The Fields Institute Turns Twenty-Five 170725 Final book with covers | Page 137

CHAPTER 20
Encountering Mathematics
and a Mathematics Institute
Sheila Embleton
“Probably the most important thing to facilitate the research of
mathematicians [is] other mathematicians.”
I am not (really) a mathematician. But I can say that
mathematics has always been, to a greater or lesser extent, a
part of my life. The daughter of a PhD in Physics and a PhD
in Chemistry, I was introduced very early to the notion that
mathematics is everywhere, the foundation of so many things.
One of my earliest memories is of working in the garden doing
typical yard work while rehearsing multiplication tables, doing
factorials, or simply playing number games of various types.
There was never any question of fear of mathematics or of
“girls don’t do math” in my upbringing. In fact, when I first
encountered mention of these phenomena in high school, I just
could not comprehend it.