Virgil wrote:
> In article <41368$480700d8$82a1e228$24194@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
> Han de Bruijn <Han.deBruijn@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>
>>Han de Bruijn wrote:
>>
>>>Mathematics is two things: the ART of creating ideas, and the SCIENCE
of
>>>applying those ideas to real world material.
>>
>>Ah, forgot one thing: the DISCIPLINE to _reject_ ideas if it turns out
>>that these ideas cannot appliccable. The discipline is the hardest part,
>>for groups as well as for individuals.
>>
>>So Mathematics is three things: the ART of creating ideas, the SCIENCE
>>of applying these ideas to real world material, and the DISCIPLINE to
>>reject ideas for which it's is evident that they cannot be matched to
>>any real world material.
>
> However, one must be careful in mathematics not to apply that rejection
> discipline too soon, as some developments in mathematics which
> eventually proved to be of great use in the real world were for a long
> time thought to be quite useless in that real world, and even valued
> more highly for that reason.
>
> It is typical of both pure and applied mathematicians to undervalue the
> others worth.
Uhm, I was thinking along the lines of rejecting Phlogiston and Ether as
useless ideas. But suppose these were not mathematical ..
Han de Bruijn
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