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Gian-Carlo Rota Quotes

1932–1999 Italy

Gian-Carlo Rota (April 27, 1932 – April 18, 1999) was an Italian-American mathematician, philosopher, author, and editor. He was elected in 1978 a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and in 1982 a Member of the United States National Academy of Sciences.

Italy
Mathematicians

Random Gian-Carlo Rota quote

5 quotes

I wonder whether or when artificial intelligence will ever crash the barrier of meaning.

God created infinity, and man, unable to understand infinity, had to invent finite sets.

There are two kinds of mistakes. There are fatal mistakes that destroy a theory; but there are also contingent ones, which are useful in testing the stability of a theory.

The more experimental scientists and engineers are, the more common sense they have, and so on until you get to the mathematicians, who are totally devoid of common sense.

Mathematics is the study of analogies between analogies. All science is. Scientists want to show that things that don't look alike are really the same. That is one of their innermost Freudian motivations. In fact, that is what we mean by understanding.

Indiscrete Thoughts (2008)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Gian-Carlo Rota (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.