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ePaper created 2014-10-24, 13:39:02 | version 1.33.00
10 Welcome “At a dinner party you would not like to admit be- ing bad at English. Because everyone around you would give you a pretty strange look. Admitting to be bad at mathematics, however, would be a lot more comfortable: People would give you a smile, in full agreement and sympathy. But both math haters and math lovers agree on one sin- gle point: Mathematics is different. It is incom- parable, unique. Being not a math lover, but a math admirer - I evendaretosay:Mathe- matics is the queen of the sciences! There is no other science being that abstract, that pure, that beautiful. A world of its own, existing only in the human mind: Can science be more sublime? No wonder mathematicians and computer sci- entists have the reputation of being genii or, in the worst case, odd characters. So mathematics is mysterious on the one hand. But ordinary on the other. It’s ordinary because we meet mathe- matics and computer sciences wherever we go: Mobile phones, personal computers, automo- biles, cash dispensers and even egg cookers - it’s nothing but mathematics and computer sciences. Many people are concerned about the power that computers have. And even more about the power that computers give. Science has to ob- serve ethical limits, there is no question about that. We do not want to see everything that is possible turned into reality. But science and research will deli- ver us the solutions we desperate- ly need: Climate change, growth of population, aging societies, loss of biodiversity, dwindling natural re- sources - the threats to our world are numerous. Without the help and advice, the wisdom and prudence of our scholars… we just won’t make it.“ Theresia Bauer, M. A. in her opening speech on Sunday, Sep. 22, 2013 Minister of Science, Research and the Arts Baden-Württemberg An Ambitious Goal “No other science influences today’s life as much as mathematics and computer sciences do. An influence that is even growing - at a high pace.“