“Basically I'm an optimist. Intellectually I can see man's balance is about fifty-fifty, and his chances of blowing himself up are about one to one. I can't see this any way but intellectually. I'm just emotionally unable to believe that he will do this.”

— William Golding

Interview with James Keating, Purdue University (7 May 1961), printed in Lord of the Flies: The Casebook Edition (1964)
Context: Basically I'm an optimist. Intellectually I can see man's balance is about fifty-fifty, and his chances of blowing himself up are about one to one. I can't see this any way but intellectually. I'm just emotionally unable to believe that he will do this. This means that I am by nature an optimist and by intellectual conviction a pessimist, I suppose.

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William Golding 79

British novelist, poet, playwright and Nobel Prize for Lite… 1911–1993

Herb Goldberg (1937–2019) American psychologist

The Liberation Crunch: Getting the Worst of Both Worlds, pp. 146–147
The New Male (1979)

“I'm strictly for [Adlai] Stevenson. I don't dig the intellectual bit, but I'm telling you man, he knows the most.”

Elvis Presley (1935–1977) American singer and actor

Elvis Presley Was Always Too Busy to Vote for President http://elvis-history-blog.com/elvis-voting.html

“I'm not too interested in these swan songs I'm continuing to hear. I'm just Mike. I'm a peasant. I'm here to entertain the people. I'm no elite person. At one stage in my life, I had my little jewelry and all my little girlfriends and my big cars and things. At one point, I thought life was about acquiring things. But as a I get older life is totally about losing everything. As life goes on, we lose more than we acquire. I don't want the finest girl in the world anymore. I'm just trying to stay balanced, basically.”

Mike Tyson (1966) American boxer

As quoted in USA Today http://www.usatoday.com/sports/boxing/2005-06-12-tyson-retire-talk_x.htm (2005).
Reported in The New Yorker as: “At one point, I thought life was about acquiring things. Life is totally about losing everything.” http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/06/27/050627ta_talk_remnick
On himself

“One machine can do the work of fifty ordinary men. No machine can do the work of one extraordinary man.”

Elbert Hubbard (1856–1915) American writer, publisher, artist, and philosopher fue el escritor del jarron azul

Source: A Thousand & One Epigrams: Selected from the Writings of Elbert Hubbard (1911), p. 151

“Inching one's way along a steep cliff in the dark: on reaching the highway, one breathes a sigh of relief. Just when one can't take any more, one sees the moonlight. Beauty that seems to infuse itself into the heart: I know about that”

Banana Yoshimoto book Kitchen

Source: Kitchen

“You should watch when you talk to young men about responsibility. They're so thrilled about it. It just blows me away. Really?! That's what the counter-culture is? Grow up and do something useful. "Really? I can do that? Oh, I'm so excited by that idea. No one ever mentioned that before."”

Jordan Peterson (1962) Canadian clinical psychologist, cultural critic, and professor of psychology

Rights, rights, rights, rights… Jesus! It's appalling. People have had enough of that. And they better have, because it's a non-productive mode of being. Responsibility, man: that's where the meaning in life is.
Other

“I'm a pessimist about probabilities, I'm an optimist about possibilities.”

Lewis Mumford (1895–1990) American historian, sociologist, philosopher of technology, and literary critic

As quoted in "Lewis Mumford Remembers" by Carey Winfrey in The New York Times (6 July 1977)

“The fifties were supposed to be a golden age when the pig had everything his way. That's what TV and the government wants us to believe: there was a time when no one made trouble. What about Kerouac, you assholes? What about Neal?”

Rudy Rucker (1946) American mathematician, computer scientist, science fiction author and philosopher

Source: The Sex Sphere (1983), p. 130

“Gazzy called over to me "I can't see anything!"
"I can't see anything either," Iggy complained.
"I'm rolling my eyes, Ig." I had to tell him that because he couldn't see me do it, what with his blindness and all.”

James Patterson (1947) American author

“Me personally and professionally, I haven't been that outspoken about race and class, partly because it's in my work, but in part because I don't want to get hate mail. I'm sick of trying to talk to people. I don't think you can change people. I think people have to be forced to do the right thing, so I'm not interested in trying to change people's opinion. I can illuminate, and you can see if you like. And if you can't see it, then just go buy the next book. But I'm sorry, I'm no longer interested in trying to be nice about what is right, because that doesn't work.”

James McBride (writer) (1957) American journalist

On letting his work speak regarding race and class in “James McBride Says Fiction Writing Allows Him More Freedom” https://www.npr.org/2017/10/01/554933082/james-mcbride-says-fiction-writing-allows-him-more-freedom in NPR (2017 Oct 1)

“Basically I'm an optimist. Intellectually I can see man's balance is about fifty-fifty, and his chances of blowing himself up are about one to one. I can't see this any way but intellectually. I'm just emotionally unable to believe that he will do this.”

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William Golding 79

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