Morris Kline
Morris Kline
Morris Klinewas a Professor of Mathematics, a writer on the history, philosophy, and teaching of mathematics, and also a popularizer of mathematical subjects...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth1 May 1908
CountryUnited States of America
Morris Kline quotes about
teacher teaching errors
[The error in the teaching of mathematics is that] mathematics is expected either to be immediately attractive to students on its own merits or to be accepted by students solely on the basis of the teacher's assurance that it will be helpful in later life. [And yet,] mathematlcs is the key to understanding and mastering our physical, social and biological worlds.
beauty art form
A elegantly executed proof is a poem in all but the form in which it is written.
ignorance math statistics
Statistics: the mathematical theory of ignorance.
space machines world
In brief, the whole world is the totality of mathematically expressible motions of objects in space and time, and the entire universe is a great, harmonious, and mathematically designed machine.
knowledge math body
Mathematics is a body of knowledge, but it contains no truths.
teaching thorough-understanding firsts
Psychologically, the teaching of abstractions first is wrong. Indeed, a thorough understanding of the concrete must precede the abstract.
expression innovation groups
Though determinants and matrices received a great deal of attention in the nineteenth century and thousands of papers were written on these subjects, they do not constitute great innovations in mathematics.... Neither determinants nor matrices have influenced deeply the course of mathematics despite their utility as compact expressions and despite the suggestiveness of matrices as concrete groups for the discernment of general theorems of group theory....
should-have practice paper
Every paper published in a respectable journal should have a preface by the author stating why he is publishing the article, and what value he sees in it. I have no hope that this practice will ever be adopted.
science reality order
The stone that Dr. Johnson once kicked to demonstrate the reality of matter has become dissipated in a diffuse distribution of mathematical probabilities. The ladder that Descartes, Galileo, Newton, and Leibniz erected in order to scale the heavens rests upon a continually shifting, unstable foundation.
science definitions rigor
There is no rigorous definition of rigor.
math challenges mind
The tantalizing and compelling pursuit of mathematical problems offers mental absorption, peace of mind amid endless challenges, repose in activity, battle without conflict, refuge from the goading urgency of contingent happenings, and the sort of beauty changeless mountains present to senses tried by the present day kaleidoscope of events.