Georg Cantor? Galileo Galilei? Rudy Rucker? David Foster Wallace? Apocryphal?

Question for Quote Investigator: The careless use of infinity in mathematical and scientific reasoning produces confusion and contradictions. Hence, mathematicians in the 1800s often placed tight restrictions on the use of infinity within mathematical proofs.
The theory of transfinite numbers was pioneered by mathematician Georg Cantor who envisioned an extraordinary hierarchy of infinite sets. Influential colleagues reacted with disbelief and scorn to Cantor’s mind-stretching ideas. Apparently, Cantor responded by saying something like the following:
The fear of infinity is a form of myopia that destroys the possibility of seeing the actual infinite, even though it in its highest form has created and sustains us.
Oddly, this statement has also been attributed to the famous Italian Renaissance astronomer Galileo Galilei. Would you please help me to find an accurate version of the quotation together with a citation identifying the originator?
Reply from Quote Investigator: QI has found no substantive support for the attribution to Galileo Galilei who died in 1642. A contributor to the Goodreads website implausibly linked the quotation to Galileo in 2017.1
The earliest close match in English known to QI appeared in 1982 within the book “Infinity and the Mind: The Science and Philosophy of the Infinite” by mathematician and science fiction author Rudy Rucker. Boldface added to excerpts by QI:2
In mathematics no other subject has led to more polemics than the issue of the existence or nonexistence of mathematical infinities. We will return to some of these polemics in the last chapter. For now, let us reprint Cantor’s opening salvo in the modern phase of this age-old debate:
The fear of infinity is a form of myopia that destroys the possibility of seeing the actual infinite, even though it in its highest form has created and sustains us, and in its secondary transfinite forms occurs all around us and even inhabits our minds.
The accompanying footnote pointed to a letter by Georg Cantor published within a collection of his essays.
Below are details and additional selected citations in chronological order.
Continue reading “Quote Origin: The Fear of Infinity Is a Form of Myopia. The Infinite in Its Highest Form Created Us”