Michael Atiyah Quotes

7 Sourced Quotes

This 'Hodge conjecture' has by now achieved a considerable status, almost on a par with the Riemann hypothesis or the Poincaré conjecture.

Michael Atiyah
In the broad light of day mathematicians check their equations and their proofs, leaving no stone unturned in their search for rigour. But, at night, under the full moon, they dream, they float among the stars and wonder at the miracle of the heavens. They are inspired. Without dreams there is no art, no mathematics, no life.

Michael Atiyah
Algebra is the offer made by the devil to the mathematician. The devil says: I will give you this powerful machine, it will answer any question you like. All you need to do is give me your soul: give up geometry and you will have this marvellous machine.'

Michael Atiyah
If you attack a mathematical problem directly, very often you come to a dead end, nothing you do seems to work and you feel that if only you could peer round the corner there might be an easy solution. There is nothing like having somebody else beside you, because he can usually peer round the corner.

Michael Atiyah
The aim of mathematics is to explain as much as possible in simple terms.

Michael Atiyah
Mathematics is always a continuum, linked to its history, the past - nothing comes out of zero.

Michael Atiyah
I think it is said that Gauss had ten different proofs for the law of quadratic reciprocity. Any good theorem should have several proofs, the more the better. For two reasons: usually, different proofs have different strengths and weaknesses, and they generalize in different directions - they are not just repetitions of each other.

Michael Atiyah