Another math quote

[James A. Landau]

I received the following from a mathematician named Roger Cooke, who in the
quote below is criticizing a proof in which the would-be prover says,
essentially, "let n be a number with such-and-such a property" without giving
a method to construct such a number.

In a message dated 2/11/03 10:06:26 AM Eastern Standard Time,
ckrglj at adelphia.net (Roger Cooke) writes:

<snip>
> I'm reminded of the mathematician staying in a hotel who heard a fire alarm
>  in the night.  He promptly went to the basin and drew some water out of the
>  tap.  Having proved that a solution exists, he went back to bed.