Mathematical Beauty quotes:

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A physical law must possess mathematical beauty. -- Paul Dirac
A theory with mathematical beauty is more likely to be correct than an ugly one that fits some experimental data. -- Paul Dirac
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...the feeling of mathematical beauty, of the harmony of numbers and of forms, of geometric elegance. It is a genuinely aesthetic feeling, which all mathematicians know -- Henri Poincare
Theoretical physicists accept the need for mathematical beauty as an act of faith... For example, the main reason why the theory of relativity is so universally accepted is its mathematical beauty. -- Paul Dirac
The harmony of the world is made manifest in Form and Number, and the heart and soul and all the poetry of Natural Philosophy are embodied in the concept of mathematical beauty. --
What makes the theory of relativity so acceptable to physicists in spite of its going against the principle of simplicity is its great mathematical beauty. This is a quality which cannot be defined, any more than beauty in art can be defined, but which people who study mathematics usually have no difficulty in appreciating. -- Paul Dirac
The research worker, in his efforts to express the fundamental laws of Nature in mathematical form, should strive mainly for mathematical beauty. He should take simplicity into consideration in a subordinate way to beauty ... It often happens that the requirements of simplicity and beauty are the same, but where they clash, the latter must take precedence. -- Paul Dirac
It is quite clear that beauty does depend on one's culture and upbringing for certain kinds of beauty, pictures, literature, poetry and so on...But mathematical beauty is of a rather different kind. I should say perhaps it is of a completely different kind and transcends these personal factors. It is the same in all countries and at all periods of time. -- Paul Dirac
Mathemagical mathematics combines the beauty of mathematical structure with the entertainment value of a trick. -- Martin Gardner
As for everything else, so for a mathematical theory: beauty can be perceived but not explained. -- Arthur Cayley
The chief forms of beauty are order and symmetry and definiteness, which the mathematical sciences demonstrate in a special degree. -- Aristotle
Mathematics has beauty and romance. It's not a boring place to be, the mathematical world. It's an extraordinary place; it's worth spending time there. -- Marcus du Sautoy

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