Quotations

René Thom


View the biography of René Thom


If one must choose between rigour and meaning, I shall unhesitatingly choose the latter.
I believe that proving is not a natural activity for mathematicians.
Algebra is rich in structure but weak in meaning.
The importance of the "New Mathematics" lies mainly in the fact that it has taught us the difference between the disc and the circle.
Quoted in D MacHale, Comic Sections (Dublin 1993)