Saying 6; this is a variant of widely used teaching anecdotes of India involving blind men and an elephant.
Râmakrishna : His Life and Sayings (1898)
Context: Four blind men went to see an elephant. One touched the leg of the elephant, and said, "The elephant is like a pillar." The second touched the trunk, and said, "The elephant is like a thick stick or club." The third touched the belly, and said, "The elephant is like a big jar." The fourth touched the ears, and said, "The elephant is like a winnowing basket." Thus they began to dispute amongst themselves as to the figure of the elephant. A passer-by seeing them thus quarrelling, said, "What is it that you are disputing about?" They told him everything, and asked him to arbitrate. That man said, "None of you has seen the elephant. The elephant is not like a pillar, its legs are like pillars. It is not like a big water-vessel, its belly is like a water-vessel. It is not like a winnowing basket, its ears are like winnowing baskets. It is not like a thick stick or club, but its proboscis is like that. The elephant is the combination of all these." In the same manner those quarrel who have seen one aspect only of the Deity.... Different creeds are but different paths to reach the Almighty.
"The Blindmen and the Elephant", a poem based on ancient parables of blind men and an elephant.
“With four parameters I can fit an elephant, and with five I can make him wiggle his trunk.”
Attributed to von Neumann by Enrico Fermi, as quoted by Freeman Dyson in "A meeting with Enrico Fermi" in Nature 427 (22 January 2004) p. 297 http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/427297a
“All but blind
In his chambered hole
Gropes for worms
The four-clawed Mole.”
All But Blind.
“They say love is blind, but it’s trauma that’s blind. Love sees what is.”
The Truth: An Uncomfortable Book About Relationships (2015)
“Yeah, I was a postcard, I was a record
I was a camera until I went blind”
train under water
I'm Wide Awake, It's Morning (2005)
“Love is blind; but it makes you see the blind man; teetering on the roadside…”
Source: London Fields
short quotes, 31 October 1966; p. 58
1960's, Conversations with Samuel Beckett and Bram van Velde' (1965 - 1969)
