Howard Whitley Eves famous quotes

It is impossible to overstate the imporance of problems in mathematics. It is by means of problems that mathematics develops and actually lifts itself by its own bootstraps... Every new discovery in mathematics, results from an attempt to solve some problem.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Mean #Math #Discovery

There is a distinction between what may be called a problem and what may be considered an exercise. The latter serves to drill a student in some technique or procedure, and requires little if any, original thought... No exercise, then, can always be done with reasonbable dispatch and with a miniumum of creative thinking. In contrast to an exercise, a problem, if it is a good one for its level, should require though on the part of the student.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Math #Exercise #Thinking

A formal manipulator in mathematics often experiences the discomforting feeling that his pencil surpasses him in intelligence.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Feelings #Statistics #Mathematics

Mathematics may be likened to a large rock whose interior composition we wish to examine. The older mathematicians appear as persevering stone cutters slowly attempting to demolish the rock from the outside with hammer and chisel. The later mathematicians resemble expert miners who seek vulnerable veins, drill into these strategic places, and then blast the rock apart with well placed internal charges.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Rocks #Wish #Experts

A good problem should be more than a mere exercise; it should be challenging and not too easily solved by the student, and it should require some "dreaming" time.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Education #Dream #Exercise

We call the slope of a line m because the word "slope" begins with the letter m.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Lines #Letters #Slopes

One is hard pressed to think of universal customs that man has successfully established on earth. There is one, however, of which he can boast the universal adoption of the Hindu-Arabic numerals to record numbers. In this we perhaps have man's unique worldwide victory of an idea.
-- Howard Whitley Eves

#Math #Men #Thinking

For the most part I have been able to meet all my goals, but I always strive for bigger goals in life so everything's not complete just yet. My first aspiration was to be known as a singer and also as an advocate for sickle cell disease. I try to be that inspiration, you know. It's not as bad as people try to make it seem. I mean, it is, but it's not. People don't have to be afraid of it; they don't have to be held down by it. Try to find triumph in the situation.

The whole bible is the working out of the relationship between God and man. God is not a dictator barking out orders and demanding silent obedience. Were it so, there would be no relationship at all. No real relationship goes just one way. There are always two active parties. We must have reverence and awe for God, and honor for the chain of tradition. But that doesn't mean we can't use new information to help us read the holy texts in new ways.

Our fans want us to be happy and if that means being married or having a girlfriend, they are okay with that. Of course, in this industry it is a bit harder to have normal relationships, but it is possible.

The survival of democracy depends on the renunciation of violence and the development of nonviolent means to combat evil and advance the good.

We two remake our world by naming it / Together, knowing what words mean for us / And for the other for whom current coin / Is cold speech--but we say, the tree, the pool, / And see the fire in the air, the sun, our sun, / Anybody's sun, the world's sun, but here, now / Particularly our sun....

Since the mathematicians have invaded the theory of relativity I do not understand it myself any more.

To make a discovery is not necessarily the same as to understand a discovery.

And of all illumination which human reason can give, none is comparable to the discovery of what we are, our nature, our obligations, what happiness we are capable of, and what are the means of attaining it.

Painting is self-discovery. You arrive at the image through the act of painting.

Rules for Self Discovery: 1. What we want most; 2. What we think about most; 3. How we use our money; 4. What we do with our leisure time; 5. The company we enjoy; 6. Who and what we admire; 7. What we laugh at.