>>13060247Languages are pretty interesting though. And it's not like they're telling you to learn Swahili or ancient Avestan; German will likely turn out to be useful considering the pre-eminent position of Germany in the EU. And there are some mathematicians who learn a lot of languages (like German, French, Russian, Chinese) just to be able to read research papers in the original language in which they were published. Even if you don't like learning German, the fact that you will have access to more reading material without having to wait for a translation (if there will ever be a translation) should motivate you.
>>13060294Good God, how juvenile. Von Neumann spoke French, German, Latin, Greek, English, Yiddish, and Hungarian. He also had a deep knowledge of history, particularly Byzantine history. Does that make him a "retard" since he cared so much for "surface level stuff" like languages and history?
