Quotes about problems
page 13

Glenn Jacobs photo
Joseph Chamberlain photo

“What is to be the nature of the domestic legislation of the future? (Hear, hear.) I cannot help thinking that it will be more directed to what are called social subjects than has hitherto been the case.—How to promote the greater happiness of the masses of the people (hear, hear), how to increase their enjoyment of life (cheers), that is the problem of the future; and just as there are politicians who would occupy all the world and leave nothing for the ambition of anybody else, so we have their counterpart at home in the men who, having already annexed everything that is worth having, expect everybody else to be content with the crumbs that fall from their table. If you will go back to the origin of things you will find that when our social arrangements first began to shape themselves every man was born into the world with natural rights, with a right to a share in the great inheritance of the community, with a right to a part of the land of his birth. (Cheers.) But all these rights have passed away. The common rights of ownership have disappeared. Some of them have been sold; some of them have been given away by people who had no right to dispose of them; some of them have been lost through apathy and ignorance; some have been stolen by fraud (cheers); and some have been acquired by violence. Private ownership has taken the place of these communal rights, and this system has become so interwoven with our habits and usages, it has been so sanctioned by law and protected by custom, that it might be very difficult and perhaps impossible to reverse it. But then, I ask, what ransom will property pay for the security which it enjoys? What substitute will it find for the natural rights which have ceased to be recognized?”

Joseph Chamberlain (1836–1914) British businessman, politician, and statesman

Speech to the Birmingham Artisans' Association at Birmingham Town Hall (5 January 1885), quoted in ‘Mr. Chamberlain At Birmingham.’, The Times (6 January 1885), p. 7.
1880s

“When I met Wittgenstein, I saw that Schlick's warnings were fully justified. But his behavior was not caused by any arrogance. In general, he was of a sympathetic temperament and very kind; but he was hypersensitive and easily irritated. Whatever he said was always interesting and stimulating and the way in which he expressed it was often fascinating. His point of view and his attitude toward people and problems, even theoretical problems, were much more similar to those of a creative artist than to those of a scientist; one might almost say, similar to those of a religious prophet or a seer. When he started to formulate his view on some specific problem, we often felt the internal struggle that occurred in him at that very moment, a struggle by which he tried to penetrate from darkness to light under an intense and painful strain, which was even visible on his most expressive face. When finally, sometimes after a prolonged arduous effort, his answers came forth, his statement stood before us like a newly created piece of art or a divine revelation. Not that he asserted his views dogmatically … But the impression he made on us was as if insight came to him as through divine inspiration, so that we could not help feeling that any sober rational comment of analysis of it would be a profanation.”

Rudolf Carnap (1891–1970) German philosopher

Rudolf Carnap, as quoted in The Philosophy of Rudolf Carnap (1963) by Paul Arthur Schilpp, p. 25, and in Ludwig Wittgenstein : The Duty of Genius (1991) by Ray Monk, p. 244

David Cross photo

“I really don't have a problem with gay marriage… because I'm tolerant and rational.”

David Cross (1964) American comedian, writer and actor

The Last Laugh 2005

Donald J. Trump photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
Kenneth Arrow photo
Mohammad Reza Pahlavi photo
George W. Bush photo
John S. Bell photo
Abd al-Bari Atwan photo
Clarence Thomas photo
Philippe Kahn photo

“Trying to solve the worlds problems by making things 5% more efficient is like trying to play the violin with gardening gloves. Not much good will come out of it. We must invent new ways!”

Philippe Kahn (1952) Entrepreneur, camera phone creator

On why saving a bit of power here or there will not solve our energy problems. Comments made at the opening of the movie "An Inconvenient Truth.

Jean-François Revel photo
Maurice Wilkes photo
George W. Bush photo

“I believe it is the job of a President to confront problems, not pass them on to future Presidents and future generations.”

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

Remarks to the National Association of Home Builders, October 2, 2004 http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2004/10/20041002-7.html
2000s, 2004

Venkatraman Ramakrishnan photo
Camille Pissarro photo

“What I dislike is that he [= Paul Gauguin ] copied these elements from the Japanese, the Byzantine painters and others. I criticize him for not applying his synthesis to our modern philosophy which is absolutely social, anti-authoritarian and anti-mystical. - There is where the problem becomes serious. This is a step backwards; Gauguin is not a seer, he is a schemer… The symbolists also take this line! What do you think? They must be fought like the pest!”

Camille Pissarro (1830–1903) French painter

Quote of Camille Pissarro, in a letter to his son, 20 April 1891, in Camille Pissarro - Letters to His Son Lucien, ed. John Rewald, with assistance of Lucien Pissarro – (translated from the unpublished French letters by Lionel Abel); Pantheon Books Inc. New York, second edition, 1943, p. 163
1890's

Hayley Jensen photo

“Mark: I constantly admire your strength but I don't know - I heard pitching problems.”

Hayley Jensen (1983) Australian singer

Australian Idol, Final Performances, Final 7

Elia M. Ramollah photo
David Foster Wallace photo
Colin Wilson photo

“The world is a complex, interconnected, finite, ecological–social–psychological–economic system. We treat it as if it were not, as if it were divisible, separable, simple, and infinite. Our persistent, intractable global problems arise directly from this mismatch.”

Donella Meadows (1941–2001) American environmental scientist, teacher, and writer

Meadows (1982) " Whole Earth Models and Systems http://www.oss.net/dynamaster/file_archive/040324/48c97c243f534eee32d379e69b039289/WER-INFO-73.pdf". In: The CoEvolution Quarterly, Summer, pages 98–108.

“What greater thing can you do — besides for God — than good for other people? That goes for you mean people, too — I mean, really, what is your problem?”

Ysabella Brave (1979) American singer

"We Are a Powder Drink" (20 August 2008) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=My7jqQx0mfo

“Q: Does the creation of Design admit constraint?
Design depends largely on constraints.
Q: What constraints?
The sum of all constraints. Here is one of the few effective keys to the Design problem: the ability of the Designer to recognize as many of the constraints as possible; his willingness and enthusiasm for working within these constraints. Constraints of price, of size, of strength, of balance, of surface, of time, and so forth. Each problem has its own peculiar list.”

Charles Eames (1907–1978) American designer, half of duo the Eames

Another part of the interview: Also cited at: Mark Wunsch. "[http://markwunsch.com/blog/2008/09/27/design-q-a-with-charles-eames.html A software engineer and technologist: Design Q&A with Charles Eames". at markwunsch.com/blog, 2008/09/27
Design Q & A with Charles Eames, 1972

Alexander Calder photo
U.G. Krishnamurti photo
P. D. Ouspensky photo
Heinz Isler photo

“…I do not say any form which you construct this way is a good form, or must lead to a good solution; but there are forms which can lead to good solutions, and of course that is only the first link in a whole chain of investigations, and the other links in the investigation, model tests, measuring of the first structure, or a model test in scale 1:1 as we have it out here, these are of primary importance. So the engineer[‘s] problem is remaining all the same, but it is the first link, here, the shaping which has been lacking up to now, and this method can lead to a very nice solution.”

Heinz Isler (1926–2009) engineer

First Congress of the International Association of Shell Structures (now IASS), Madrid (1959) discussion following presentation of his paper paper ‘New Shapes for Shells’, as quoted by John Chilton, "39 etc… : Heinz Isler’s infinite spectrum of new shapes for shells" (2009) Proceedings of the International Association for Shell and Spatial Structures (IASS) Symposium 2009, Valencia, Evolution and Trends in Design, Analysis and Construction of Shell and Spatial Structures, 28 September – 2 October 2009, Universidad Politecnica de Valencia, Spain, eds. Alberto Domingo, Carlos Lazaro.

Calvin Coolidge photo
Lou Reed photo

“There are problems in these times, but none of them are mine
I'm beginning to see the light”

Lou Reed (1942–2013) American musician

"Beginning to See the Light"
Lyrics

Jair Bolsonaro photo

“Competence? It's a problem for each deputy. If I want to hire a prostitute for my office, I'll hire her. If I want to hire my mother, I'll hire her. It'll be my problem.”

Jair Bolsonaro (1955) Brazilian president elect

About the Proposed Amendment to the Constitution that would ban nepotism in public sectors. Câmara discute nesta terça projeto que proíbe nepotismo nos três Poderes http://www.gazetadopovo.com.br/vida-publica/camara-discute-nesta-terca-projeto-que-proibe-nepotismo-nos-tres-poderes-ae4kwcuwkopja36kryzji3w3y. Gazeta do Povo (5 March 2007).

Damian Pettigrew photo
Rudy Giuliani photo

“When you confront a problem, you begin to solve it.”

Rudy Giuliani (1944–2001) American businessperson and politician, former mayor of New York City

As quoted in RFID Journal, February 28, 2005. http://www.rfidjournal.com/article/articleview/1421/1/2/

Kurt Lewin photo
Preston Manning photo
John C. Baez photo

“Buddha's teachings are scientific methods to solve the problems of all living beings permanently.”

Kelsang Gyatso (1931) Tibetan writer and lama

Modern Buddhism: The Path of Compassion and Wisdom (2011)

Kurt Schuschnigg photo
Emil M. Cioran photo
Frederick Douglass photo

“It was once said by Abraham Lincoln that this Republic could not long endure half slave and half free; and the same may be said with even more truth of the black citizens of this country. They cannot remain half slave and half free. They must be one thing or the other. And this brings me to consider the alternative now presented between slavery and freedom in this country. From my outlook, I am free to affirm that I see nothing for the negro of the South but a condition of absolute freedom, or of absolute slavery. I see no half-way place for him. One or the other of these conditions is to solve the so-called negro problem. There are forces at work in both of these directions, and for the present that which aims at the re-enslavement of the negro seems to have the advantage. Let it be remembered that the labor of the negro is his only capital. Take this from him, and he dies from starvation. The present mode of obtaining his labor in the South gives the old master-class a complete mastery over him. I showed this in my last annual celebration address, and I need not go into it here. The payment of the negro by orders on stores, where the storekeeper controls price, quality, and quantity, and is subject to no competition, so that the negro must buy there and nowhere else–an arrangement by which the negro never has a dollar to lay by, and can be kept in debt to his employer, year in and year out–puts him completely at the mercy of the old master-class. He who could say to the negro, when a slave, you shall work for me or be whipped to death, can now say to him with equal emphasis, you shall work for me, or I will starve you to death… This is the plain, matter-of-fact, and unexaggerated condition of the plantation negro in the Southern States today.”

Frederick Douglass (1818–1895) American social reformer, orator, writer and statesman

Speech http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-nations-problem/

Vijay Prashad photo
T. Colin Campbell photo
Larry Wall photo

“If there's a particular problem that Perl is trying to solve, it's the basic fact that all programming languages suck. Sort of the concept of original sin, applied to programming languages.”

Larry Wall (1954) American computer programmer and author, creator of Perl

Public Talks, The State of the Onion 10

Slavoj Žižek photo
Lewis M. Branscomb photo
John F. Kennedy photo
Henry Adams photo
John Gray photo
Joan Robinson photo
David Attenborough photo
Orde Charles Wingate photo
Francis Escudero photo
Gabrielle Giffords photo

“Our country must be strong enough to solve problems, and that means we must learn how to work together again.”

Gabrielle Giffords (1970) American politician

Comment after winning re-election — [Giffords wins re-election to U.S. House; Kelly says voters have spoken, Sierra Vista Herald, Arizona, November 6, 2010, Bill Hess]

Vitruvius photo
James K. Morrow photo
Jimmy Wales photo

“I don't see any particular problem with that.”

Jimmy Wales (1966) Wikipedia co-founder and American Internet entrepreneur

Responding to http://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2007-March/066648.html the deletion of a Wikipedia article from non-administrator view, while the article's deletion was being reviewed by the community. (27 March 2007)

Russell L. Ackoff photo
Martin Luther King, Jr. photo
David Horowitz photo

“We are divided not only about political facts and social values, but also about what the Constitution itself means. The crusaders on this issue choose to ignore these problems and are proposing to deny the will of 64 million voters by appealing to five Supreme Court Justices (since no one is delusional enough to think that the four liberal justices are going to take the presidency away from Obama). What kind of conservatism is this?”

David Horowitz (1939) Neoconservative activist, writer

Horowitz speaks about Obama birth certificate doubters. [David, Horowitz, http://www.nationalreview.com/article/226474/obama-derangement-syndrome-david-horowitz, "Shut up about the birth certificate.", nationalreview.com, December 8, 2008, 2016-30-03]
2008

Tibor R. Machan photo

“[The media] assume, in the way they address politicians or report on social problems, that whatever is important to society must be a matter of public or state concern.”

Tibor R. Machan (1939–2016) Hungarian-American philosopher

Source: Private Rights and Public Illusions (1994), p. xiii

Ray Comfort photo
Sugar Ray Leonard photo

“I had a drug problem. I'd go to parties, take a leak, and there was cocaine right there. I was 25 when it started, rich, famous, and retired.”

Sugar Ray Leonard (1956) American boxer

Sugar Ray Leonard talking about drugshttp://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_qn4158/is_20061006/ai_n16774982/pg_3

John McCain photo
Manuel Castells photo
Woody Allen photo

“You know, the whole American culture is going down the drain, you can't turn on a television set and see anything, or walk in the street and not find garbage, or neighborhoods that were formerly beautiful now have McDonald's in them, and it's all a part of an enormous degeneration of culture in the United States. People that exist in that culture are forced to make moral decisions all the time about their lives, their occupations, their love-lives, and they make decisions that are commensurate with what's happening to them in this culture, and it's too bad that that's happening because that's what Manhattan is about, that New York used to be such a great city, so wonderful, and it has to fight every day for its survival against the encroachment of all this terrible ugliness that is gradually overcoming all the big cities in America.
This ugliness comes from a culture that has no spiritual center, a culture that has money and education, but no sense of being at peace with the world, no sense of purpose in life. They don't know what they're doing, or why they're here. They have no religious center, they have no philosophical center, and so they act, they do what's expedient at the moment. They have no long view of society. They only have the view of quick money, and kill the pain of the moment, and so instead of dealing with the real problems that exist, that are complicated, they sweep them under the rug by turning on the television set, or taking cocaine, or doing many things that enable them to escape confrontation with the unpleasant realities of the world.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

[Allen, Woody, France Roche, Woody Allen, ou L'Anhedoniste; le Plus Drole du Monde, New York, 1979, France 2, 05 January 2013]
Others

Oskar R. Lange photo
Michael Moorcock photo

“It is many years since I have wielded a weapon larger than a pen, borne anything weightier than a difficult problem in philosophy.”

Book 3, Chapter 5 “Five Heroes and a Heroine” (p. 467)
The Runestaff (1969)

Robert Kagan photo
Sandra Fluke photo
Mike Rosen photo
Edsger W. Dijkstra photo
Roger Ebert photo
Michael Hudson (economist) photo
Al-Biruni photo
Donald A. Norman photo
Stuart Hall (cultural theorist) photo
Paul Ryan photo

“We don't have a tax revenue problem in Washington, we have a spending problem in Washington.”

Paul Ryan (1970) American politician

[2007-01-06, House approves spending limits, Craig, Gilbert, Journal Sentinel, http://www.jsonline.com/news/president/29271094.html, 2012-09-30]

Jakaya Kikwete photo
Paul Krugman photo
Richard Stallman photo
Lyndon B. Johnson photo
Gilbert Ryle photo