1950s, Conquering Self-centeredness (1957)
Context: For a long time, man felt that he was the center of the universe and all of his science had given him that. All of the days in the past he came up under what was known as the geocentric theory: the earth was the center of the universe and everything revolved around the earth. Then came Copernicus and Galileo and others, said that the sun is the center, the heliocentric theory came into being. And that reminded us somehow that we are dependent on something. We are not just at the center of this universe. We are only at the center to the extent that we give ourselves and our allegiance to God Almighty. And I’m so glad that the new science came into being to dampen our arrogance. It says to us that our earthly planet is a dependent planet; it is a small planet in the orbits of this universe. The sun is the center of this universe, that man must look beyond himself to discover his significance. And that does something to each of us so that we can see when we have faith in God that we have nothing to boast about, we have nothing to be arrogant about but we live with a humility that keeps us going.
“We are healthy only to the extent that our ideas are humane.”
Kilgore Trout's epitaph
Unsourced paraphrase or variant: We are human only to the extent that our ideas remain humane.
Breakfast of Champions (1973)
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Kurt Vonnegut 318
American writer 1922–2007Related quotes
Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/solaris-2002 of Solaris (22 November 2002)
Reviews, Three-and-a-half star reviews
Source: “Ethics and Religion: Two Kantian Arguments” (2011), p. 165
“I have no idea of the extent of this zoo. I know only my corner and whatever passes before me.”
A Tiger for Malgudi (1982)
Source: The Voice of Destruction (1940), pp. 192-193
“We want to know what genes the human embryo needs to become a healthy baby.”
“We can be redeemed only to the extent to which we see ourselves.”
The Saviors of God (1923)
Context: We do not struggle for ourselves, nor for our race, not even for humanity.
We do not struggle for Earth, nor for ideas. All these are the precious yet provisional stairs of our ascending God, and they crumble away as soon as he steps upon them in his ascent.
In the smallest lightning flash of our lives, we feel all of God treading upon us, and suddenly we understand: if we all desire it intensely, if we organize all the visible and invisible powers of earth and fling them upward, if we all battle together like fellow combatants eternally vigilant — then the Universe might possibly be saved.
It is not God who will save us — it is we who will save God, by battling, by creating, and by transmuting matter into spirit.