
“There is always something to upset the most careful of human calculations.”
Book II, ch. 2.
The Japanese Family Storehouse (1688)
Book XXX, sec. 30
History of Rome
“There is always something to upset the most careful of human calculations.”
Book II, ch. 2.
The Japanese Family Storehouse (1688)
Source: "The Engineer as an Economist," 1886, p. 428; Lead paragraph
Self cited in: Henry R. Towne in Foreword to the 1911 editions of: F.W. Taylor Shop management; a paper read before the American society of mechanical engineers New York. 1903/1911.
Context: The monogram of our national initials, which is the symbol for our monetary unit, the dollar, is almost as frequently conjoined to the figures of an engineer's calculations as are the symbols indicating feet, minutes, pounds, or gallons. The final issue of his work, in probably a majority of cases, resolves itself into a question of dollars and cents, of relative or absolute values. This statement, while true in regard to the work of all engineers, applies particularly to that of the mechanical engineer, for the reason that his functions, more frequently than in the case of others, include the executive duties of organizing and superintending the operations of industrial establishments, and of directing the labor of the artisans whose organized efforts yield the fruition of his work.
“anger based on calculated reason is more dangerous than anger based on blind hate”
Source: Last Sacrifice
Source: How to Pay for the War (1940), Ch. 3 : Our Output Capacity and the National Income
Address to United Nations General Assembly http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1987/092187b.htm (21 September 1987)
1980s, Second term of office (1985–1989)
Context: Cannot swords be turned to plowshares? Can we and all nations not live in peace? In our obsession with antagonisms of the moment, we often forget how much unites all the members of humanity. Perhaps we need some outside, universal threat to make us recognize this common bond. I occasionally think how quickly our differences worldwide would vanish if we were facing an alien threat from outside this world. And yet, I ask you, is not an alien force already among us? What could be more alien to the universal aspirations of our peoples than war and the threat of war?
Quoted in Jonathan Fenby; Chiang Kai Shek: China's Generalissimo and the Nation He Lost
U.S. House of Representatives, September 12, 2001 http://www.house.gov/paul/congrec/congrec2001/cr091201.htm
2000s, 2001-2005
on making American Dreamz http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/entertainment/movies/14326165.htm
Also phrased as: "I think it was just the weird feeling of, being like a lot of Americans and sort of reading the paper in the morning and worrying about terrorism and whether the administration was handling things in the right way, and then in the evening worrying even more about whether Constantine was going to get kicked off American Idol. It was really just kind of observing myself and, finding this weird disconnect, between the supposedly deadly serious situation of being at war with us going about our daily lives as if nothing is happening."
“No more fiction for us: we calculate; but that we may calculate, we had to make fiction first.”
Sec. 624, as translated by Tobias Dantzig in Number, the Language of Science. Fourth edition, New York: Doubleday 1954, p 141. See discussion of this entry for details.
The Will to Power (1888)