[FOM] alleged Hilbert quote

Tue May 10 22:31:17 EDT 2005

While Hilbert probably never said that math is a meaningless game with symbols, 
ths spirit of this phrase is somewhat similar to a famous actual citation from 
Hilbert's Intro to his Foundations of Geometry: 

"One must be able to say at all times -- instead of points, straight lines, and 
planes -- tables, beer mugs, and chairs."

> From: Richard Zach <rzach at ucalgary.ca>
> To: Martin Davis <martin at eipye.com>

> Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
> 
> On Fri, 2005-04-08 at 11:19 -0700, Martin Davis wrote:
> > Thanks to all who responded. As I presumed, the quotation is spurious - 
> > apparently having been initiated by E.T. Bell.