Carl Friedrich Gauss Quotes

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All quotes by Carl Friedrich Gauss: Education Giving Math Mathematics Science more...
  • Arc, amplitude, and curvature sustain a similar relation to each other as time, motion, and velocity, or as volume, mass, and density.

    Carl Friedrich Gauss (1965). “General investigations of curved surfaces”
  • Mathematics is concerned only with the enumeration and comparison of relations.

  • My young friend, I wish that science would intoxicate you as much as our good Göttingen beer! Upon seeing a student staggering down a street.

    Science  
  • A great part of its theories derives an additional charm from the peculiarity that important propositions, with the impress of simplicity on them, are often easily discovered by induction, and yet are of so profound a character that we cannot find the demonstrations till after many vain attempts; and even then, when we do succeed, it is often by some tedious and artificial process, while the simple methods may long remain concealed.

    "Mathematical Circles Adieu". Book by Howard W. Eves, 1977.
  • The total number of Dirichlet's publications is not large: jewels are not weighed on a grocery scale.

  • When a philosopher says something that is true then it is trivial. When he says something that is not trivial then it is false.

  • We must admit with humility that, while number is purely a product of our minds, space has a reality outside our minds, so that we cannot completely prescribe its properties a priori.

    Letter to Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel, 1830.
  • With a thousand joys I would accept a nonacademic job for which industriousness, accuracy, loyalty, and such are sufficient without specialized knowledge, and which would give a comfortable living and sufficient leisure, in order to sacrifice to my gods [mathematical research]. For example, I hope to get the editting of the census, the birth and death lists in local districts, not as a job, but for my pleasure and satisfaction.

    Science  
  • To such idle talk it might further be added: that whenever a certain exclusive occupation is coupled with specific shortcomings, it is likewise almost certainly divorced from certain other shortcomings.

    "Gauss-Schumacher Briefwechsel". Book by Carl Friedrich Gauss, 1862.
  • Does the pursuit of truth give you as much pleasure as before? Surely it is not the knowing but the learning, not the possessing but the acquiring, not the being-there but the getting there that afford the greatest satisfaction. If I have exhausted something, I leave it in order to go again into the dark. Thus is that insatiable man so strange: when he has completed a structure it is not in order to dwell in it comfortably, but to start another.

  • It may be true that people who are merely mathematicians have certain specific shortcomings; however that is not the fault of mathematics, but is true of every exclusive occupation. Likewise a mere linguist, a mere jurist, a mere soldier, a mere merchant, and so forth. One could add such idle chatter that when a certain exclusive occupation is often connected with certain specific shortcomings, it is on the other hand always free of certain other shortcomings.

    Science  
  • In my opinion instruction is very purposeless for such individuals who do no want merely to collect a mass of knowledge, but are mainly interested in exercising (training) their own powers. One doesn't need to grasp such a one by the hand and lead him to the goal, but only from time to time give him suggestions, in order that he may reach it himself in the shortest way.

  • I am giving this winter two courses of lectures to three students, of which one is only moderately prepared, the other less than moderately, and the third lacks both preparation and ability. Such are the onera of a mathematical profession.

  • Life stands before me like an eternal spring with new and brilliant clothes.

  • Less depends upon the choice of words than upon this, that their introduction shall be justified by pregnant theorems.

    Carl Friedrich Gauss (1965). “General investigations of curved surfaces”
  • I have a true aversion to teaching. The perennial business of a professor of mathematics is only to teach the ABC of his science; most of the few pupils who go a step further, and usually to keep the metaphor, remain in the process of gathering information, become only Halbwisser [one who has superficial knowledge of the subject], for the rarer talents do not want to have themselves educated by lecture courses, but train themselves. And with this thankless work the professor loses his precious time.

  • There have been only three epoch-making mathematicians, Archimedes, Newton, and Eisenstein.

    Science  
    "Mathematics, Queen and Servant of Science". Book by Eric Temple Bell, 1951.
  • I believe you are more believing in the Bible than I. I am not, and, you are much happier than I.

    "Carl Friedrich Gauss: Titan of Science". Book by Guy Waldo Dunnington, 1955.
  • I have the vagary of taking a lively interest in mathematical subjects only where I may anticipate ingenious association of ideas and results recommending themselves by elegance or generality.

    Science  
  • In mathematics there are no true controversies.

  • Mathematics is the queen of sciences and number theory is the queen of mathematics. She often condescends to render service to astronomy and other natural sciences, but in all relations she is entitled to the first rank.

    "Gauss zum Gedächtniss". Book by Wolfgang Sartorius von Waltershausen, 1856.
  • I mean the word proof not in the sense of the lawyers, who set two half proofs equal to a whole one, but in the sense of a mathematician, where half proof = 0, and it is demanded for proof that every doubt becomes impossible.

    Letter to Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers on May 14, 1826. "Calculus Gems". Book by George F. Simmons, 1992.
  • The enchanting charms of this sublime science reveal only to those who have the courage to go deeply into it.

    Letter to Sophie Germain, April 30, 1807.
  • Further, the dignity of the science itself seems to require that every possible means be explored for the solution of a problem so elegant and so celebrated.

    "Disquisitiones Arithmeticae". Textbook by Carl Friedrich Gauss, Article 329, 1801.
  • Ask her to wait a moment - I am almost done.

    Attributed in "Men of Mathematics" by E. T. Bell, 1937.
  • I confess that Fermat's Theorem as an isolated proposition has very little interest for me, because I could easily lay down a multitude of such propositions, which one could neither prove nor dispose of.

    "The World of Mathematics". Book by J. R. Newman, 1956.
  • Mathematics is the queen of the sciences.

    "Gauss zum Gedächtniss". Book by Wolfgang Sartorius von Waltershausen, 1856.
  • Mathematicians stand on each other's shoulders.

  • To the distracting occupations belong especially my lecture courses which I am holding this winter for the first time, and which now cost much more of my time than I like. Meanwhile I hope that the second time this expenditure of time will be much less, otherwise I would never be able to reconcile myself to it, even practical (astronomical) work must give far more satisfaction than if one brings up to B a couple more mediocre heads which otherwise would have stopped at A.

  • To praise it would amount to praising myself. For the entire content of the work... coincides almost exactly with my own meditations which have occupied my mind for the past thirty or thirty-five years.

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Carl Friedrich Gauss quotes about: Education Giving Math Mathematics Science

Carl Friedrich Gauss

  • Born: April 30, 1777
  • Died: February 23, 1855
  • Occupation: Mathematician