Paul Erdős
said
Television is something the Russians invented to destroy American education.
— As quoted in Comic Sections : The Book of Mathematical Jokes, Humour, Wit, and Wisdom (1993) by Des MacHale
Paul Erdős
Hungarian mathematician (1913–1996)
- Fame66.3
- Momentum15.1
- Academics rank#234
Source-basedFalling
- Fame66.3
- Momentum15.1
- Academics rank#234
- Wikipedia70.8K
Lived 1913–1996, aged 83
AcademicsAcademic
Summary
Updated 2026-06-09
A Hungarian mathematician who treated math as a nomadic social practice, publishing around 1,500 papers with more than 500 collaborators — so many that researchers measure their proximity to him in steps, the Erdős number.
Biography
About
Born in Budapest on 26 March 1913, Erdős spent his career cracking open problems others had left unsolved, working across discrete mathematics, graph theory, number theory, and probability theory. He championed Ramsey theory, which examines how order emerges from chaos, and preferred solving longstanding puzzles to carving out new fields. He taught at universities in the U.S. and Israel but never settled, living out of a suitcase with the sole purpose of writing papers with other mathematicians. His eccentric, itinerant life and relentless output — waking hours devoted to proofs, even in old a…
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In their own words
Sourced, dated quotes from Paul Erdős
Paul Erdős
said
Suppose aliens invade the earth and threaten to obliterate it in a year's time unless human beings can find the Ramsey number for red five and blue five.
— As quoted in "Ramsey Theory" by Ronald L. Graham and Joel H. Spencer, in Scientific American (July 1990), p. 112-117
Paul Erdős
said
Another roof, another proof.
— His motto, as he roamed about the world, as the guest of other mathematicians, as quoted in A Tribute to Paul Erdős (1990) edited by Alan
Paul Erdős
said
I'm not competent to judge. But no doubt he was a great man.
— Response to a question by an agent of the US Immigration and Naturalization Service in 1954 as to what he thought of Karl Marx, often cited
Paul Erdős
saidundated
I think that, as , a very clever young Israeli mathematician, once said, "I am an opportunist.
— as quoted by Donald J. Albers and ,
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Falling66.3
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Momentum15.1
Historical26.5
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Source confidence65.0
Completeness65.0
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