It will be another million years, at least, before we understand the primes.
Paul ErdosRead
Why are numbers beautiful? It’s like asking why is Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony beautiful._x000D_ If you don’t see why, someone can’t tell you. I know numbers are beautiful._x000D_ If they aren’t beautiful, nothing is.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the inherent beauty in numbers, similar to the beauty found in music and art.
Paul Erdos compares the beauty of numbers to the beauty of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, suggesting that appreciation for such beauty is subjective and cannot be fully explained to someone who does not perceive it. He emphasizes that if one cannot see the beauty in numbers, then they may struggle to recognize beauty in anything at all, illustrating the deep connection between mathematical concepts and aesthetic appreciation.
Themes
NumbersBeautyArtSymmetryAppreciation
In practice
Example use cases
In a presentation about the beauty of mathematics, this quote can be used to inspire students.
More from Paul Erdos
All quotes →Similar quotes
You have to create the show anew, and find it anew, on a nightly basis.
Bruce SpringsteenRead
If you let the plot be determined by what you feel is in the character's mind at that point, it may not turn out to be a very good play, but at least it will be a play where people are behaving in a kind of truthful way.
Tom StoppardRead
Sometimes just to paint a head you have to give up the whole figure. To paint a leaf, you have to sacrifice the whole landscape. It might seem like you're limiting yourself at first, but after a while you realize that having a quarter of an inch of something you have a better chance of holding on to a certain feeling of the universe than if you pretended to be doing the whole sky.
Nicole KraussRead
Life is rich, always changing, always challenging, and we architects have the task of transmitting into wood, concrete, glass and steel, of transforming human aspirations into habitable and meaningful space.
Arthur EricksonRead
Writing is not about making a buck, not about publishers and agents. Writing is not about feeling good. Writing is about pain, suffering, hard work, risk, and fear.
Sue GraftonRead
The best thing about writing has been the writer's life, the sense of being expressed, the ownership of the day, the entirely specious sense of freedom we have, however slave we are to some boss or other. I wouldn't trade it for any other life.
Anthony MinghellaRead