"Good work is not done by 'humble' men. It is one of the first duties of a professor, for example, in any subject, to exaggerate a little both the importance of his subject and his importance in it." – G. H. Hardy
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That's just silly once you put it in context, after all the book is entitled "A Mathematician's Apology" https://www.math.ualberta.ca/mss/misc/A%20Mathematician%27s%20Apology.pdf …pic.twitter.com/Huqiy0wSaa
Perhaps you are misunderstanding what he means by apology? He doesn't mean that word in the modern sense of saying "I'm sorry." He means it in the sense of apologia – to state the case for something.
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Yes I know. But he's making a case for pure mathematics, despite it being (actually because it is) "by all practical standards" useless. There's no "huge social error" among "educated English people" to being "boastful" (as you put it) about pure intellectual pursuits (1/n)
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Avoidance of boasting is directed to practical or financial matters, rather than intellectual matters. Indeed its deemed preferable to regard life as an intellectual competition. For example, Trinity is well known for the "boast" that it has "more Nobel Prizes than France" (2/n)
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