First of all, before I truly delve into my problem, I want to make something very clear. I'm quite geeky. But I'm not a geek. While my mind is more than happy to pursue the complexities of the universe, my heart is quite content just painting and drawing. It's this duality of purpose that has kept me from moving forward, but that's not the reason I'm posting.
It's mathematics.
Like I said, my heart may not be into it, but my mind is. Not only that, but I once made a promise to a friend that I would like to keep. I won't go into details, but let's just say the "queen of sciences" is involved.
Thus, my predicament.
I'm quite good with numbers, don't get me wrong. Pre-calc was easy and until I dropped out, I was doing quite well at Calculus. However, no matter how hard I look, I don't see the purpose of math. Or rather, I don't see why it is studied as a "stand-alone" science. You see, to me, math is more of a "support science". It's there to help the other sciences out, not to be studied for it's own sake. In that sense, it is useless. Obscure beauty that only a rare few can see.
And even fewer understand.
So where am I going with this? I want to study math. Not only that, but eventually, I even want to appreciate it. However, I have no idea how to do that. So, I come to you with a few questions that will hopefully steer me in the right direction:
Finally, I have spent some time looking at research papers written by some of the world's top mathematicians. To be perfectly honest, most of them didn't make the slighest bit of sense to me. As I move past Calculus, will this situation change (and perhaps I will even start getting some good research ideas of my own), or it's a case of, if I don't get it now, there is a good chance that I won't get it later?
With this thread, I hope to get more insight into what makes math enjoyable. Answers to my questions, as well as some advice, would be appreciated. Thanks. And sorry for the long post.