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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 April 2011
“Can we analyse the relation between ‘savoir faire’ in puzzles and games and mathematical modes of thought? If we use such methods of popularization, how do we prevent mathematics from being associated with the solution of inconsequential problems?” (A.G.Howson, J.-P.Kahane, H.Pollak, The Popularization of Mathematics).
MATHEMATICS, ART AND GAMES
Mathematics is a many-sided human activity. It is, of course, a science; even more, it is the model and paradigm of all scientific activity. It is a powerful instrument for the exploration of the universe and for the appropriate use of the natural resources at our disposal. It is a model of thought which along the centuries has served as a privileged field for the study of the capacities of the human mind.
But mathematics has also been and continues to be an authentic art and game and this artistic and gamelike component is so consubstantial with the development of mathematics that every field of mathematical work that does not attain a certain level of aesthetic satisfaction remains unstable, reaching for a more polished expression that might convey a unitary, harmonious, pleasurable, amusing vision, in the same way as an unfinished symphony or poem stretches out in the mind of its author for the most beautiful possible form.
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