"The Sport of Counting Each Other Out" The New York Times (1967-11-02)
“What terrible tragedies realism inflicts on people.”
The Brothers Karamazov (1879–1880)
“I think the people who say we need satire often mean, "We need satire of them, not of us."”
AV Club interview (2000)
“The thing about smart people is that they seem like crazy people to dumb people.”
1910s, Principles of Research (1918)
Context: In the temple of science are many mansions, and various indeed are they that dwell therein and the motives that have led them thither. Many take to science out of a joyful sense of superior intellectual power; science is their own special sport to which they look for vivid experience and the satisfaction of ambition; many others are to be found in the temple who have offered the products of their brains on this altar for purely utilitarian purposes. Were an angel of the Lord to come and drive all the people belonging to these two categories out of the temple, the assemblage would be seriously depleted, but there would still be some men, of both present and past times, left inside. Our Planck is one of them, and that is why we love him.
I am quite aware that we have just now lightheartedly expelled in imagination many excellent men who are largely, perhaps chiefly, responsible for the buildings of the temple of science; and in many cases our angel would find it a pretty ticklish job to decide. But of one thing I feel sure: if the types we have just expelled were the only types there were, the temple would never have come to be, any more than a forest can grow which consists of nothing but creepers. For these people any sphere of human activity will do, if it comes to a point; whether they become engineers, officers, tradesmen, or scientists depends on circumstances.
Now let us have another look at those who have found favor with the angel. Most of them are somewhat odd, uncommunicative, solitary fellows, really less like each other, in spite of these common characteristics, than the hosts of the rejected. What has brought them to the temple? That is a difficult question and no single answer will cover it.
Random thoughts http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell042902.asp, Jewish World Review, April 29, 2002
2000s
“.. poor art for poor people [his critic on social realism art in America]”
Source: posthumous, Astract Expressionist Painting in America, p. 6
“It's a good thing most people bleed on the inside or this would be a gory, blood-smeared earth.”
Source: Go Ask Alice
"Socialist or Fascist?" http://jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell061212.php3#.XEZfbc2E6Mp, Jewish World Review (June 12, 2012)
2010s
Fascism is a form of far-right, authoritarian ultranationalism characterized by dictatorial power, forcible suppression of opposition, and strong regimentation of society and of the economy which came to prominence in early 20th-century Europe.
