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
Music and comedy are so linked. The rhythm of comedy is connected to the rhythm of music. They’re both about creating tension and knowing when to let it go. I’m always surprised when somebody funny is not musical.
Conan O'BrienRead
Our vanity, our passions, our spirit of imitation, our abstract intelligence, our habits have long been at work, and it is the task of art to undo this work of theirs, making us travel back in the direction from which we have come to the depths where what has really existed lies unknown within us.
Marcel ProustRead
The function of music is to release us from the tyranny of conscious thought.
Thomas BeechamRead
Ah, art! Ah, life! The pendulum swinging back and forth, from complex to simple, again to complex. From romantic to realistic, back to romantic.
Ray BradburyRead
Never resist a sentence you like, in which language takes its own pleasure and in which, after having abused it for so long, you are stupefied by its innocence.
Jean BaudrillardRead
Hip-hop is still cool at a party. But to me, hip-hop has never been strictly a party; it is also there to elevate consciousness.
Saul WilliamsRead