stones, so is science made of facts.
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It is a misfortune for a science to be born too late when the means of observation have become too perfect. That is what is happening at this moment with respect to physical chemistry the founders are hampered in their general grasp by third and fourth decimal places.
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It is far better to foresee even without certainty than not to foresee at all.
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If we wish to foresee the future of mathematics, our proper course is to study the history and present condition of the science.
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It is the simple hypotheses of which one must be most wary because these are the ones that have the most chances of passing unnoticed.
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When the physicists ask us for the solution of a problem, it is not drudgery that they impose on us, on the contrary, it is us who owe them thanks.
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Les faits ne parlent pas. Facts do not speak.
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. . . by natural selection our mind has adapted itself to the conditions of the external world. It has adopted the geometry most advantageous to the species or, in other words, the most convenient. Geometry is not true, it is advantageous.
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Why is it that showers and even storms seem to come by chance, so that many people think it quite natural to pray for rain or fine weather, though they would consider it ridiculous to ask for an eclipse by prayer.
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Most striking at first is the appearance of sudden illumination, a manifest sign of long unconscious prior work.
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Science is built up with facts, as a house is with stones. But a collection of facts is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house.
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Mathematics has a threefold purpose. It must provide an instrument for the study of nature. But this is not all: it has a philosophical purpose, and, I daresay, an aesthetic purpose.
Henri Poincare