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Logic sometimes makes monsters. For half a century we have seen a mass of bizarre functions which appear to be forced to resemble as little as possible honest functions which serve some purpose.

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
Seen
Monsters
Possible
Appear
Purpose
Logic
Half
Serve
Makes
Function
Resemble
Littles
Mass
Functions
Little
Century
Bizarre
Sometimes
Honest
Forced

More quotes by Henri Poincare

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Geometry is the art of correct reasoning from incorrectly drawn figures.
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Thus, be it understood, to demonstrate a theorem, it is neither necessary nor even advantageous to know what it means.
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Experiment is the sole source of truth. It alone can teach us something new it alone can give us certainty.
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Thought is only a flash between two long nights, but this flash is everything.
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In the old days when people invented a new function they had something useful in mind.
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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.
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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.
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It is far better to foresee even without certainty than not to foresee at all.
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All of mathematics is a tale about groups.
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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.
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Geometry is not true, it is advantageous.
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Just as houses are made of stones, so is science made of facts.
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The mind uses its faculty for creativity only when experience forces it to do so.
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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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Most striking at first is the appearance of sudden illumination, a manifest sign of long unconscious prior work.
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A scientist worthy of his name, about all a mathematician, experiences in his work the same impression as an artist his pleasure is as great and of the same nature.
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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.
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The subliminal self is in no way inferior to the conscious self. It knows how to choose and to divine.
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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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Les faits ne parlent pas. Facts do not speak.
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