Quotes about change
page 36

“Over the years, I have become convinced that Hellenism as a culture represents not a static condition of uniform sublimity mysteriously achieved and maintained as an effect of some racial advantage. Rather it should be understood as an evolving process, governed by a dynamic of change, as both language and thought underwent transformational alteration caused by a transition from orality to literacy. The instrument of change is discerned to be the invention of the Greek alphabet, at a quite late stage in the history of developing cultures.”

Eric A. Havelock (1903–1988) 1903-1988, British classical philologist

"Chinese Characters and the Greek Alphabet" in Sino-Platonic Papers, 5 (December 1987)

History

“Great changes are not caused by ideas alone; but they are not effected without ideas.”

Leonard Trelawny Hobhouse (1864–1929) British sociologist

Source: Liberalism (1911), Chapter III, The Movement Of Theory, p. 30.

Idea

“Fame, (fame) makes a man take things over
Fame, (fame) lets him loose, hard to swallow
Fame, (fame) puts you there where things are hollow
Fame (fame)Fame, it's not your brain, it's just the flame
That burns your change to keep you insane”

David Bowie (1947–2016) British musician, actor, record producer and arranger

sane
Fame, written with Carlos Alomar and John Lennon
Song lyrics, Young Americans (1975)

“All lasting change is preceded by changed thinking. Any other type of change will only be temporary.”

Tommy Newberry American writer

The 4:8 Principle.
The 4:8 Principle (2007)

Thinking

“Renovating thoughts does not mean ranting with new terms, it’s the change in the way we build those thoughts in the first place”

Ali Al-Wardi (1913–1995) Iraqi sociologist

Way

“A widely heralded view holds that nuclear power is experiencing a dramatic worldwide revival and vibrant growth, because it’s competitive, necessary, reliable, secure, and vital for fuel security and climate protection. That’s all false. In fact, nuclear power is continuing its decades-long collapse in the global marketplace because it’s grossly uncompetitive, unneeded, and obsolete—so hopelessly uneconomic that one needn’t debate whether it’s clean and safe; it weakens electric reliability and national security; and it worsens climate change compared with devoting the same money and time to more effective options.”

Amory B. Lovins (1947) American physicist

The Nuclear Illusion http://www.rmi.org/images/PDFs/Energy/E08-01_AmbioNuclIlusion.pdf p. 1. (May 2008)

Money, Time, Falseness

“A very large percentage of the founding Fathers, men who signed the Declaration of Independence and others after them, lost everything. They paid a price. But nobody wants to pay a price now; they want it handed to them. That has to change.”

Rousas John Rushdoony (1916–2001) American theologian

Audio lectures, Dangers Inherent in Public Education (March 24, 1986)

Men

“Cellular pathology is not an end if one cannot see any alteration in the cell. Chemistry brings the clarification of living processes nearer than does anatomy. Each anatomical change must have been preceded by a chemical one.”

Rudolf Virchow (1821–1902) German doctor, anthropologist, public health activist, pathologist, prehistorian, biologist and politician

attributed to Rudolph Virchow Coper, H., Herken, H., 1963. Dtsch. Med. Wochenschr. 88,2025– 2036. cited by 1. Gelman BB, Soukup VM, Schuenke KW, Keherly MJ, Holzer C, Richey FJ, et al. Acquired neuronal channelopathies in HIV-associated dementia. J Neuroimmunol. 2004;157(1–2 SPEC. ISS.):111–9.

“Upon a foundation of changed lives permanent reconstruction is assured.”

Frank Buchman (1878–1961) Evangelical theologist

Remaking the world, The Speeches of Frank N.D. Buchman, Blandford Presss 1947, revised 1958, p. 5
Moral attitude

“This goes back to the reason why alarmists abandoned the "global warming" term in favor of climate change. They can play this bait and switch, showing changes in climate (which always exist) and then blaming them on CO2. But there is no mechanism ever proposed by anyone where CO2 can change the climate directly without going through the intermediate step of warming. If climate is changing but we are not seeing warming, then the change can't be due to CO2.”

Anthony Watts (1958) American television meteorologist

Just where are those grid killing tornadoes anyway? http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/17/just-where-are-those-grid-killing-tornadoes-anyway/, wattsupwiththat.com, June 17, 2009. 2009

“For years, we thought we are a sporting nation but we had little to show. In the last decade, India's sporting success has changed all that.”

Anil Kumble (1970) Former Indian cricketer

India became a sporting nation in the last decade: Kumble

Sport, Success

“In June of 1964 the research group and academic program moved to Penn bringing with it most of the faculty, students, and research projects. Our activities flourished in the very supportive environment that Penn and Wharton provided. The wide variety of faculty members that we were able to involve in our activities significantly enhanced our capabilities. By the mid-1960s I had become uncomfortable with the direction, or rather, the lack of direction, of professional Operations Research. I had four major complaints.
First, it had become addicted to its mathematical tools and had lost sight of the problems of management. As a result it was looking for problems to which to apply its tools rather than looking for tools that were suitable for solving the changing problems of management. Second, it failed to take into account the fact that problems are abstractions extracted from reality by analysis. Reality consists of systems of problems, problems that are strongly interactive, messes. I believed that we had to develop ways of dealing with these systems of problems as wholes. Third, Operations Research had become a discipline and had lost its commitment to interdisciplinarity. Most of it was being carried out by professionals who had been trained in the subject, its mathematical techniques. There was little interaction with the other sciences professions and humanities. Finally, Operations Research was ignoring the developments in systems thinking — the methodology, concepts, and theories being developed by systems thinkers.”

Russell L. Ackoff (1919–2009) Scientist

Preface, cited in Gharajedaghi, Jamshid. Systems thinking: Managing chaos and complexity: A platform for designing business architecture http://booksite.elsevier.com/samplechapters/9780123859150/Front_Matter.pdf. Elsevier, 2011. p. xiii Towards a Systems Theory of Organization, 1985

Way, Mathematics, Support, Problem

“Respectable scientists like de Broglie himself accept wave mechanics because it confers coherence and unity upon the experimental findings of contemporary science, and in spite of the astonishing changes it implies in connection with ideas of causality, time, and space, but it is because of these changes that it wins favor with the public. The great popular success of Einstein was the same thing. The public drinks in and swallows eagerly everything that tends to dispossess the intelligence in favor of some technique; it can hardly wait to abdicate from intelligence and reason and from everything that makes man responsible for his destiny.”

Simone Weil (1909–1943) French philosopher, Christian mystic, and social activist

“Wave Mechanics,” p. 75
On Science, Necessity, and the Love of God (1968)

Intelligence, Idea, Drink, Science

“I think uh…we lost everyday Vietnamese life in fighting the Communists, you know, and and no progress, we have to do something else, you can, we cannot have a more of the same, you know, every, every day, so we, we must change, yes.”

Nguyen Khanh (1927–2013) South Vietnamese soldier

Ngo Dinh Diem versus the drive to reform
1980s, Interview with Nguyen Khanh (1981)

Life, Thinking, Fight

“The growth and maintenance of new synaptic terminals makes memory persist. …The ability to grow new synaptic connections as a result of experience appears to have been conserved throughout evolution. As an example… the cortical maps of the body surface are subject to constant modification in response to changing input from sensory pathways.”

Eric R. Kandel (1929) American neuropsychiatrist

In Search of Memory (2006)

Appearance, Memory

“Any change in routine was terrifying, even if it involved less violence rather than more.”

Laura Anne Gilman book Flesh and Fire

Source: Flesh and Fire (2009), p. 30

“For starters, the emerging zero marginal cost economy radically changes our notion of the economic process. The old paradigm of owners and workers, and of sellers and consumers, is beginning to break down. Consumers are becoming their own producers, eliminating the distinction. prosumers will increasingly be able to produce, consume, and share their own goods and services with one another on the Collaborative Commons at diminishing marginal costs approaching zero, bringing to the fore new ways of organizing economic life beyond the traditional capitalist market model.”

Jeremy Rifkin (1945) American economist

The Zero Marginal Cost Society: The Internet of Things, the Collaborative Commons, and the Eclipse of Capitalism (2014)

Life, Way

“Losing Bogey was horrible, obviously. Because he was young. And because he gave me my life. I wouldn't have had a — I don't know what would have happened to me if I hadn't met him — I would have had a completely different kind of life. He changed me, he gave me everything. And he was an extraordinary man.”

Lauren Bacall (1924–2014) American actress, model

Larry King interview (2005)

Life

“I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution. But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living God. And that's what we need to do — to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view of how we treat each other, and how we treat the family.”

Mike Huckabee (1955) Arkansas politician

Morning Joe
Television
MSNBC
2008-01-15, quoted in * David
Edwards
Muriel
Kane
Huckabee: Amend Constitution to be in 'God's standards'
2008-01-15
Raw Story
http://rawstory.com/news/2007/Huckabee_Amend_Constitution_to_meet_Gods_0115.html
2011-03-01
Mike Huckabee: Amend the Constitution to God's Standards
2008-01-15
YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D08Dq_iNMRk
2011-03-01

God, Family

“Liberated, Iraq is the only Arab country, so far, to have changed governments three times through elections and also the only one where all political parties operate freely. Iraqis didn’t achieve what they hoped; they achieved what they could. The invasion was not about the United States setting up bases or stealing Iraq’s oil or using Iraq for an invasion of Iran, as Saddam’s apologists claimed. Nor was it about imposing democracy by force. It was about two things: stopping a time bomb that was ticking in the heart of the region and removing the impediment to democratization that was Saddam’s regime. More than a million Americans fought and worked in Iraq. They share part of the credit for the fact that Iraqis today are able to run their own lives without fear. They can be proud that, once again, American power was used to free a nation from tyranny.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"What Saddam’s ouster achieved" http://nypost.com/2013/03/19/what-saddams-ouster-achieved/, New York Post (March 19, 2013). New York Post

Fear, Hope, Democracy, Time

“Don't live too long with people who refuse to change their behavior, especially if their work is important to achieving your reengineering goals.”

James A. Champy (1942) American businessman

Source: Reengineering management, 1995, p. 109

People, Behavior

“It certainly looks like the days of the Confederate battle flag flying on the grounds of the state house in Columbia, South Carolina are numbered. This is in large part due to prominent South Carolina political leaders changing positions under pressure given the recent mass murder in the state. No one can deny that. The arguments concerning the display of that particular flag are neither more nor less valid than before. Nor will the flag’s removal silence white supremacists and Confederate heritage advocates, especially those who have freely associated with white supremacists.”

Brooks D. Simpson (1957) American historian

2010s, Down It Comes: No What? (June 2015)

Silence, Parting, Housing, Flying

“If science proves some belief of Buddhism wrong, then Buddhism will have to change. In my view, science and Buddhism share a search for the truth and for understanding reality. By learning from science about aspects of reality where its understanding may be more advanced, I believe that Buddhism enriches its own worldview.”

Tenzin Gyatso (1935) spiritual leader of Tibet

The New York Times (12 November 2005).

Truth, Search, Understanding, Reality

“In this room, the salamander was squashed between the pages of the rhyming dictionary, thereby changing poetry forever. Here, Salome walked around with a big red fish held high up over her head. Old Father spanked her with a ballet slipper, sending her to bed without milk or honey. Dance was changed in this room, too.”

Tom Robbins Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas

Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas (1994)

Fish, Dance

“So it was that the Catherines poured water and spooned gruel, while the Clares prayed for the intercession of the saints. The Catherines changed sheets. The Clares practiced mortification of the flesh. The Catherines employed antibiotics. The Clares made a public display of a kneecap of their patron saint.
It was soon widely know to which hospital one went to get well, and to which one went to die.”

Michael Swanwick book Jack Faust

Source: Jack Faust (1997), Chapter 9, “The Plague Kitchen” (p. 141)

Water

“It (i. e., agriculture) was the most profound revolution in hominid living since Homo erectus had left the forest and committed themselves to the savannah. Compared to this phase shift, the advances of the future—even genetic engineering—were details. There would never be so significant a change again, not until humans themselves disappeared from the planet.”

Stephen Baxter book Evolution

Source: Evolution (2002), Chapter 14 “The Swarming People” section II (p. 456)

Future

“We will get true and lasting change as soon as we make helping people a way of life instead of a business.”

Steve Maraboli (1975)

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 60

Life, People, Way, Business

“I'm running for president because I think that, with a lot of help, I can stem the tide of this slide and restore America’s leadership in the world and change our priorities. I will argue that my experience and my track record — both on the foreign and domestic side — put me in a position to be able to do that.
I would respectfully suggest to you that the Democrats out there understand I am the only person with a plan that can get out of Iraq without our interests in the region not falling apart.”

Joe Biden (1942) 47th Vice President of the United States (in office from 2009 to 2017)

Conference call https://www.nytimes.com/cq/2007/01/31/cq_2212.html?pagewanted=all with reporters after announcing candidacy for the 2008 Democratic president nomination (January 30, 2007) 2000s

World, Thinking, Help

“If the people at large be not already convinced that a sufficient general case has been made out for Administrative Reform, I think they never can be, and they never will be…. Ages ago a savage mode of keeping accounts on notched sticks was introduced into the Court of Exchequer, and the accounts were kept, much as Robinson Crusoe kept his calendar on the desert island. In the course of considerable revolutions of time, the celebrated Cocker was born, and died; Walkinghame, of the Tutor's Assistant, and well versed in figures, was also born, and died; a multitude of accountants, book-keepers and actuaries, were born, and died. Still official routine inclined to these notched sticks, as if they were pillars of the constitution, and still the Exchequer accounts continued to be kept on certain splints of elm wood called "tallies." In the reign of George III an inquiry was made by some revolutionary spirit, whether pens, ink, and paper, slates and pencils, being in existence, this obstinate adherence to an obsolete custom ought to be continued, and whether a change ought not to be effected.
All the red tape in the country grew redder at the bare mention of this bold and original conception, and it took till 1826 to get these sticks abolished. In 1834 it was found that there was a considerable accumulation of them; and the question then arose, what was to be done with such worn-out, worm-eaten, rotten old bits of wood? I dare say there was a vast amount of minuting, memoranduming, and despatch-boxing on this mighty subject. The sticks were housed at Westminster, and it would naturally occur to any intelligent person that nothing could be easier than to allow them to be carried away for fire-wood by the miserable people who live in that neighbourhood. However, they never had been useful, and official routine required that they never should be, and so the order went forth that they were to be privately and confidentially burnt. It came to pass that they were burnt in a stove in the House of Lords. The stove, overgorged with these preposterous sticks, set fire to the panelling; the panelling set fire to the House of Lords; the House of Lords set fire to the House of Commons; the two houses were reduced to ashes; architects were called in to build others; we are now in the second million of the cost thereof, the national pig is not nearly over the stile yet; and the little old woman, Britannia, hasn't got home to-night…. The great, broad, and true cause that our public progress is far behind our private progress, and that we are not more remarkable for our private wisdom and success in matters of business than we are for our public folly and failure, I take to be as clearly established as the sun, moon, and stars.”

Charles Dickens (1812–1870) English writer and social critic and a Journalist

"Administrative Reform" (June 27, 1855) Theatre Royal, Drury Lane Speeches Literary and Social by Charles Dickens https://books.google.com/books?id=bT5WAAAAcAAJ (1870) pp. 133-134

Wisdom, People, Books, Age

“Audiences and critics acknowledge that a play or concerto gains force in great rendition. A good play may overcome bad staging. A great concerto may survive a poor soloist. But it is naturally assumed that a more accomplished performance intensifies the impact of the work. The play's text or concerto's score does not change, but the right actors and musicians help realize its full potential. Among contemporary literary critics, however, one never encounters this notion in regard to books and printing. To recognize the sensual contributions of the physical elements of a book is somehow assumed to demean the spiritual purity of the text. To notice the book itself smacks of philistinism, and to make distinctions based on paper, binding, and typography brings accusations of elitism or decadence.”

Dana Gioia (1950) American writer

"Designing Literature: Creative Collaboration" http://www.danagioia.net/essays/ecreative.htm (1992) Essays

Books, Nature, Help

“Sociobiology is not just any statement that biology, genetics, and evolutionary theory have something to do with human behavior. Sociobiology is a specific theory about the nature of genetic and evolutionary input into human behavior. It rests upon the view that natural selection is a virtually omnipotent architect, constructing organisms part by part as best solutions to problems of life in local environments. It fragments organisms into “traits,” explains their existence as a set of best solutions, and argues that each trait is a product of natural selection operating “for” the form or behavior in question. Applied to humans, it must view specific behaviors (not just general potentials) as adaptations built by natural selection and rooted in genetic determinants, for natural selection is a theory of genetic change. Thus, we are presented with unproved and unprovable speculations about the adaptive and genetic basis of specific human behaviors: why some (or all) people are aggressive, xenophobic, religious, acquisitive, or homosexual.”

Stephen Jay Gould book Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes

"Our Natural Place", p. 243
Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes (1983)

Life, People, Behavior, Question

“My merry, merry, merry roundelay
Concludes with Cupid’s curse:
They that do change old love for new,
Pray gods, they change for worse!”

George Peele (1556–1596) English translator and poet

Cupid's Curse, Lines 12-13 (date uncertain), reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919).

Love, God

“I think we need to change that old saying, "I don't need a building to fall on me." Because two did and we still don't get it. I think we all stick our head in the sand as a deep human impulse.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

When You Ride Alone You Ride with Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism (2002)

Thinking

“He [Marcus Aurelius] constantly recurs to his fundamental principle that the universe is wisely ordered, that every man is a part of it and must conform to that order which he cannot change, that whatever the Deity has done is good, that all mankind are a man's brethren, that he must love and cherish them and try to make them better, even those who would do him harm.”

George Long (1800–1879) English classical scholar

The Philosophy of Antoninus

Love, Universe, Parting

“Human rights and the rule of law are vital to global security and prosperity. As Truman said, “We must, once and for all, prove by our acts conclusively that Right Has Might”. That’s why this country has historically been in the vanguard of the global human rights movement. But that lead can only be maintained if America remains true to its principles, including in the struggle against terrorism. When it appears to abandon its own ideals and objectives, its friends abroad are naturally troubled and confused.
— And States need to play by the rules towards each other, as well as towards their own citizens. That can sometimes be inconvenient, but ultimately what matters is not inconvenience. It is doing the right thing. No State can make its own actions legitimate in the eyes of others. When power, especially military force, is used, the world will consider it legitimate only when convinced that it is being used for the right purpose — for broadly shared aims –- in accordance with broadly accepted norms.
— No community anywhere suffers from too much rule of law; many do suffer from too little — and the international community is among them. This we must change.”

Kofi Annan (1938–2018) 7th Secretary-General of the United Nations

Truman Library address (2006)

World, Law, Communication, Nature

“The whole history of negotiation with the Soviet Union teaches us that if you do something they want without insisting on something in return, the Soviets do not regard it as a kindness to be reciprocated, but as a weakness to be exploited. There is a lot of fashionable nonsense talked about how we misunderstand Communism, misrepresent Communism, see Communists under every bed. An attempt is being made, it seems, to create an atmosphere where truth and commonsense on these matters is actively discouraged. I believe the people of this country understand better the truth of the matter than those who try to mislead them. We must work for a real relaxation of tension, but in our negotiations with the Eastern bloc we must not accept words or gestures as a substitute for genuine detente. No flood of words emanating from a summit conference will mean anything unless it is accompanied by some positive action by which the Soviet leaders show that their ingrained attitudes are really beginning to change.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Speech to Chelsea Conservative Association (26 July 1975) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/102750 Leader of the Opposition

People, Truth, History, Communication

“Well, before you are always self—you’re always self-centered. Everything is for you. Your self is God. And we make lousy gods. Humans make lousy gods, I think. We need to let God be God and us be what we are. I think that’s what changes: the focus on who you’re serving. You’re not serving you. You’re serving Christ.”

Alice Cooper (1948) American rock singer, songwriter and musician

God, Thinking, Christ

“Annihilation means, with the Buddhistical philosophy, only a dispersion of matter, in whatever form or semblance of form it may be; for everything that bears a shape was created, and thus must sooner or later perish, i. e., change that shape; therefore, as something temporary, though seeming to be permanent, it is but an illusion, Maya; for, as eternity has neither beginning nor end, the more or less prolonged duration of some particular form passes, as it were, like an instantaneous flash of lightning. Before we have the time to realize that we have seen it, it is gone and passed away for ever; hence, even our astral bodies, pure ether, are but illusions of matter, so long as they retain their terrestrial outline. The latter changes, says the Buddhist, according to the merits or demerits of the person during his lifetime, and this is metempsychosis. When the spiritual entity breaks loose for ever from every particle of matter, then only it enters upon the eternal and unchangeable Nirvana. He exists in spirit, in nothing; as a form, a shape, a semblance, he is completely annihilated, and thus will die no more, for spirit alone is no Maya, but the only REALITY in an illusionary universe of ever-passing forms.”

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky book Isis Unveiled

Source: Isis Unveiled, Volume I, Chapter VII

Reality, Universe, Time, Personality

“In the restaurant, eyes / above a soup bowl's rim / Is it she? / Changes shape, is and is not. / Now she's spat out a bit of bone, / I don't think it's her, / I'm leaving, I'm done eating. / This is a long and mad journey: / I see her on the faces of others, my own.”

Mirkka Rekola (1931–2014) Finnish writer

Thinking, Madness

“…with the escort of the Military Secretaries, aids-de-camp and the President’s Body Guard, all in their splendid uniforms We made a glittering sight. Even in my best dress I looked drab beside my wife in a simple and well-chosen ensemble. I felt a little pride but was reminded of the entry of Caliph Omar into Damascus. He was offered ths surrender of the city if he came to the city in person. Omar rode his one-eyed camel with a servant on foot, and they traveled equal distance on foot in turn and rode in turn. Near Damascus, Omer was met by his generals Abu Obaida and Khalid bin Walid. Seeing his tattered and travel-worn dress they insisted that he should change into proper clothes and ride a caparisoned charger. Omar gave in and followed their advice. Very soon afterwards he stopped and asked for his former clothes and his camel saying “Pride is entering my soul, and the Prophet said that if a man has pride, the size of a mustard seed, he will not enter Paradise. I felt ashamed of myself and put aside the feeling at once and began thinking of other things.”

Mohammad Hidayatullah (1905–1992) 11th Chief Justice of India

On the occasion of 15th August 1969, India’s Independence Day.
Source: Law in the Scientific Era, P.245-46.

Travel, Feeling, Soul, Thinking

“There must be some leeway; the church operates across the world, including in totalitarian states where a fair criminal trial is unlikely for the accused. But some standards regarding inquiries and treatment of victims must surely be possible, as well as clear guidance on assessment of recruits to the priesthood. And the exit door for bishops needs to change. … We Catholics deserve this. Especially the children the church failed to protect.”

Catherine Pepinster (1959)

Pope Francis has utterly failed to tackle the church’s abuse scandal https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jul/26/pope-francis-catholic-church-abuse-scandal-failed (26 July 2018), The Guardian.

Children, World

“Conventional economic theory is built is built on the assumption of diminishing returns. Economic actions engender a negative feedback that leads to a predictable equilibrium for prices and market shares. Such feedback tends to stabilize the economy because any major changes will be offset by the very reactions they generate. The high oil prices of the 1970s encouraged energy conservation and increased oil exploration, precipitating a predictable drop in prices by the early 1980s. According to conventional theory, the equilibrium marks the “best” outcome possible under the circumstances: the most efﬁcient use and allocation of resources.”

W. Brian Arthur (1946) American economist

Source: Increasing Returns and Path Dependence in the Economy, (1994), p. 1: Chapter 1. Positive feedback in economics

“The characteristic method of social invention in general and of the development of negative capability in particular is to seize on deviant, subsidiary, or repressed elements in present or remembered experience and to push them toward a dominant position, all the while changing them in the course of this extension…. [T]he most successful transmutations over the long run—the ones least vulnerable to subversion by practical rivalry, moral indignation or aspiration, and by theoretical insight—are likely to be those that permit or invite further tinkering. Thus, they may be repeatedly corrected rather than entirely replaced.”

Roberto Mangabeira Unger (1947) Brazilian philosopher and politician

Source: False Necessityː Anti-Necessitarian Social Theory in the Service of Radical Democracy (1987), p. 336

Success

“Beyond the slogans of "a common language and a common citizenship" a program of Americanization has not been accepted. America, the greatest immigration country in the world, has no national domestic policy whatsoever and no organization as a government for dealing with race assimilation, its most delicate and fundamental problem. Americans like to think hi a crude way of this country as a melting pot, with peasants from Ellis Island going in at the top and citizens in American clothes going out at the bottom. We now know there has been little real change accomplished, and we are beginning to wonder whether the new arrival needs as much change as we thought he did to become one of us.”

Frances Kellor (1873–1952) American sociologist

What is Americanization? (1919)

World, Way, Problem, Thinking

“You need to understand that Islam is the problem. I am sick and tired of people here in the West asking me to soften my message. I am sick and tired of people asking me, "Are you trying to change 1.3 billion people?"”

Wafa Sultan (1958) American psychistrist

Yes, I am trying!
Speech at Restoration Weekend, 2007

People, Understanding, Problem

“Thought may well be ever ranging,
And opinion ever changing,
Task-work be, though ill begun,
Dealt with by experience better;
By the law and by the letter
Duty done is duty done
Do it, Time is on the wing!”

Arthur Hugh Clough (1819–1861) English poet

Love, Not Duty http://whitewolf.newcastle.edu.au/words/authors/C/CloughArthurHugh/verse/poemsproseremains/lovenotduty.html, st. 1 (1841).

Law, Time

“We are moving towards another type of society than that to which we have become accustomed. This is sometimes referred to as a new service society, the society of the second industrial revolution or the post-industrial society. There is no guarantee of our safe arrival. Not only are the interdependencies greater – they are differently structured… The changes in the policy field [housing, health care, urban rehabilitation, education, etc. ] demand a new mobilization of the sciences.”

Eric Trist (1909–1993) British scientist

Eric Trist (1969) cited in: Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld ed. (2011) INNOVATION SUMMIT April 13 & 14, 2011 http://summit.research.illinois.edu/files/posters/CutcherGershenfeldWorkshopPoster.pdf.

Health, Education, Science, Housing

“I have come to understand that strength, inner strength, comes from receiving love as much as it comes from giving it…God's love will never change us if we don't accept it.”

Donald Miller book Blue Like Jazz: nonreligious thoughts on Christian spirituality

Blue Like Jazz (2003, Nelson Books)

Love, God, Understanding

“The meaning of the word “feminist” has not really changed since it first appeared in a book review in the Athenaeum of April 27, 1895, describing a woman who “has in her the capacity of fighting her way back to independence.” It is the basic proposition that, as Nora put it in Ibsen's A Doll's House a century ago, “Before everything else I'm a human being.” It is the simply worded sign hoisted by a little girl in the 1970 Women's Strike for Equality: I AM NOT A BARBIE DOLL. Feminism asks the world to recognize at long last that women aren't decorative ornaments, worthy vessels, members of a “special-interest group”. They are half (in fact, now more than half) of the national population, and just as deserving of rights and opportunities, just as capable of participating in the world's events, as the other half. Feminism's agenda is basic It asks that women not be forced to “choose” between public justice and private happiness. It asks that women be free to define themselves — instead of having their identity defined for them, time and again, by their culture and their men.”

Susan Faludi book Backlash: The Undeclared War Against American Women

Backlash (1992)

Women, Men, Happiness, Books

“The last time I visited the Capitol, I came to take an oath. On the steps of this building, I pledged to honor our Constitution and laws, and I asked you to join me in setting a tone of civility and respect in Washington. I hope America is noticing the difference. We are making progress. Together, we are changing the tone in the Nation’s capital. And this spirit of respect and cooperation is vital, because in the end we will be judged not only by what we say or how we say it, we will be judged by what we are able to accomplish. America today is a Nation with great challenges, but greater resources.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

2000s, 2001, Address to Joint Session of Congress on Administration Goals (February 2001)

Law, Hope, Time

“You can’t crush ideas by suppressing them. You can only crush them by ignoring them. By refusing to think, refusing to change. And that’s precisely what our society is doing!”

Ursula K. Le Guin Hainish Cycle

Source: Hainish Cycle, (1974), Chapter 6 (p. 165)

Idea, Thinking

“All change is disruptive. We have seen that the specter of terrorism is enough to cast stable democracies into turmoil. Climate change will have even more dramatic consequences. Men and women will be thrown back upon the resources of the state. They will look to their political leaders and representatives to protect them: open societies will once again be urged to close in upon themselves, sacrificing freedom for ‘security’. The choice will no longer be between the state and the market, but between two sorts of state. It is thus incumbent upon us to re-conceive the role of government. If we do not, others will.”

Tony Judt (1948–2010) British historian

Ill Fares the Land (2010), Introduction

Women, Men, Democracy, Freedom

“I really hate it when I think I’m on the precipice of saying something deep and empowering when it’s actually more or less a quote from Rocky IV (“If I can change and you can change, everybody can change”) or a lyric from an M People song (“search for the hero inside yourself”) but I’ve really got very little to add to these scattered and perennial pop cultural artifacts.”

Russell Brand book Revolution

Revolution (2014)

Hate, People, Quotes, Search

“What made the West successful was neither capitalism, nor science, nor an historical accident such as a favourable geography. Instead, political and mental diversity combined to create an ever changing panorama of technologically creative societies.”

Joel Mokyr (1946) Israeli American economic historian

p 302
The lever of riches: Technological creativity and economic progress, 1992

Science, Success

“When Mrs. Casaubon was announced he started up as from an electric shock, and felt a tingling at his fingerends. Any one observing him would have seen a change in his complexion, in the adjustment of his facial muscles, in the vividness of his glance, which might have made them imagine that every molecule in his body had passed the message of a magic touch. And so it had. For effective magic is transcendent nature; and who shall measure the subtlety of those touches which convey the quality of soul as well as body, and make a man’s passion for one woman differ from his passion for another as joy in the morning light over valley and river and white mountain-top differs from joy among Chinese lanterns and glass panels? Will, too, was made of very impressible stuff. The bow of a violin drawn near him cleverly, would at one stroke change the aspect of the world for him, and his point of view shifted— as easily as his mood. Dorothea’s entrance was the freshness of morning.”

George Eliot book Middlemarch

Middlemarch (1871)

World, Soul, Imagination, Mountain

“That war in the early 1990s changed a lot for me. I never thought I would see, in Europe, a full-dress reprise of internment camps, the mass murder of civilians, the reinstitution of torture and rape as acts of policy. And I didn't expect so many of my comrades to be indifferent – or even take the side of the fascists. It was a time when many people on the left were saying 'Don't intervene, we'll only make things worse' or, 'Don't intervene, it might destabilise the region. And I thought – destabilisation of fascist regimes is a good thing. Why should the left care about the stability of undemocratic regimes? Wasn't it a good thing to destabilise the regime of General Franco? It was a time when the left was mostly taking the conservative, status quo position – leave the Balkans alone, leave Milosevic alone, do nothing. And that kind of conservatism can easily mutate into actual support for the aggressors. Weimar-style conservatism can easily mutate into National Socialism. So you had people like Noam Chomsky's co-author Ed Herman go from saying 'Do nothing in the Balkans', to actually supporting Milosevic, the most reactionary force in the region. That's when I began to first find myself on the same side as the neocons. I was signing petitions in favour of action in Bosnia, and I would look down the list of names and I kept finding, there's Richard Perle. There's Paul Wolfowitz. That seemed interesting to me. These people were saying that we had to act. Before, I had avoided them like the plague, especially because of what they said about General Sharon and about Nicaragua. But nobody could say they were interested in oil in the Balkans, or in strategic needs, and the people who tried to say that – like Chomsky – looked ridiculous. So now I was interested.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

"In enemy territory? An interview with Christopher Hitchens." http://www.johannhari.com/2004/09/23/in-enemy-territory-an-interview-with-christopher-hitchens, Interview with Johann Hari (2004-09-23): On the Bosnian War 2000s, 2004

War, People, Support, Time

“When the Deep Impact probe hit Comet 9P/Tempel, there was almost no change in brightness. … This outburst by Comet Holmes is extreme!”

Brian G. Marsden (1937–2010) British astronomer

On the unprecedented brightening of Comet Holmes, as quoted in "Mystery Comet Explodes into Brightness" (26 October 2007) at Physorg.com http://www.physorg.com/news112622756.html. Within the space of a few hours between 23-24 October 2007 it brightened from a very dim and obscure object requiring powerful telescopes to see into one easily visible to the naked eye.

“I thought that the evidence against your claims about me would shame you into changing your behavior. But, five years since you started misrepresenting my role in the founding of Wikipedia, you’re still at it.”

Larry Sanger (1968) American former professor, co-founder of Wikipedia, founder of Citizendium and other projects

"An open letter to Jimmy Wales" Citizendium.org (8 April 2009) http://blog.citizendium.org/2009/04/08/an-open-letter-to-jimmy-wales-copy/.

Behavior

“Dada is a farce, a legend, a state of myth. A badly behaved myth whose subterranean survival and capricious manifestation upset everyone... The aesthetic of absolute negativity has been changed into methodical doubt, thanks to which it will finally be able to incarnate new signs... After the NO and the ZERO, there is a third position for the myth; the anti-art gesture of Marcel Duchamp has been charged with positive energy. The Dada spirit identifies itself with a method of appropriation of exterior reality of the modern world... The ready-made is no longer the height of negativity or of polemic, but the basis element of a new expressive repertoire. Such is the New Realism: a direct means for getting one's feet back on the ground but at 40 degree above Dada zero.”

Gerhard Richter (1932) German visual artist, born 1932

Source: after 2000, Doubt and belief in painting' (2003), p. 41, note 30

World, Art, Reality

“The decision by the Rewa Provincial Council to leave the chairperson's position of the council vacant until the Government has changed the constitution to enable the paramount chief of the province to take the position seems strange in this day and age.”

Epeli Ganilau (1951) Fijian politician

Views on the chiefly system

Age, Decision

“Surely, the violence and the entity who says, "I must change violence into non-violence", are both the same. To recognize that fact is to put an end to all conflict, is it not? There is no longer the conflict of trying to change, because I see that the very movement of the mind not to be violent is itself the outcome of violence.
So, the questioner wants to know why it is that he cannot go beyond all these superficial wrangles of the mind. For the simple reason that, consciously or unconsciously, the mind is always seeking something, and that very search brings violence, competition, the sense of utter dissatisfaction. It is only when the mind is completely still that there is a possibility of touching the deep waters.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti (1895–1986) Indian spiritual philosopher

Further response to the above question
1950s, Freedom From the Self (1955)

Search, Question, Sense, Water

“Kester wrote about people and since human nature doesn't change his observations hadn't dated.”

Susan Howatch book The Wheel of Fortune

The Wheel of Fortune (1984), Part 6: Hal

People, Nature

“The most conservative man in the world is the British Trade Unionist when you want to change him.”

Ernest Bevin (1881–1951) British labour leader, politician, and statesman

Report of the Proceedings of the Trade Union Congress, 1927
Speech to the TUC General Council, 8 September 1927.

World

“Sometimes I see it and then paint it. Other times I paint it and then see it. Both are impure situations, and I prefer neither. At every point in nature there is something to see. My work contains similar possibilities for the changing focus of the eye.”

Jasper Johns (1930) American artist

Sixteen Americans, (1959) Dorothy C. Miller, Moma, New York, p. 22
1950s

Nature, Time, Painting

“Times go by turns and chances change by course,
From foul to fair, from better hap to worse.”

Robert Southwell (1561–1595) English Jesuit

Source: Times Go by Turns, Line 5; p. 47.

Chance, Time

“Conformity may give you a quiet life; it may even bring you to a University Chair. But all change in history, all advance, comes from the nonconformists. If there had been no trouble-makers, no Dissenters, we should still be living in caves.”

A.J.P. Taylor (1906–1990) Historian

"The Radical Tradition: Fox, Paine, and Cobbett", p. 14
The Trouble Makers: Dissent over Foreign Policy, 1792-1939 (1957)

Life, History, Universe

“I know we live in troubled times, my friends, I know things which once stood up suddenly don't stand up anymore. I know that innocent people shopping or buying gas are often shot down, shot down for no reason. And it makes a nation nervous. Now, personally, I like the nation to be nervous. And in these nervous times, sometimes people come up to me, and they say, "Perhaps, Jack, you should tone down your rhetoric a bit. Perhaps, the stuff you say in between songs might be construed as, well, not very patriotic. Well, actually, Jack, you might get yourself in some big trouble." And I say to myself, "Oh! Trouble is my business, friend." In these uncertain times, it's not a good idea to give up on your values, and change your mind about the things you hold dear. It's not. I want to talk about someone who fell pretty damn hard, and this song is called "I Shot President Reagan, and I'm Gonna Do It Again and Again and Again and Again!"”

Jack Terricloth (1970)

Introducing "Secret Service Freedom Fighting U.S.A."
Live

People, Idea, Business, Time

“Since to raise up and comfort in distress
Whom Fortune's wheel beats down in changeful run,
Was never blamed; with glory oftener paid.”

Ludovico Ariosto book Orlando Furioso

Che rilevare un che Fortuna ruote
Talora al fondo, e consolar l'afflitto,
Mai non fu biasmo, ma gloria sovente.
Canto X, stanza 14 (tr. W. S. Rose)
Orlando Furioso (1532)

“Canada is a great country, one of the hopes of the world. We can be a better one – a country of greater equality, justice, and opportunity. We can build a prosperous economy and a society that shares its benefits more fairly. We can look after our seniors. We can offer better futures for our children. We can do our part to save the world’s environment. We can restore our good name in the world. We can do all of these things because we finally have a party system at the national level where there are real choices; where your vote matters; where working for change can actually bring about change. In the months and years to come, New Democrats will put a compelling new alternative to you. My colleagues in our party are an impressive, committed team. Give them a careful hearing; consider the alternatives; and consider that we can be a better, fairer, more equal country by working together. Don’t let them tell you it can’t be done.”

Jack Layton (1950–2011) Leader of the New Democratic Party of Canada

"A letter to Canadians from the Honourable Jack Layton." https://pdf.yt/d/RKyhnDdu-DXG3J6s 20 August 2011. Released upon his death.

Children, World, Justice, Hope

“We still think and talk of the basic problems of an industrial society as problems that can be solved by changing the system, that is the superstructure of political organization. Yet the real problems lie within the [industrial] enterprise. …our representative institution… a mirror in which we look when we want to see ourselves.”

Peter F. Drucker (1909–2005) American business consultant

1930s- 1950s, The New Society (1950)

Lie, Problem, Thinking

“Tragabigzanda was a rather large girl. Later on, Captain Smith named a portion of Massachusetts after her. [Footnote: This was afterwards changed to Cape Ann, because you really can't have a part of Massachusetts named Tragabigzanda. ]”

Will Cuppy (1884–1949) American writer

The Decline and Fall of Practically Everybody (1950), Part VI: Now We're Getting Somewhere, Captain John Smith

Girl, Parting

“Therefore, you must never be disappointed in life and you must remember that what even God cannot achieve, you can achieve through hard work. Karma is a thing, which can even change the course laid down by God.”

Haidakhan Babaji teacher in northern India

Karma yoga
Source: The Teachings of Babaji, 4 February 1984.

Life, God, Disappointment

“Tis only Man, mischievous Man, that can make Death a Sport. Nature taught your Stomach to crave nothing but Vegetables; but your violent Fondness to change, and greater Eagerness after Novelties, have prompted you to the Destruction of Animals without Justice or Necessity, perverted your Nature and warp'd your Appetites which way soever your Pride or Luxury have call'd them.”

Bernard Mandeville book The Fable of the Bees

Remark P, pp. 193-4
The Fable of the Bees (1714)

Death, Justice, Way, Nature

“The analysis model will not be a reflection of what the problem domain looks like… The reason is simply to get a more maintainable structure where changes will be local and thus manageable. We thus do not model reality as it is, as object orientation is often said to do, but we model the reality as we want to see it and to highlight what is important in our application.”

Ivar Jacobson (1939) Swedish computer scientist

Source: Object-Oriented Software Engineering: A Use Case Driven Approach (1992), p. 185: cited in: " Object Oriented Software Engineering: A Use Case Driven Approach Ivar Jacobson, et al. (1992) http://tedfelix.com/software/jacobson1992.html", Book review by Ted Felix on tedfelix.com, 2006.

Problem, Reality

“I read On the Road in maybe 1959. It changed my life like it changed everyone else's.”

Bob Dylan (1941) American singer-songwriter, musician, author, and artist

On the influence of Jack Kerouac on him, as quoted Grasping for the Wind : The Search for Meaning in the 20th Century (2001) by John W. Whitehead

Life, Reading

“Take God here / I have to talk to him / I want to tell him / about a life I have lived / and which I haven't understood / what it has been worth living / what has changed / or better / what have I earned?”

Vasco Rossi (1980) Italian singer-songwriter

from Portatemi Dio, 1983)
Song lyrics

Life, God

“You cannot just speak change, you have to LIVE change!”

Steve Maraboli (1975)

Source: Life, the Truth, and Being Free (2010), p. 83

“Lao Chiu's burns were so extensive that, with the exception of his scalp, two shoulders, the waist where his leather belt was worn and the soles of his feet, pratically his whole body was affected. His back and hips were burned deeply and his right leg was even worse. Every time it was necessary to turn him over and change his dressings ten doctors and five nurses were required and the process took several hours. Moreover, the patient suffered very much and was short of breath for a long while.”

Ba Jin (1904–2005) Chinese novelist

A Battle For Life (July 1958)

Suffering, Time

“The rising power of the United States in world affairs … requires, not a more compliant press, but a relentless barrage of facts and criticism…. Our job in this age, as I see it, is not to serve as cheerleaders for our side in the present world struggle but to help the largest possible number of people to see the realities of the changing and convulsive world in which American policy must operate.”

James Reston (1909–1995) Journalist, newspaper editor

The Artillery of the Press, introduction (1966)

People, Age, World, Reality

“First we notice an investigation which Prof. Planck of Berlin published in 1899. His aim was that it should fit the observed facts of radiation, and show why the energy of bodies was not wholly transformed into radiation. …his investigation seemed to show that continuity had to be given up, suggesting that in the last resort changes in the universe do not consist of continuous motions in space and time, but in some way are discontinuous.”

James Jeans (1877–1946) British mathematician and astronomer

Physics and Philosophy (1942)

Way, Universe, Time

“For Queen Diana did my body change
Into a fork-tongued dragon flesh and fell,
And through the island nightly do I range,
Or in the green sea mate with monsters strange,
When in the middle of the moonlit night
The sleepy mariner I do affright.”

William Morris (1834–1896) author, designer, and craftsman

The Earthly Paradise (1868-70), The Lady of the Land

Sea, Night

“I find that the conservatism which I follow does have some things in common with what Professor Hayek was preaching and also has some things in common with what you called old-fashioned Liberals. Let me just quote one, to whom I am devoted, John Stuart Mill on liberty. “A nation that dwarfs its citizens will find that with small men it can accomplish no great thing.” Is that not what I have been saying? Yes, it is partly perhaps old-fashioned liberalism… my pride that it has something in common with that… but that also has something in common with my belief that really nations are there to try to help people to bring out the best talents and abilities and initiatives in themselves and that, I think, is conserving the best in human nature and trying to change the rest, but trying to change it through the character of men and women.”

Margaret Thatcher (1925–2013) British stateswoman and politician

Radio Interview for BBC Radio 3 (17 December 1985) http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/105934 Second term as Prime Minister

Women, Men, People, Quotes

“To be able to come out of that mess as I did is special. To be able to improve my relations with my dad is special. I'm happy with the way my life's going, the way I'm growing up as a person. Skating has changed me. I've had a lot of chances, and this is my time to shine.”

Apolo Anton Ohno (1982) American short track speed skating competitor

Prior to the 2002 Winter Olympics Price, S.L. (2002) "Launch of Apolo" http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/si_online/news/2002/02/13/launch_of_apolo/ Sports Illustrated. (accessed May 24, 2007)

Life, Happiness, Way, Chance

“It is impossible to have workers' control within a capitalist society. Capitalism, by its very nature, produces contradictions which cannot be resolved until and unless we change the system of society…The unions could only have class collaboration and compromise with the mixed economy, and those who advanced the theory of workers' control in present-day society were putting forward an intellectual, Utopian dream, idealistic, unworkable and unattainable.”

Arthur Scargill (1938) British trade unionist

The Miner (5 December 1977), quoted in Paul Routledge, "Scargill attack on idea of worker directors", The Times (5 December 1977), p. 17

Dreams, Nature

“Hope and optimism are irrepressible but there is a deep underlying premonition that the opposition to change is likely to be vicious. Often the anxious question is asked: will such an oppressive regime really give us democracy? And the answer has to be: democracy, like liberty, justice and other social and political rights, is not 'given', it is earned through courage, resolution and sacrifice.”

Aung San Suu Kyi (1945) State Counsellor of Myanmar and Leader of the National League for Democracy

In Quest of Democracy (1991)

Justice, Hope, Democracy, Courage

“Decisions and plans made by others… [can be judged to be] quantitatively at least as important as the primary uncertainty arising from random acts of nature and unpredictable changes in consumers' preferences.”

Tjalling Koopmans (1910–1985) Dutch American economist

Source: Three Essays (1957), p. 163; as cited in: Richard Langlois (1989) Economics as a Process. p. 181

Nature, Decision

“When great changes occur in history, when great principles are involved, as a rule the majority are wrong.”

Eugene V. Debs (1855–1926) American labor and political leader

Speech in Cleveland, Ohio.(Sept. 11, 1918) Eugene V. Debs Speaks, ed. Jean Y. Tussey (1970)

History

“It's the same old tune, fiddle and guitar.
Where do we take it from here?
Rhinestone suits and new shiny cars;
We've been the same way for years.
We need to change.”

Waylon Jennings (1937–2002) American country music singer, songwriter, and musician

Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way, from Dreaming My Dreams (1975).
Song lyrics

Cars, Way

“I have, quite possibly, the most self-antagonistic brain of our generation. So when I really want to work on something, it goes into overdrive to think of other things that are really bitchin' to distract me. And if I change gears to work on that new shiny thing, it'll think of something even more bitchin' for the original thing or a wholly new project altogether. It's a wonder I manage to dress myself, really.”

Brian Clevinger (1978) writer

http://www.nuklearpower.com/daily.php?date=050927

Thinking

“Definition of design = Everyone designs who devise courses of action aimed at changing existing situations into preferred ones. The intellectual activity that produces material artifacts is no different fundamentally from the one that prescribes remedies for a sick patient or the one that devises a new sales plan for a company or a social welfare policy for a state.”

Herbert A. Simon (1916–2001) American political scientist, economist, sociologist, and psychologist

Source: 1960s-1970s, The Sciences of the Artificial, 1969, p. 130.

“Nehru's great passion was to change our society — the congealed society which we inherited from our own past, and from the static past of the British period. And, social change he connected with economic change. We could not change our society without changing our economic system and economic relations in society. His whole dream was that, his whole effort was in that direction. But the march of society, of social change has not been fast enough, nor fundamental enough so far. And, our inherited caste system remains with us, but it has been very badly battered. And, the conceptions behind the caste system have also been very badly damaged by policies, by the march of technology and economics, all these things. To some extent while this progressive movement was taking place, there was also, concurrently, some sort of counter-revolution, resisting it. But the overwhelming force of the progressive movement has been winning by and large. But now we have to specifically deal with many of the social ills and backwardness.”

K. R. Narayanan (1920–2005) 9th Vice President and the 10th President of India

Shri K. R. Narayanan President of India in Conversation with N. Ram on Doordarshan and All India Radio

Dreams, Effort, Passion, Past

“On the changing face of Indian cinema "At one time I wondered if I was doing the right films, today I know I have made the right choices. Indian cinema is changing, not step by step but by leaps. New blood is coming in, mindsets are changing and our exposure to the world is ever-increasing. I am glad these positive changes are happening when I am in the industry and not ten years from now.”

Preity Zinta (1975) film actress

Famous quotes

World, Time

“There are reasons to believe that the world economy is once again in the throes of a phase change. There are also reasons to believe that this phase change, like the preceding ones, will involve a paradigmatic shift in the organization of people around their work. If this is so, then our perceptions of what has happened in the past decade or more in the world of work may need to be modified; likewise our perceptions of where those changes are leading us”

Fred Emery (1925–1997) Australian psychologist

Fred Emery (1982) " Socio-Technical Foundations for a New Social Order? http://www.moderntimesworkplace.com/archives/ericsess/sessvol2/Soc_Order.pdf" in Human Relations, Vol 35: p. 1095-1122.

People, World, Past

“They met with cold words, and yet colder looks:
Each was changed in himself, and yet each thought
The other only changed, himself the same.”

Letitia Elizabeth Landon (1802–1838) English poet and novelist

Change from The London Literary Gazette (23rd August 1823)
The Improvisatrice (1824)

“Most men develop convictions about the cosmos and such beliefs come in two varieties. One kind is a conviction that the cosmos does not make sense. That it exists by chance and changes by chance and human beings do not matter. This view produces a fine complacency. The other kind is a belief that the cosmos does make sense, and was designed with the idea that people were going to live in it, and that what they do and what happens to them is important. This theory seems to be depressing.”

Murray Leinster (1896–1975) Novelist, short story writer

Source: Time Tunnel (1964), Chapter 1 (p. 8).

Men, People, Idea, Sense

“I've been married too many times. How terrible to change children's affiliations, their affections — to give them the insecurity of placing their trust in someone when maybe that someone won't be there next year.”

Elizabeth Taylor (1932–2011) British-American actress

Elizabeth Taylor : An informal memoir (1965)

Children, Time

“The song was finished. His lyre and his celestial voice had ceased together. Yet even so there was no change in the company; the heads of all were still bent forward, their ears intent on the enchanting melody. Such was his charm – the music lingered in their hearts.”

Apollonius of Rhodes book Argonautica

Source: Argonautica (3rd century BC), Book I. Preparation and Departure, Lines 512–515; of Orpheus.

Music, Heart

“The death of the wildebeest herd didn’t change the bloody savagery she’d witnessed in the Roman Circus, but it put life and death in much clearer perspective. Nature wasn’t any nobler or gentler than human beings. It was just as deadly and just as cruel and just as savagely “unfair” to the weak…
Maybe more so.”

Robert Lynn Asprin (1946–2008) American science fiction and fantasy author

Source: Time Scout (1995), Chapter 17 (p. 370; ellipsis in the original)

Life, Death, Nature

“I discovered soon that teaching has the handicap of retrospection. And that I don't believe in. So I started [at the w:Bauhaus in Dessau] instead a method of handling material with the material itself. So that was my main change. Whereas Itten before [Itten left the Bauhaus in 1923 and Albers followed him as art-teacher] had only spoken about the appearance, 'matiere' - (the French word) and I said I would turn from 'matiere' - the outside - to the inside, to the capacity of the material, before the appearance. And that changed the attitude basically I think.”

Josef Albers (1888–1976) German-American artist and educator

Homage to the square' (1964), Oral history interview with Josef Albers' (1968)

Art, Thinking, Teachers, Appearance

“The Mercantile System still had a certain artless Catholic candour and did not in the least conceal the immoral nature of trade. … But when the economic Luther, Adam Smith, criticised past economics things had changed considerably. … Protestant hypocrisy took the place of Catholic candour.”

Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) German social scientist, author, political theorist, and philosopher

Das Merkantilsystem hatte noch eine gewisse unbefangene, katholische Geradheit und verdeckte das unsittliche Wesen des Handels nicht im mindesten. ... Als aber der ökonomische Luther, Adam Smith, die bisherige Ökonomie kritisierte, hatten sich die Sachen sehr geändert. ... An die Stelle der katholischen Geradheit trat protestantische Gleisnerei.
Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy (1844)

Nature, Past

Quotes about change page 36

Quotes about change
page 36