Dictionary of Quotations in Mathematics »

This work contains almost 3,000 quotations, arranged under 38 chapters and 389 subsections, that present quotations over a spectrum stretching to infinity. A few of the many areas covered: the God hypothesis, historical origins, linguistics, the arts, mathematicians themselves, logic, real and idealized space, number theory, algebra, computers, probability theory, and statistics. Immensely useful for speeches, papers, and presentations - and entertaining for browsing. Fully indexed by author and keyword.

Library Journal

Nowlan (mathematics, Southern Connecticut State Univ.) here gathers nearly 3000 mathematical quotations for use as a teaching tool. He has a bit of a tin ear (many of the quotations he selected don't feature memorable turns of phrase or beautiful language), but he makes up for it with meticulous accuracy in attribution. While mathematical quotation dictionaries like Carl Gaither's Statistically Speaking: A Dictionary of Quotations concentrate on the words of famous mathematicians, telling anecdotes, or pithy and humorous sayings, this one also data-mines the literature of popular mathematics and classic textbooks for particularly clever or concise ways of talking about mathematical ideas. The quotations are organized by subject in order to "serve as something of a group discussion of the topic by those who have thought extensively about it" and are cross-referenced in author and keyword indexes. The famous lines are all here, but the keyword index is sometimes too skimpy to find them easily. For example, "A mathematician is a machine for turning coffee into theorems" is indexed under "theorems" but not "coffee." However, once you locate the quotation, you learn that it may have originated with Alfred Renyi and not, as is commonly assumed, Paul Erdos. On the whole, a solid sourcebook for teachers and mathematicians.-Amy Brunvand, Univ. of Utah Lib., Salt Lake City Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.