[Logo] Mathematical Poetry

Über Geometrie von J. W. Goethe:

Doch erst zur Tat erregt den tiefsten Sinn
Geometrie, die Allbeherrscherin:
Sie schaut das All durch ein Gesetz belebt,
Sie mißt den Raum und was im Raume schwebt;
Sie regelt streng die Kreise der Natur,
Hiernach die Pulse deiner Taschenuhr;
Sie öffnet geistig grenzenlosen Kreis
Der Menschenhände kümmerlichstem Fleiß,
Uns gab sie erst den Hebel in die Hand,
Dann ward es Rad und Schraube dem Verstand;
Nun aber g'nügt ein Hauch der steten Regung,
Aus Füll und Leere bildet sie Bewegung,
Bis mannigfaltigst endlich unbezirkt
Nun Kraft zu Kräften überschwenglich wirkt.

(aus: "Die ersten Zeugnisse der Stotternheimer Saline.
Überreicht zum 30. Januar 1828")

Das Hexeneinmaleins aus "Faust I", nochmal von J. W. Goethe:

Du musst versteh'n!
Aus eins mach Zehn,
Und Zwei lass gehn,
Und Drei mach gleich,
So bist du reich.
Verlier die Vier!
Aus Fünf und Sechs,
So sagt die Hex,
Mach Sieben und Acht,
So ist's vollbracht;
Und neun ist Eins,
Und Zehn ist keins,
Das ist das Hexen-Einmaleins!

"Herbstag", wie Rilke ihn wirklich gemeint hat:

Herr, es ist Zeit, der Urlaub war sehr kurz,
leg Deinen Schatten auf die Sonnenuhren
und in der Uni lass' die Studis los.

Verbiet den letztgenannten, faul zu sein,
gib' ihnen noch zwei schwierigere Fragen
dränge sie zur Vollendung hin und jage
die letzte Muße aus dem schweren Sein.

Wer jetzt nichts tut, verbaut sich nur noch mehr
wer jetzt verwirrt ist, wird es lange bleiben
wird wachen, rechnen, unter Mathe leiden
und wird in den Gedanken, hin und her,
unruhig wandern, wenn die (Hausaufgaben-)blätter treiben.

von Katrin Prechtel, damals Mathematik-Studentin an der TU München; 
Geschenk zu einer Analysis-Vorlesung. Das gerahmte Original
hängt in meinem Büro.

"Reformgedicht"

Gedicht zur Reformitis an deutschen Hochschulen, von Dieter Gromes,
emeritierter Professor für theoretische Physik (Univ. Heidelberg).

"Argument" by Bill Parry, 1934-2006

As he cleaned the board, 
chalk-dust rose like parched mist.
A dry profession, he mused as morosely
they shuffled settling tier upon tier.

Now, almost half-way through the course,
(coughs, yawns and automatic writing)
the theorem is ready.

Moving to the crucial point,
the sly unconventional twist,
a quiver springs his voice and breast;

soon the gambit will appear
opposed to what's expected.
The ploy will snip one strand
the entire skein sloughing to the ground.

His head turns sympathetically
from board to class.
They copy copiously.
But two, perhaps three pause and frown,

wonder will this go through
questioning this entanglement
--yet they nod encouragement.
Then the final crux; the ropes relax and fall.

His reward: two smile, perhaps three
and one is visibly moved.
Q.E.D., the theorem is proved.

This was his sole intent.
Leaving the symbols on the board
he departs with a swagger of achievement.

(see also the original publication in the Notices of the AMS, 3/2007)

A poem from "Under Which Lyre" by W.H. Auden (1946)

Thou shalt not do as the dean pleases,
Thou shalt not write thy doctor's thesis
     On education,
Thou shalt not worship projects nor
Shalt thou or thine bow down before 
     Administration.
        
Thou shalt not answer questionnaires
Or quizzes upon World-Affairs,
     Nor with compliance
Take any test. Thou shalt not sit
With statisticians nor commit
     A social science
        
Thou shalt not be on friendly terms
With guys in advertising firms,
     Nor speak with such
As read the Bible for its prose,
Nor, above all, make love to those
     Who wash too much.
        
Thou shalt not live within thy means
Nor on plain water and raw greens.
     If thou must choose
Between the chances, choose the odd;
Read The New Yorker, trust in God;
     And take short views.
(see also the original citation on Toby Bayley's homepage)

"Stewart and Tall" by Caroline Series

Stewart and Tall wrote a book called `Foundations'
For students to use in abstruse calculations,
And whether they loved it or whether they dropped it,
They all had to buy it, which brought in the profit.
    Sing epsilon delta, Stewart and Tall,
    Such combining of intellect few can recall.

O yes, you thought you knew all abount counting,
But you didn't you know, till you understood mapping.
There are types of infinity large beyond number,
But no-one can count them, how's that for a wonder?
    Sing epsilon delta, Stewart and Tall
    I betcha you'll buy it, the price is quite small.

They said the real numbers were not what you thought
But the rules of al-ge-bra worked just as they ought.
And noone could count till a man named Peano,
But quite how he did it, why, noone could tell you.
    Sing epsilon delta, Stewart and Tall,
    You can take it or leave it, it's better than Hall.

They spoke of the ease of a proof by induction,
And then they reduced the whole thing ad absurdum.
If still you were with them, they started on logic,
But really the proofs were nothing but magic.
    O epsilon zeta, Stewart and Tall,
    Their tricks will delight you, their puzzles enthrall.

You thought you were suffering with your relations?
Just wait till they grasp at your mind with injections.
At the end they wax lyrical, talking of rings
And fields (but not sheaves or more delicate things).
    O epsilon delta, sing David and Ian,
    When stuck with a problem, try putting the tea on.

As I sing you this sage, I say there're no questions
Whose answers aren't buried within the Foundations.
Can you find a number sufficiently small?
There's noone can beat them, old Stewart and Tall.
   Sing alpha and omega, Stewart and Tall,
   Witha cheer for Foundations: hip hooray one and all!

N.B. `The foundations of mathematics', by Ian Stewart and David Tall, Oxford Sc. Publ., 1977. See also the original citation of this poem on Caroline Series' homepage.

"Weapons of Math Instruction" by Brian Leiter (2003)

At New York's Kennedy airport today, an individual later discovered to be a public school teacher was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a setsquare, a slide rule, and a calculator.

At a morning press conference, Attorney general John Ashcroft said he believes the man is a member of the notorious al-gebra movement. He is being charged by the FBI with carrying weapons of math instruction.

"Al-gebra is a fearsome cult,", Ashcroft said. "They desire average solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in a search of absolute value. They use secret code names like "x" and "y" and refer to themselves as "unknowns", but we have determined they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country.

"As the Greek philanderer Isosceles used to say, there are 3 sides to every triangle," Ashcroft declared.

When asked to comment on the arrest, President Bush said, "If God had wanted us to have better weapons of math instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes.

"I am gratified that our government has given us a sine that it is intent on protracting us from these math-dogs who are willing to disintegrate us with calculus disregard. Murky statisticians love to inflict plane on every sphere of influence," the President said, adding: "Under the circumferences, we must differentiate their root, make our point, and draw the line."

President Bush warned, "These weapons of math instruction have the potential to decimal everything in their math on a scalene never before seen unless we become exponents of a Higher Power and begin to factor-in random facts of vertex."

Attorney General Ashcroft said, "As our Great Leader would say, read my ellipse. Here is one principle he is uncertainty of: though they continue to multiply, their days are numbered as the hypotenuse tightens around their necks."

"Proof of the Riemann Hypothesis utilizing the theory of Alternative Facts" by donald J. Trump (2017)

As the previous text shows, American politics make up for great contributions to this page. Of course, the 45th president of the US needed to contribute as well. Here is his far-reaching proof of the Riemann hypothesis: pdf-file (original citation)

"Florida Math" by Dana Milbank from `The Washington Post' (2022)

Did I already mention that we owe great additions to these pages to American politics? Here is another one, a newspaper opinion column by D. Milbank (April 19, 2022).

DeSantis saves Florida kids from being indoctrinated with math

When Florida released the names Monday of the 54 math textbooks it had rejected, most for allegedly including "critical race theory" or other "prohibited topics", I was struck by how the publishers had adjusted their titles to reflect the state's singular interpretation of the subject matter.

The books had names such as "Florida Reveal Math," or "Florida's B.E.S.T. Math," or simply "Florida Math." The titles essentially codified what Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis's censorship program has accomplished: There is math - and then there is Florida math.

On one level, we already understood that "Florida math" is not the same thing as "math":

Problem 1: In an election, the Republican candidate gets 232 electoral votes and the Democratic candidate gets 306. Who won?

Answer: It was rigged.

Problem 2: Florida had 153 coronavirus deaths per 100,000 people over the past year while California had only 58 per 100,000. How much higher is Florida's death rate?

Answer: I'm going to do my own research.

It's easy to laugh at Florida's claim that it rejected 28 math textbooks over "publishers' attempts to indoctrinate students" with such "special topics" as CRT, "culturally responsive teaching," "social justice" and "social emotional learning."

But then I opened the 2020 edition of one of the banned textbooks, Cengage's "Precalculus With Limits" - and was horrified by the "indoctrinating concepts" I saw. If this is Precalculus With Limits, I'd hate to see the kind without limits.

At a time when Floridians by law "don't say gay," much less "trans," this banned book brazenly teaches about the "Transitive Property of Equality." Not only are impressionable minds taught about the "transformation of functions," but also they are even indoctrinated in "describing transformations" and - appallingly - "sketching transformations."

At a time when DeSantis is trying to restore the traditional definition of marriage as between a man and a woman, "Precalculus With Limits" has endless references to "sin" and "polynomials" - even "multiplying polynomials." On Page 318, for example, it tells children to believe that "sin x takes on its full range of values." Valuing sin! On Page 734, incredibly, it orders children to "sketch the graph of the degenerate conic." Disgusting.

At a time when Florida is banning the acknowledgment of gender fluidity or any identity outside male and female, this subversive textbook unabashedly tells suggestible children that such things exist as "reciprocal identities," "cofunction identities," "additive identity property" and even "multiplicative identity property".

Right now, all Floridians should be fighting the radical socialists, but "Precalculus With Limits" is inviting children to find the "simplest form of a radical equation," or even to take a perfectly normal equation and "rewrite with a radical." Which radical? Saul Alinsky?

I am not being hyperbolic. Or even parabolic.

This terrible tome is packed with mentions of "regression" and other forms of deviancy ("define conics in terms of eccentricity," it commands); it tries to promote forbidden teachings about sexuality in requiring young people to identify "the product of conjugate pairs."

Some of its indoctrinating concepts are merely gross ("Gaussian elimination"), while others are downright disgusting. "The focal chord perpendicular to the axis of the parabola is called the latus rectum," it says on Page 702. It goes on to tell Florida's children to "find the length of the latus rectum." I don't even want to know how that is done.

As radical as it is filthy, "Precalculus With Limits" tries to undermine parental authority. On Page 74, it teaches children how to "write an equation for the transformation of the parent function," even providing "plotting points" for "translating a parent function." Had this book hit the classrooms, kids would have been graphing parents out of existence with a "double stem-and-leaf plot."

The textbook sneaks critical race theory into the curriculum in insidious ways. It teaches children about "classifying by discriminant," and its author appears to be obsessed with the far-left concept of addressing inequality: "solving linear inequalities" (p. 40), "how to solve a polynomial inequality" (p. 184), "solving a system of inequalities" (p. 512). The book blatantly and repeatedly commands students to "solve the inequality" even though they did not cause it and are not responsible for it.

Don't think this is about color? Well explain this, on Page 512: "Using a different colored pencil to shade the solution of each inequality in a system will make identifying the solution of the system of inequalities easier."

Thanks to DeSantis, Florida's children will never have to learn about such "indoctrinating concepts." In fact, they won't have to learn much of anything at all.


Questions and comments concerning this page should be addressed per e-mail to agricola@mathematik.uni-marburg.de,
Ilka Agricola, last update 21.04.2022.

Impressum / Datenschutzerklärung (privacy policy and legal notice)