If parents want their children to have a secure career, that of a mathematician is really good. It's stable, with a stable pay, and you don't have to skip sleep like those who work on Wall Street, nor do you lose hair every day as a life scientist trying to conduct experiments.

But only a few people can become mathematicians, and they need talent and interest. For ordinary people like us, how do we cultivate our own, and our children's, interest in mathematics?

Parents are a bit too concerned about children in some aspects, and totally unconcerned in others. As a result, children have no room to cultivate their interests via thinking. Parents always care about the children's exam scores, but not the interests they can cultivate. But the latter, not the former, makes mathematicians.

From kindergarten to high school, Chinese students face too much pressure. Yet upon finishing high school, they feel they have finished their tasks and have little interest in learning. Children need to unleash their natural instincts when they are young, cultivate their interest in basic science through exposure to nature, lay a good foundation in middle school and high school, and develop the habit of studying hard and gaining knowledge in college. Children need more space.

On the national level, the next generation needs to be encouraged to study not only mathematics, but also all basic science. I will host an international basic science conference this summer, because I believe it is the foundation of all modern technologies, like soil breeding a tree. China needs to vigorously develop basic science if it wants to become a big tree in terms of being a world technological power. I hope more people will take this path, which is more meaningful than making money on Wall Street.