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Mathematicians are born, not made.

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
Math
Mathematics
Born
Made
Mathematicians
Mathematician

More quotes by Henri Poincare

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When the logician has resolved each demonstration into a host of elementary operations, all of them correct, he will not yet be in possession of the whole reality, that indefinable something that constitutes the unity ... Now pure logic cannot give us this view of the whole it is to intuition that we must look for it.
Henri Poincare
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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
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How is error possible in mathematics?
Henri Poincare
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Ideas rose in clouds I felt them collide until pairs interlocked, so to speak, making a stable combination.
Henri Poincare
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The subliminal self is in no way inferior to the conscious self. It knows how to choose and to divine.
Henri Poincare
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Mathematical discoveries, small or great are never born of spontaneous generation.
Henri Poincare
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Experiment is the sole source of truth. It alone can teach us something new it alone can give us certainty.
Henri Poincare
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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.
Henri Poincare
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Most striking at first is the appearance of sudden illumination, a manifest sign of long unconscious prior work.
Henri Poincare
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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.
Henri Poincare
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Just as houses are made of stones, so is science made of facts.
Henri Poincare
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Geometry is the art of correct reasoning from incorrectly drawn figures.
Henri Poincare
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In the old days when people invented a new function they had something useful in mind.
Henri Poincare
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Doubting everything and believing everything are two equally convenient solutions that guard us from having to think
Henri Poincare
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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.
Henri Poincare
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What is it indeed that gives us the feeling of elegance in a solution, in a demonstration?
Henri Poincare
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A sane mind should not be guilty of a logical fallacy, yet there are very fine minds incapable of following mathematical demonstrations.
Henri Poincare
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How is it that there are so many minds that are incapable of understanding mathematics? ... the skeleton of our understanding, ... and actually they are the majority. ... We have here a problem that is not easy of solution, but yet must engage the attention of all who wish to devote themselves to education.
Henri Poincare
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Mathematicians do not study objects, but relations among objects they are indifferent to the replacement of objects by others as long the relations don't change. Matter is not important, only form interests them.
Henri Poincare
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One would have to have completely forgotten the history of science so as to not remember that the desire to know nature has had the most constant and the happiest influence on the development of mathematics.
Henri Poincare