Why Mathematics?

Extract

Most of us, I suppose, can quote a few phrases read or heard, which have greatly affected our outlook on life in general and our own work in particular. Of about half a dozen such, two came vividly into my mind as I recently attended, at the University of London Institute of Education, a course of lectures in which a closer link between the sixth form and the University courses in mathematics was sought. The first goes back to my youth, and comes from Ruskin—“Know what you have to do—and do it!” Ruskin goes on to say that insufficiency of means is far less frequently a source of failure than an inadequate understanding of the thing to be done. The second is more recent, and came as a gentle rebuke from more than one of the nurses at St. Bartholomew’s Hospital, during my stay there after becoming blind, when I apologetically asked for some small non-routine service—“What are we here for?” Surely Ruskin’s precept and the nurses’ question are very relevant to our work.