Quotes about thinking
page 79

Douglas Coupland photo
James Inhofe photo

“We don't stop and realize that we are dealing with people—the far-left doesn't think we need a military to start with, they really don't. You've heard me say this before, they really believe if all countries would just stand in a circle and unilaterally disarm and hold hands then all threats would go away, they believe that. They would never say that but they do believe that.”

James Inhofe (1934) American politician

2012-12-04
The Frank Gaffney Show
Radio
http://www.securefreedomradio.org/2012/12/04/teetering-on-a-failed-state/, quoted in * 2012-12-05
Inhofe Claims Obama and Liberals Hope to Disband the Military
Brian
Tashman
Right Wing Watch
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/inhofe-obama-liberals-hope-disband-military

Kent Hovind photo
John Barrowman photo
Daniel Dennett photo
Donald J. Trump photo
Roger Manganelli photo
Brian Leiter photo
Mary Martin photo
Peggy Noonan photo

“The most qualified? No. I think they went for this — excuse me — political bullshit about narratives.”

Peggy Noonan (1950) American author and journalist

On Sarah Palin as a candidate for US Vice-President, in comments caught on tape http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=CrG8w4bb3kg after an interview on MSNBC (3 September 2008)]

Joseph Heller photo

“Everyone in my book accuses everyone else of being crazy. Frankly, I think the whole society is nuts — and the question is: What does a sane man do in an insane society?”

Joseph Heller (1923–1999) American author

As quoted in "Heller's legacy will be 'Catch-22' ideas" at CNN (13 December 1999) http://archives.cnn.com/1999/books/news/12/13/heller/index.html

T. H. White photo
Lucy Lawless photo

“They either overcompensate for the way they feel and are incredibly sycophantic or incredibly brusque in order to prove they don't think you're superior.”

Lucy Lawless (1968) New Zealand actress

Discussing the differences between her fans in the United States and those in New Zealand— reported in Sarah Stuart (January 12, 2003) "Superstars in our midst", Sunday Star Times, p. A1.

Everett Dean Martin photo
Mikhail Baryshnikov photo

“You ask me what's happened in my life, why and how I did this and that. And I think and tell, but it's never true story, because everything is so much more complicated, and also I can't even remember how things happened. Whole process is boring. Also false, but mostly boring.”

Mikhail Baryshnikov (1948) Soviet-American dancer, choreographer, and actor born in Letonia, Soviet Union

As quoted in "Profile: The Soloist" by Joan Acoccella, in The New Yorker (January 19, 1998); reprinted in Life Stories: Profiles from The New Yorker https://books.google.com/books?id=KDhjzXAjyUMC&pg=PA62 (2000), edited by David Remnick, p. 62.

Adlai Stevenson photo

“The idea that you can merchandise candidates for high office like breakfast cereal — that you can gather votes like box tops — is, I think, the ultimate indignity to the democratic process.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

Speech at the Democratic National Convention (18 August 1956)

Donald J. Trump photo

“I think there has to be a trust. There actually has to be a trust. If you don't trust, you're not going to do very well.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

In response to a reporter's line of questioning on what his specific plans will be to achieve the goals of his campaign. "Trump on Specifics of His Proposals: ‘Trust Me'" http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/melanie-hunter/trump-specifics-his-proposals-trust-me (12 August 2015), by Melanie Hunter
2010s, 2015

Stanley Baldwin photo

“What about my Soul? That's all right. The essence of such service is unselfishness. My first thought has to be of others, of the relationship of Crown and people: there will be no room to think of money or of my own career.”

Stanley Baldwin (1867–1947) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

Letter to J. C. C. Davidson (28 January 1919) on contemplating acceptance of government office, quoted in Robert Rhodes James (ed.), Memoirs of a Conservative: J. C. C. Davidson's Memoirs and Papers, 1910-1937 (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1969), p. 95.
1910s

Howard Stern photo

“I think it's my identity. Like, this is who I am. This is what I do…. Like I'm Babe Ruth, you know?”

Howard Stern (1954) American radio personality

Howard Stern on Piers Morgan Tonight, CNN (January 18, 2011)

Noam Chomsky photo
Samuel Butler photo

“Think of and look at your work as though it were done by your enemy. If you look at it to admire it you are lost.”

Samuel Butler (1835–1902) novelist

Improvement in Art
The Note-Books of Samuel Butler (1912), Part IX - A Painter's Views on Painting

Ursula K. Le Guin photo
Ingmar Bergman photo
Fred Thompson photo
Gerhard Richter photo
Henry Hazlitt photo

“Let us begin with the simplest illustration possible: let us, emulating Bastiat, choose a broken pane of glass.A young hoodlum, say, heaves a brick through the window of a baker’s shop. The shopkeeper runs out furious, but the boy is gone. A crowd gathers, and begins to stare with quiet satisfaction at the gaping hole in the window and the shattered glass over the bread and pies. After a while the crowd feels the need for philosophic reflection. And several of its members are almost certain to remind each other or the baker that, after all, the misfortune has its bright side. It will make business for some glazier. As they begin to think of this they elaborate upon it. How much does a new plate glass window cost? Fifty dollars? That will be quite a sum. After all, if windows were never broken, what would happen to the glass business? Then, of course, the thing is endless. The glazier will have $50 more to spend with other merchants, and these in turn will have $50 more to spend with still other merchants, and so ad infinitum. The smashed window will go on providing money and employment in ever-widening circles. The logical conclusion from all this would be, if the crowd drew it, that the little hoodlum who threw the brick, far from being a public menace, was a public benefactor.Now let us take another look. The crowd is at least right in its first conclusion. This little act of vandalism will in the first instance mean more business for some glazier. The glazier will be no more unhappy to learn of the incident than an undertaker to learn of a death. But the shopkeeper will be out $50 that he was planning to spend for a new suit. Because he has had to replace a window, he will have to go without the suit (or some equivalent need or luxury). Instead of having a window and $50 he now has merely a window. Or, as he was planning to buy the suit that very afternoon, instead of having both a window and a suit he must be content with the window and no suit. If we think of him as a part of the community, the community has lost a new suit that might otherwise have come into being, and is just that much poorer.The glazier’s gain of business, in short, is merely the tailor’s loss of business. No new “employment” has been added. The people in the crowd were thinking only of two parties to the transaction, the baker and the glazier. They had forgotten the potential third party involved, the tailor. They forgot him precisely because he will not now enter the scene. They will see the new window in the next day or two. They will never see the extra suit, precisely because it will never be made. They see only what is immediately visible to the eye.”

Economics in One Lesson (1946), The Broken Window (ch. 2)

Janeane Garofalo photo

“I think we all remember where we were when Rush Hour hit the water. That was an important day.”

Janeane Garofalo (1964) comedian, actress, political activist, writer

self-titled TV comedy special, 1997
Standup routines

Derren Brown photo
William Styron photo

“My life and work have been far from free of blemish, and so I think it would be unpardonable for a biographer not to dish up the dirt.”

William Styron (1925–2006) American novelist and essayist

"A Conversation with William Styron", Humanities (May/June 1997)

Donald J. Trump photo
Eugène Delacroix photo

“.. The movement and the rustle of the branches [in the forest, while losing his attention for chasing] delights me. The clouds float past and I lift my head to follow their flight, or think about some madrigal, when a slight sound, which has been going on for a little while, rouses me slowly from my dream.; at least I turn my head and see, to my grief, a little white scut just disappearing into the thicket…”

Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863) French painter

Quote in a letter to Delacroix' friend Achille Peron - 16 September 1819, Paris; as quoted in Eugene Delacroix – selected letters 1813 – 1863, ed. and translation Jean Stewart, art Works MFA publications, Museum of Fine Art Boston, 2001, p. 51
1815 - 1830

Ron Paul photo
Frederick II of Prussia photo

“I think it better to keep a profound silence with regard to the Christian fables, which are canonized by their antiquity and the credulity of absurd and insipid people.”

Frederick II of Prussia (1712–1786) king of Prussia

Letters of Voltaire and Frederick the Great (New York: Brentano's, 1927), trans. Richard Aldington, letter 37 from Frederick to Voltaire (June 1738)

Carl Sagan photo
Max Brooks photo
Jennifer Beals photo
Clarence Thomas photo

“It's fascinating that people, there's so many people now who will make judgments based on what you look like. I'm black, so I'm supposed to think a certain way? I'm supposed to have certain opinions? I don't do that. You don't create a box and put people in and then make a lot of generalizations about them.”

Clarence Thomas (1948) Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

Interview with Steve Kroft https://web.archive.org/web/20140611214639/http://www.cbsnews.com/news/clarence-thomas-the-justice-nobody-knows/ (September 2007).
2000s

Robert Rauschenberg photo
Psy photo

“I don’t think this dance is suitable for weddings. This is not a formal dance, this is a cheesy dance! But still, I appreciate that.”

Psy (1977) South Korean singer

When told that “Gangnam Style” has become a popular wedding dance.
Interview with The New York Times, 'His Style Is Gangnam, and Viral Too' http://www.nytimes.com/2012/10/14/arts/music/interview-psy-the-artist-behind-gangnam-style.html?_r=0, October 2012.

“I think [the movie Light of the World] will help a lot of pastors. It should get a lot of people sold—uh, saved.”

Jack T. Chick (1924–2016) Christian comics writer

" Meet Jack Chick https://web.archive.org/web/20110423142950/http://members.cox.net/jimmyakin/x-meet-jack-chick.htm," an interview with Jimmy Akin (2004)

Orson Scott Card photo

“That’s how it goes within a family. You think you know each other so well, and so you don’t bother hardly getting to know each other at all.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Source: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Prentice Alvin (1989), Chapter 2.

“p>The inherent contradictions and binds men find themselves in in trying to become less macho in their relationship with a woman were poignantly expressed in a letter written by a young man to a New York newspaper in response to an article that addressed itself to a question posed by a woman writer—whether women would be able to think of a non-macho man as sexy. The letter writer wrote:I am by nature a gentle and non-aggressive 27-year-old man who often finds women turned off sexually by my tenderness and non-macho view of the world. I have come to realize that for all their talk, a lot of women still want the hairy, sexy, war-mongering, aggressive machoman of their dreams. So after several fruitless years as a gentle poet-man, I now turn myself into a heavy machismo when I go out with a woman. It works. I open the doors, I order the food and drinks, I decide which movie or play we will see. I keep my shirt unbuttoned down past my nipples and wear a gold chain around my neck with a carved elephant tusk medallion, and if the relationship is not working out, I make the first move and tell my companion that I'm sorry but we're through.The sad thing about all this is that it works.”

Herb Goldberg (1937–2019) American psychologist

After all those years of being naturally sensitive and gentle, and now I've got to turn myself inside out just to appear sexy. It's fun and it's nice, but I do wish I could just be myself again.</p></blockquote>
Who Is the Victim? Who Is the Oppressor?, pp. 165&ndash;166
The New Male (1979)

Arthur Hugh Clough photo
James Gleick photo

“Linear relationships can be captured with a straight line on a graph. Linear relationships are easy to think about…. Linear equations are solvable… Linear systems have an important modular virtue: you can take them apart, and put them together again — the pieces add up.”

Hanssen commented: "Following distinctions between linear and nonlinear systems from James Gleick's 1987 book on chaos theory may be helpful."
Source: Chaos: Making a New Science, 1987, p. 23 as cited in: James R. Hansen (2004), Trees of Texas: An Easy Guide to Leaf Identification, p. 246

Ze Frank photo

“Just a reminder, what other people think of you is none of your business.”

Ze Frank (1972) American online performance artist

http://www.zefrank.com/theshow/archives/2006/04/040506.html
"The Show" (www.zefrank.com/theshow/)

David Fleming photo
Myron Tribus photo
Daniel Dennett photo
Mitt Romney photo

“I think we ought to have more oil. We ought to develop more sources of oil so that we can increase our supply. But the last thing I want to do is suck it all dry as quickly as we can. I want to use less of it.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

Interview on Hardball with Chris Matthews, December 2005.
2003–2007 Governor of Massachusetts

Ian Paisley photo
Lennox Lewis photo

“In boxing, if you think you will lose.. you're already halfway there.”

Lennox Lewis (1965) British-Canadian boxer

Lennox Lewis (From his Twitter account)

Edith Sitwell photo
Willie Mays photo
John Banville photo
Nigel Farage photo
Swami Vivekananda photo
Jimmy Buffett photo

“To me it was more about eight years of bad policy before (Obama) got there that let this happen. It was Dracula running the blood bank in terms of oil and leases. I think that has more to do with it than how the president reacted to it.”

Jimmy Buffett (1946) American singer–songwriter and businessman

Jimmy Buffett Organizes Gulf Benefit, Blames Bush for Spill, foxnews.com, July 6, 2010, January 6, 2011 http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2010/07/06/jimmy-buffet-organizes-gulf-benefit-blames-bush-spill/#ixzz1AHyM5yHe,

André Maurois photo

“When you think of natural ballplayers, only two come into mind, Babe Ruth and Willie Mays.”

Arnold Hano (1922) American writer

As quoted in "In Willie's time, he was No. 1" http://static.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/neyer_rob/1191263.html by Rob Neyer, at ESPN, posted May 4, 2001
Sports-related

David Lynch photo

“The worst thing about this modern world is that people think you get killed on television with zero pain and zero blood. It must enter into kids' heads that it's not very messy to kill somebody, and it doesn't hurt that much. That's a real sickness to me. That's a real sick thing.”

David Lynch (1946) American filmmaker, television director, visual artist, musician and occasional actor

As quoted in "Dark Lens on America" in The New York Times Magazine (14 January 1990) http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0CE0D6113FF937A25752C0A966958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all

Giacomo Casanova photo
William Hazlitt photo

“The soul of a journey is liberty, perfect liberty, to think, feel, do just as one pleases.”

William Hazlitt (1778–1830) English writer

"On Going on a Journey"
Table Talk: Essays On Men And Manners http://www.blupete.com/Literature/Essays/TableHazIV.htm (1821-1822)

Clive Staples Lewis photo
Gertrude Stein photo
Li Bai photo

“Before bed, the bright moon was shining.
Now, I think the ground has a frost covering.
I raise my head … to view the bright moon,
Then I lower my head … and I think of home.”

"Thoughts on a Still Night" (静夜思); in Jean Ward's Li T'ai-po: Remembered (2008), p. 99
Variant: Variant translation:
Before my bed the moonlight glitters
Like frost upon the ground.
I look up to the mountain moon,
Look down and think of home.
Source: "Quiet Night Thought", in Classical Chinese Literature: An Anthology of Translations (2000), p. 723

Pete Seeger photo
Loujain al-Hathloul photo

“I am with the uprising of women in the Arab world because I can think and fully practice my religion (like men). Also, I’m in debt to my daughter to offer her an honorable life.”

Loujain al-Hathloul (1989) Saudi Arabian activist

As quoted in Did Facebook censor an Arab Women’s Rights Group?l http://www.vocativ.com/tech/facebook/facebook-double-standard-why-these-women-had-their-pictures-taken-down/index.html (November 13, 2012), Vocativ.

Leo Igwe photo
Coretta Scott King photo

“If American women would increase their voting turnout by ten percent, I think we would see an end to all of the budget cuts in programs benefiting women and children.”

Coretta Scott King (1927–2006) American author, activist, and civil rights leader. Wife of Martin Luther King, Jr.

As quoted in New Woman, Vol. 16, No. 4 (April 1986), p. 20

Martti Ahtisaari photo

“I think it's a disgrace for the international community that we have allowed so many conflicts to become frozen, and we are not making a serious effort to solve them.”

Martti Ahtisaari (1937) Finnish politician and former President of Finland

Telephone interview with Adam Smith, Editor-in-Chief of Nobelprize.org (10 October 2008) http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/peace/laureates/2008/ahtisaari-telephone.html

Milton Friedman photo

“They think that the cure to big government is to have bigger government… the only effective cure is to reduce the scope of government - get government out of the business.”

Milton Friedman (1912–2006) American economist, statistician, and writer

Milton Friedman - Big Business, Big Government http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R_T0WF-uCWg

Christopher Hitchens photo

“There is a widespread view that the war against jihadism and totalitarianism involves only differences of emphasis. In other words, one might object to the intervention in Iraq on the grounds that it drew resources away from Afghanistan - you know the argument. It's important to understand that this apparent agreement does not cover or include everybody. A very large element of the Left and of the isolationist Right is openly sympathetic to the other side in this war, and wants it to win. This was made very plain by the leadership of the "anti-war" movement, and also by Michael Moore when he shamefully compared the Iraqi fascist "insurgency" to the American Founding Fathers. To many of these people, any "anti-globalization" movement is better than none. With the Right-wingers it's easier to diagnose: they are still Lindberghians in essence and they think war is a Jewish-sponsored racket. With the Left, which is supposed to care about secularism and humanism, it's a bit harder to explain an alliance with woman-stoning, gay-burning, Jew-hating medieval theocrats. However, it can be done, once you assume that American imperialism is the main enemy. Even for those who won't go quite that far, the admission that the US Marine Corps might be doing the right thing is a little further than they are prepared to go - because what would then be left of their opposition credentials, which are so dear to them?”

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

"Love, Poverty and War" http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Read.aspx?GUID=C78DC231-4599-4745-9CA5-A398398916A0, FrontPageMagazine.com (2004-12-29).
2000s, 2004

Jerry Goldsmith photo
Oliver Stone photo

“Arms trade. If there was a legitimate trade, they'd sell those things - guns and bombs - in a supermarket. It would be like a cosmetics demonstration, and you'd have a little bit of shopping music in the background. And so, here's our arms trade demonstrator. 'Hello, and welcome to our new "Twilight of the World" range - our stunning new collection for nuclear winter. Now, for those persistent racial problems, why not try our new ethnic cleanser, "Pogrom"? Apply vigorously to the affected area, and then wipe off the face of the earth. For persistent outbreaks, to eliminate those last spots of resistance, why not try our new "I Can't Believe It's Not a Kalashnikov"? Go on, leaders, treat yourself. Tell yourself "I want it, I need it, I'll have it". Now, for those particularly sensitive areas, why not try our new range, "U. N."? It's entirely cosmetic; it does nothing. Apply half-heartedly with our new hand-wringing cream. Now, people often come up to me and say "Can you save my face?" Well, I can. So for those secret little deals - those secret little Iraqi liaisons - why not try "Embargo", the mark of the middleman? Now, for a touch of mystery, why not visit the "Missing Body Shop"? Collect your free nail remover and watch your problems disappear. Now, you're probably sitting there thinking "Oh, I'm such a hideous old blood-soaked dictator of a thing; nobody will deal with me". How wrong you are! We are sole suppliers to the US government of "Turn-a-Blind-Eye Liner" - use always in conjunction with "Oil of Kuwaiti", a touch of "Massacre" and blusher. Oh, you won't need that. I'm Marlene from the House of Charnel. Thank you for your time and patience. And for that finishing touch - for those romantic evenings when you really want to take the enemy out - why not try our stunning new nerve gas, "Paralyse" by Calvin Klein.' (Linda Live 1993)”

Linda Smith (1958–2006) comedian

Stand-up

Christopher Hitchens photo

“A double problem arises: There is first the difficulty of, if not the impossibility of demonstrating the existence of any creator or designer at all. I think I say something uncontroversial when I say that no theologian has ever conclusively demonstrated that such a designer can or does or ever has existed. The most you can do, by way of the argument from design, is to infer him or her or it from an apparent harmony in the arrangements - and this was at a time when that was the very best that, so to speak, could be done. But religion goes a little further than this already rather impossible task, and expects us to believe as follows: that the speaker not only can prove the existence of a said entity, but can claim to know this entity's mind - in fact, can claim to know it quite intimately; can claim to know his or her personal wishes; can, in turn, tell you what you may do, in his name - a quite large arrogation of power, you will suddenly notice, is being granted to the speaker here. The speaker can tell you that he knows - he cannot tell you how - but he can tell you that he knows, for example, that heaven hates ham, that god doesn't want you to eat pork products; he can tell you that god has a very very strong view about with whom you may have sexual relations, indeed, how you may have sexual relations with others; he can indicate, perhaps a little less convincingly but no less firmly, that there are certain books or courses of study that you might want to avoid or treat with great suspicion.”

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

Christopher Hitchens vs. Marvin Olasky, 14/05/2007 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMgMUHD_kPI?t=1m35s
2000s, 2007

Julian of Norwich photo
Alain Badiou photo
Sadhguru photo

“In human affairs, all that endures is what men think.”

Isabel Paterson (1886–1961) author and editor

Source: The God of the Machine (1943), p. 15

Tucker Carlson photo

“I think Michael Moore is loathsome, though, not because he dislikes Bush, but because he seems to dislike America.”

Tucker Carlson (1969) American political commentator

source needed
Date unidentified

John A. Eddy photo
Saul Leiter photo

“Greed is all right, by the way. I think greed is healthy. You can be greedy and still feel good about yourself.”

Ivan Boesky (1937) American investor, white-collar criminal

Den of Thieves (1992), by John B. Stewart

Morrissey photo
Paul Dini photo
Neil Young photo
George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston photo

“We may also, I think, congratulate ourselves on the part that the British Empire has played in this struggle, and on the position which it fills at the close. Among the many miscalculations of the enemy was the profound conviction, not only that we had a "contemptible little Army," but that we were a doomed and decadent nation. The trident was to be struck from our palsied grasp, the Empire was to crumble at the first shock; a nation dedicated, as we used to be told, to pleasure-taking and the pursuit of wealth was to be deprived of the place to which it had ceased to have any right, and was to be reduced to the level of a second-class, or perhaps even of a third-class Power. It is not for us in the hour of victory to boast that these predictions have been falsified; but, at least, we may say this—that the British Flag never flew over a more powerful or a more united Empire than now; Britons never had better cause to look the world in the face; never did our voice count for more in the councils of the nations, or in determining the future destinies of mankind. That that voice may be raised in the times that now lie before us in the interests of order and liberty, that that power may be wielded to secure a settlement that shall last, that that Flag may be a token of justice to others as well as of pride to ourselves, is our united hope and prayer.”

George Curzon, 1st Marquess Curzon of Kedleston (1859–1925) British politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/lords/1918/nov/18/the-armistice-address-to-his-majesty in the House of Lords (18 November 1918).

“You see, if E. O. Wilson says that Indian scientists should do taxonomy, now of course, someone will say that you are preventing them from doing the sort of high science that is done elsewhere. So it should not come from there, it should come from us. I think that we must recognize where we have the advantages and where we have the disadvantages.”

Raghavendra Gadagkar, [Michael L. Lewis, Inventing Global Ecology: Tracking the Biodiversity Ideal in India, 1947-1997, Modern Ecology Comes to India, http://books.google.com/books?id=0Bl8s5JCM4UC&pg=PA129, 2003, Ohio University Press, 978-0-8214-1540-5, 129]

Antoine François Prévost photo

“Do you really think one can be truly loving when one is short of bread?”

Antoine François Prévost (1697–1763) French novelist

Crois-tu qu'on puisse être bien tendre lorsqu'on manque de pain?
Part 1, p. 98; translation p. 48.
L'Histoire du chevalier des Grieux et de Manon Lescaut (1731)