"Mathematics is often considered a difficult and mysterious science, because of the numerous symbols which it employs. ...[T]echnical terms of any profession or trade are incomprehensible to those who have never been trained to use them. But this is not because they are difficult in themselves. On the contrary, they have invariably been introduced to make things easy. So in mathematics, granted that we are giving... attention to... ideas, the symbolism is invariably an immense simplification. ...[I]t represents an analysis of the ideas of the subject and an almost pictorial representation of their relations to each other."
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An Introduction to Mathematics
An Introduction to Mathematics, by Alfred North Whitehead and published in 1911, was intended for a general lay audience. The book touches upon the nature, unity and internal structure of mathematics and its applications toward describing and understanding natural phenamena. It foreshadows some points of Whitehead's later work in philosophy and metaphysics.
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