Book III, Ch. IV, pp. 152-155.
Physics
“Anaximander used to assert that the primary cause of all things was the Infinite,—not defining exactly whether he meant air or water or anything else.”
Anaximander, 2.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 2: Socrates, his predecessors and followers
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Diogenes Laërtius 107
biographer of ancient Greek philosophers 180–240Related quotes
“The thing that cannot be defined is the first thing; the primary fact.”
Ch 1 : "The Dickens Period"
Charles Dickens (1906)
Context: Much of our modern difficulty, in religion and other things, arises merely from this: that we confuse the word "indefinable" with the word "vague." If some one speaks of a spiritual fact as "indefinable" we promptly picture something misty, a cloud with indeterminate edges. But this is an error even in commonplace logic. The thing that cannot be defined is the first thing; the primary fact. It is our arms and legs, our pots and pans, that are indefinable. The indefinable is the indisputable. The man next door is indefinable, because he is too actual to be defined. And there are some to whom spiritual things have the same fierce and practical proximity; some to whom God is too actual to be defined.
Source: Isis Unveiled (1877), Volume I, Chapter VII
Book II, Ch. IV, pp. 113-115.
Physics
“Water belongs to us all. Nature did not make the sun one person's property, nor air, nor water, cool and clear.”
Usus communis aquarum est.
Nec solem proprium natura nec aera fecit
nec tenues undas
Book VI, 349-351; translation by Michael Simpson https://books.google.ca/books?id=hDPmwbCSSPEC
Metamorphoses (Transformations)
“The original answer defines certain conditions, […] Anything else is a different question.”
Marilyn vos Savant
(1946) US American magazine columnist, author and lecturer
Regarding ambiguity in her famous statement of the Monty Hall problem. "Ask Marilyn" column, Parade Magazine, 17 February 1991, p. 12.
Gerard Manley Hopkins
(1844–1889) English poet
" In the Valley of the Elwy http://www.bartleby.com/122/16.html", lines 9-10
Wessex Poems and Other Verses (1918)
Max Weber
(1864–1920) German sociologist, philosopher, and political economist
Source: Religion of China (1915), p. 160
“[T]he only mark-to-market thing in politics is Election Day; everything else is hot air.”
Mike Murphy (political consultant)
(1962) American political consultant
2010s, 2018, Interview with Bill Kristol (2018)