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Quotes from Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics — Richard Hamming

1915–1998 United States

← All quotes by Richard Hamming

26 quotes

There is simply too much known to continue the older approach of giving detailed results.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Statistics should be taught early so that the concepts are absorbed by the student's flexible, adaptable mind before it is too late.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

The beauty of mathematics often makes the subject matter much more attractive and easier to master.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

There are so many ways of being wrong and so few ways of being right that it is much more economical to study successes.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Calculus systematically evades a great deal of numerical calculation.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Continuous distributions are basic to the theory of probability and statistics, and the calculus is necessary to handle them with any ease.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

It is not easy to become an educated person.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Probability and statistics are now so obviously necessary tools for understanding many diverse things that we must not ignore them even for the average student.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

If you expect to continue learning all your life, you will be teaching yourself much of the time. You must learn to learn, especially the difficult topic of mathematics.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

In the long run, the methods are the important part of the course. It is not enough to know the theory; you should be able to apply it.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Theorems... record more complex patterns of thinking that once shown to be valid need not be repeated every time they are needed.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Rigor is not a yes-no property of a proof... it is a vague standard of careful treatment that is currently acceptable to a particular group.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Faced with almost an infinity of details you cannot afford to deal constantly with the specific; you must learn to embrace more and more detail under the cover of generality.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

A central problem in teaching mathematics is to communicate a reasonable sense of taste—meaning often when to, or not to, generalize, abstract, or extend something you have just done.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

The applications of knowledge, especially mathematics, reveal the unity of all knowledge. In a new situation almost anything and everything you ever learned might be applicable, and the artificial divisions seem to vanish.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Calculus is the mathematics of change. ...Change is characteristic of the world.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

It is the same as an art course.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Any unwillingness to learn mathematics today can greatly restrict your possibilities tomorrow.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Science and mathematics... have added little to our understanding of such things as Truth, Beauty, and Justice. There may be definite limits to the applicability of the scientific method.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

When a theory is sufficiently general to cover many fields of application, it acquires some "truth" from each of them. Thus... a positive value for generalization in mathematics.

Methods of Mathematics Applied to Calculus, Probability, and Statistics (1985)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Richard Hamming (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.