Nathaniel Branden (1930–2014) Canadian–American psychotherapist and writer
Interview by Alec Mouhibian in The Free Radical (November 2004)
“My old man claimed that the more complicated the law the more opportunity for scoundrels.”
Source: The Door Into Summer (1957), Chapter 5
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Robert A. Heinlein557
American science fiction author 1907–1988Related quotes
Kevin Kelly (1952) American author and editor
Out of Control: The New Biology of Machines, Social Systems and the Economic World (1995), New Rules for the New Economy: 10 Radical Strategies for a Connected World (1999)
Scott Lynch book The Republic of Thieves
Source: The Republic of Thieves (2013), Chapter 8 “The Five-Year Game: Infinite Variation” section 2 (p. 449)
Michael Crichton (1942–2008) American author, screenwriter, film producer
Aliens Cause Global Warming (2003)
Context: I want to pause here and talk about this notion of consensus, and the rise of what has been called consensus science. I regard consensus science as an extremely pernicious development that ought to be stopped cold in its tracks. Historically, the claim of consensus has been the first refuge of scoundrels; it is a way to avoid debate by claiming that the matter is already settled.
“A wise man will make more opportunities, than he finds.”
Francis Bacon book Essays
Of Ceremonies and Respect
Essays (1625)
Variant: Wise men make more opportunities than they find.
Source: The Essays
“Things are much more complicated.”
Tom Lehrer (1928) American singer-songwriter and mathematician
Quotes from interviews, Sydney Morning Herald interview (2003)
Context: Things are much more complicated. Feminism versus pornography, for example. There are a lot of feminists who think it is bad, but others think it's good.
I have become, you might call it mature — I would call it senile — and I can see both sides. But you can't write a satirical song with 'but on the other hand' in it, or 'however'. It's got to be one-sided.
Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher
1840s, Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840), The Hero As King
“Man grows used to everything, the scoundrel.”
Fyodor Dostoyevsky book Crime and Punishment
Crime and Punishment (1866)
Stanley Baldwin (1867–1947) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom
The John Clifford Lecture at Coventry (14 July 1930), published in This Torch of Freedom (1935), p. 46.
1930
Context: There is a saying as old as the Greeks that it is more important to form good habits than to frame good laws. There is an undercurrent of suspicion that this is true and that, like patriotism, legislation is not enough. The hopes held out when laws are framed are not always realised when laws are passed... What happens to all the laws placed on the statute book? If half the hopes of their promoters had been realised, would not the millennium have arrived ere this?