Mathematics in Finance

There’s no longer any reason to believe that the wizards of Wall Street actually contribute anything positive to society, let alone enough to justify those humongous paychecks. ... It’s hard to think of any major recent financial innovations that actually aided society, as opposed to being new, improved ways to blow bubbles, evade regulations and implement de facto Ponzi schemes.

If you are interested in the ultimate character of the physical world, or the complete world, and at the present time our only way to understand that is through the mathematical type of reasoning... the great depth of character of the universality of the laws, the relationships of things... I don't know any other way to do it, we don't know any other way to describe it accurately... or to see the interrelationships without it... don't misunderstand me, there are many, many aspects of the world that mathematics is unnecessary for... but we were talking about physics... to not know mathematics is a severe limitation in understanding the world.

“It’s magic,” the chief cook concluded, in awe.
“No, not magic,” the ship’s doctor replied. “It’s much more. It’s mathematics.”