eftychia: Me in kilt and poofy shirt, facing away, playing acoustic guitar behind head (Default)
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posted by [personal profile] eftychia at 05:26am on 2009-09-28

"Les charmes enchanteux de cette sublime science ne se décèlent dans toute leur beauté qu'à ceux qui ont le courage de l'approfondir. Mais lorsqu'une personne de ce sexe, qui, par nos meurs [sic] et par nos préjugés, doit rencontrer infiniment plus d'obstacles et de difficultés, que les hommes, à se familiariser avec ces recherches épineuses, sait néanmoins franchir ces entraves et pénétrer ce qu'elles ont de plus caché, il faut sans doute, qu'elle ait le plus noble courage, des talents tout à fait extraordinaires, le génie superieur." -- German mathematician and physicist Carl Friedrich Gauss (b. 1777-04-30, d. 1855-02-23), 1807-04-30, in a letter to French mathematician Sophie Germain (b. 1776-04-01, d. 1831-06-27)

"The enchanting charms of this sublime science reveal themselves in all their beauty only to those who have the courage to go deeply into it. But when a person of that sex, that, because of our mores and our prejudices, has to encounter infinitely more obstacles and difficulties than men in familiarizing herself with these thorny research problems, nevertheless succeeds in surmounting these obstacles and penetrating their most obscure parts, she must without doubt have the noblest courage, quite extraordinary talents and superior genius."

[Quotation and translation both via Wikiquote]

There are 2 comments on this entry. (Reply.)
metahacker: A picture of white-socked feet, as of a person with their legs crossed. (Default)
posted by [personal profile] metahacker at 11:45am on 2009-09-28
Was he *purposely* trying to make this sound like a double entendre?
silmaril: A constant-boundary-condition solution to the Helmholtz Eqn. (Helmholtz)
posted by [personal profile] silmaril at 03:34pm on 2009-09-28
Oh, that is beautiful.

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