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The highest form of pure thought is in mathematics.

— Plato Disputed

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Source, in full

Also attributed on quote sites without a source, and can be found in some recent non-academic books but also without a source, and google books shows no examples of the quote in any 20th century book. Earliest example found is a usenet post from 11 April 1990.

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Mathematics

More quotes by Plato

Oh dear Pan and all the other Gods of this place, grant that I may be beautiful inside.

There is no one who ever acts honestly in the administration of states, nor any helper who will save any one who maintains the cause of the just.

Let every man remind their descendants that they also are soldiers who must not desert the ranks of their ancestors, or from cowardice fall behind.

Then we may begin by assuming that there are three classes of men—lovers of wisdom, lovers of honor, lovers of gain?

Wonder is the feeling of a philosopher, and philosophy begins in wonder.

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Anyone who believes exponential growth can go on forever in a finite world is either a madman or an economist.

Kenneth Boulding to Kenneth Boulding in: United States. Congress. House (1973)

If the doors of perception were cleansed, everything would appear to man as it is: infinite.

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Pure mathematics consists entirely of assertions to the effect that, if such and such a proposition is true of anything, then such and such another proposition is true of that thing.

Bertrand Russell

The land of easy mathematics where he who works adds up and he who retires subtracts.

Núria Añó

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Plato (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.