Quote

If nature were not beautiful, it would not be worth knowing, and if nature were not worth knowing, life would not be worth living

Henri Poincare

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Life
Worth
Knowing
Living
Nature
Beautiful
Would

More quotes by Henri Poincare

Image
Zero is the number of objects that satisfy a condition that is never satisfied. But as never means in no case, I do not see that any progress has been made.
Henri Poincare
Image
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
Image
Thus, be it understood, to demonstrate a theorem, it is neither necessary nor even advantageous to know what it means.
Henri Poincare
Image
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.
Henri Poincare
Image
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.
Henri Poincare
Image
Mathematical discoveries, small or great are never born of spontaneous generation.
Henri Poincare
Image
A sane mind should not be guilty of a logical fallacy, yet there are very fine minds incapable of following mathematical demonstrations.
Henri Poincare
Image
The subliminal self is in no way inferior to the conscious self. It knows how to choose and to divine.
Henri Poincare
Image
Tolstoi explains somewhere in his writings why, in his opinion, “Science for Science's sake” is an absurd conception. We cannot know all the facts, since they are practically infinite in number. We must make a selection. Is it not better to be guided by utility, by our practical, and more especially our moral, necessities?
Henri Poincare
Image
Mathematicians do not deal in objects, but in relations between objects thus, they are free to replace some objects by others so long as the relations remain unchanged. Content to them is irrelevant: they are interested in form only.
Henri Poincare
Image
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
Image
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
Image
Ideas rose in clouds I felt them collide until pairs interlocked, so to speak, making a stable combination.
Henri Poincare
Image
Mathematical discoveries, small or great are never born of spontaneous generation They always presuppose a soil seeded with preliminary knowledge and well prepared by labour, both conscious and subconscious.
Henri Poincare
Image
The mathematical facts worthy of being studied are those which, by their analogy with other facts, are capable of leading us to the knowledge of a physical law. They reveal the kinship between other facts, long known, but wrongly believed to be strangers to one another.
Henri Poincare
Image
We also know how cruel the truth often is, and we wonder whether delusion is not more consoling.
Henri Poincare
Image
Analyse data just so far as to obtain simplicity and no further.
Henri Poincare
Image
How is error possible in mathematics?
Henri Poincare
Image
What is a good definition? For the philosopher or the scientist, it is a definition which applies to all the objects to be defined, and applies only to them it is that which satisfies the rules of logic. But in education it is not that it is one that can be understood by the pupils.
Henri Poincare
Image
But all of my efforts served only to make me better acquainted with the difficulty, which in itself was something.
Henri Poincare