Innumeracy and pseudoscience are often associated, in part because of the ease with which mathematical certainty can be invoked, to bludgeon the innumerate into a dumb acquiescence.
The nuclear weapons on board just one of our Trident submarines contain eight times the firepower expended in all of World War II.
Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security.
In listening to stories we tend to suspend disbelief in order to be entertained, whereas in evaluating statistics we generally have an opposite inclination to suspend belief in order not to be beguiled.
When asked why he doesn’t believe in astrology, the logician Raymond Smullyan responds that he’s a Gemini and Geminis never believe in astrology.
Data, data everywhere, but not a thought to think.
Mathematicians are a bit like the laconic Vermonter who, when asked if he’s lived in the state his whole life, replies, “Not yet.”
I think, therefore I laugh.
Mathematics is no more computation than typing is literature.
So many see themselves as aggrieved; so few see themselves as aggrievers.
Defined broadly enough, mathematics encompasses everything.
The once-surprising existence of non-Euclidean models of Euclid’s first four axioms can be seen as a sort of mathematical joke.
The fashion pages have always baffled me. In my opinion, the articles appear to be full of gobbledygook as to make the astrology column seem factual by comparison.
Certainty a strange Ferris wheel of a statement!
The Internet is the world’s largest library. It’s just that all the books are on the floor.
The simple equations that generate the convoluted Mandelbrot fractal have been called the wittiest remarks ever made.