Measurement Paul Lockhart Quotes

What makes a mathematician is not technical skill or encyclopedic knowledge but insatiable curiosity and a desire for simple beauty.

It is an aesthetic principle almost universally acknowledged among mathematicians that the best way to solve a problem is to find an ingenious way not to have to solve it at all.

People don't do mathematics because it's useful. They do it because it's interesting.

it doesn’t matter so much what is true. It matters why it’s true.

Physical reality was here before there were conscious human beings, and it will still be here when we're gone. Mathematical reality, on the other hand, depends on consciousness for its very existence.

In my mind's eye, there is a universe where beautiful shapes and patterns float by and do curious and surprising things that keep me amused and entertained. It's an amazing place, and I really love it.

The solution to a math problem is not a number: it's an argument, a proof. We're trying to create these little poems of pure reason. Of course, like any other form of poetry, we want our work to be beautiful as well as meaningful. Mathematics is the art of explanation, and consequently, it is difficult, frustrating, and deeply satisfying.

This is what it means to do mathematics. To make a discovery (by whatever means, including playing around with physical models like paper, string, and rubber bands), and then to explain it in the simplest and most elegant way possible. This is the art of it, and this is why it is so challenging and fun.

This is abstract art, pure and simple. And art is always a struggle. There is no systematic way to create beautiful and meaningful paintings or sculptures, and there is also no method for producing beautiful and meaningful mathematical arguments.