Marcus Du Sautoy Quotes

I'm obviously attuned to pick up mathematics whenever I can see it. But in Mozart there is a lot of conscious use of mathematical symbolism and numbers in order to try and give messages.

The best mobile phone had the best mathematician. They know how to fit a huge amount of data into a small amount of space. How to do things efficiently, how to do them cleverly.

When people ask me what my religion is, I say it's the Arsenal.

The knowledge of what we are ignorant of seems to expand faster than our catalogue of breakthroughs.

It's important to me that no one can say I'm not pumping out high-level research.

Artists realise that mathematicians have a way of looking at the world that can make them see things differently.

Of course, physics prevents us from dividing things beyond a certain limit, determined by what is called the Planck constant. This is because, according to physicists, it is actually impossible to measure a distance smaller than 10-34m without creating a black hole that would swallow up the measuring device.

The stage is like a laboratory where you can run theatrical experiments, imposing interesting conditions on the cast or story and seeing how they pan out. Each new play is like creating a tiny virtual universe enclosed by the confines of the stage.

I think my primary audience is in some sense an adult audience, because I think that will then have a knock-on effect for children.

The point is with good maths skills you have just wonderful opportunities and if you don't have good maths skills, there are just so many things that you won't be able to do.

Viruses like symmetrical shapes because symmetry provides a very simple means for them to multiply, and that is what makes viral diseases so infectious - in fact, that's what 'virulent' means. Traditionally, symmetry has been something people have found aesthetically appealing, whether it is seen in a diamond, a flower or the face of a supermodel. But symmetry isn't always so desirable. Some of the most deadly viruses on the biological books, from influenza to herpes, from polio to the AIDS virus, are constructed using the shape of an icosahedron. Is

If you can make yourself symmetrical, you're sending out a sign that you've got good genes, you've got a good upbringing and therefore you'll make a good mate.

We need scientists and mathematicians explaining why they are excited about their subjects but also why they are important for solving social problems, informing political debate and for the economy.

I also fell in love with Borges. He is a mathematician's writer. His short stories are like mathematical proofs, delicately constructed and with ideas laced together effortlessly. Each step is taken with precision and watertight logic, yet the narrative is full of surprising twists and turns.

For any scientist the real challenge is not to stay within the secure garden of the known but to venture out into the wilds of the unknown.

Theory is needed to tell you where to look.

Some might question whether it makes sense to talk about setting up the experiment and running it again with exactly the same conditions--that it is, in fact, impossible. Locally, you might get the conditions exactly the same, but you have to embed the experiment in the universe, and that has moved on. You can't rewind the wave function of the universe and rerun it. The universe is a one-time-only experiment that includes us as part of its wave function, and there's no going back.

The universe cannot be read until we have learnt the language and become familiar with the characters in which it is written. It is written in mathematical language, and the letters are triangles, circles and other geometrical figures, without which means it is humanly impossible to comprehend a single word. Without these, one is wandering about in a dark labyrinth. This

The wonderful thing about maths is it's a totally logical subject, and a pathway has been marked out. I think a lot of these things can be crystallised in something quite essential, that people can get. If I can't explain it, I realise that's probably because I don't completely understand it myself.

Mathematics is a place where you can do things which you can't do in the real world.