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Mathematicians have tried in vain to this day to discover some order in the sequence of prime numbers, and we have reason to believe that it is a mystery into which the human mind will never penetrate.

— Leonhard Euler Calculus Gems (1992)

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Mind

More quotes by Leonhard Euler

Madam, I have come from a country where people are hanged if they talk.

A function of a variable quantity is an analytic expression composed in any way whatsoever of the variable quantity and numbers or constant quantities.

Introduction to the Analysis of the Infinite (1748)

Although to penetrate into the intimate mysteries of nature and thence to learn the true causes of phenomena is not allowed to us, nevertheless it can happen that a certain fictive hypothesis may suffice for explaining many phenomena.

A conjecture about the nature of air (1780)

To those who ask what the infinitely small quantity in mathematics is, we answer that it is actually zero. Hence there are not so many mysteries hidden in this concept as they are usually believed to be.

Fundamentals of Teaching Mathematics at University Level (2000)

It would be a considerable invention indeed, that of a machine able to mimic speech, with its sounds and articulations. … I think it is not impossible.

All Leonhard Euler quotes →

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The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents.

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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)

The greater part of humanity is too much harassed and fatigued by the struggle with want, to rally itself for a new and sterner struggle with error.

Friedrich Schiller On the Aesthetic Education of Man (1794)

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.

George Bernard Shaw Maxims for Revolutionists (1903)

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