Quotes about anything
page 32

“I'd been two years locked up in hospitals. I was twenty when I got out from Bloomingdale and I met a young man from Harvard who was very attractive in a sort of Ivy League way. And we made love in my grandmother's apartment and it was terrific, it was just fabulous. That was the first time I ever made love, and I had no inhibitions or anything. It was just beautiful. I didn't get my period and so I had to tell my doctor. The hospital pass was given to see if you could handle yourself outside. I was terrified to tell him that I thought I was pregnant, but I finally did. I was pregnant. I could get an abortion without any hassle at all, just on the grounds of a psychiatric case. So that wasn't too good a first experience with lovemaking. I mean it kind of screwed up my head, for one thing. This fellow found out. I was upset... and he asked me, and I said, "I'm pregnant. I'm not going to ask you for anything, so don't get uptight, but it's just kind of making me uncomfortable. I don't know exactly what I'm going to do about it."”

Edie Sedgwick (1943–1971) Socialite, actress, model

He split, and I didn't see him again until the summer had passed and I went to Cambridge for my first free year.
On becoming pregnant after her first sexual experience
Edie : American Girl (1982)

Love, Beauty, Way, Time

“Jesus … never laughed. Nothing has ever equaled the seriousness of his life; it is clear that pleasure, recreation, anything that could divert the mind, had no part in it. The life of Jesus was utterly taut, wholly caught up in God and in the woes of men, and he gave to nature only what he could not have refused it without destroying it.”

Pierre Nicole (1625–1695) French Jansenists

Essais de Morale (1753), XIII, 390, in The Bourgeois: Catholicism vs. Capitalism in Eighteenth-Century France (1927) as translated by Mary Ilford (1968), p. 118

Life, Men, God, Pleasure

“Now as for thinking your account a tale or story, my dear Franz, to be a good story is to me the highest the highest test of the truth of anything. I make no distinction whatever between reality and fantasy, or the objective and the subjective. All life and all awareness are ultimately one, including intensest pain and death itself. Not all the play need please us, and ends are never comforting. Some things fit together harmoniously and beautifully and startlingly with thrilling discords—those are true—and some do not, and those are merely bad art.”

Fritz Leiber book Our Lady of Darkness

Source: Our Lady of Darkness (1977), Chapter 17 (p. 95)

Life, Death, Pain, Truth

“I believe in only one thing and that thing is human liberty. If ever a man is to achieve anything like dignity, it can happen only if superior men are given absolute freedom to think what they want to think and say what they want to say. I am against any man and any organization which seeks to limit or deny that freedom... [and] the superior man can be sure of freedom only if it is given to all men.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

As quoted in Letters of H. L. Mencken (1961) edited by Guy J. Forgue, p. xiii
1940s–present

Men, Thinking, Freedom

“So, is “Caliph Ibrahim” of the Islamic State an extremist, a militant, a terrorist or an Islamic fighter? None of the above. All those labels imply behavior that makes some sort of sense in terms of human reality and normal ideologies. Yet the Islamic State and its kindred have broken out of the entire conceivable range of political activity, even its extreme forms. A “militant” spends much of his time promoting an idea or a political program within acceptable rules of behavior. The neo-Islamists, by contrast, recognize no rules apart from those they themselves set; they have no desire to win an argument through hard canvassing. They don’t even seek to impose a point of view; they seek naked and brutal domination. A “terrorist,” meanwhile, tries to instill fear in an adversary from whom he demands specific concessions. Yet the Islamic State et al. use mass murder to such ends. They don’t want to persuade or cajole anyone to do anything in particular; they want everything. “Islamic fighter” is equally inapt. An Islamic fighter is a Muslim who fights a hostile infidel who is trying to prevent Muslims from practicing their faith. That was not the situation in Mosul. No one was preventing the city’s Muslim majority from practicing their faith, let alone forcing them to covert to another religion. Yet the Islamic State came, conquered and began to slaughter. The Islamic State kills people because it can. And in both Syria and Iraq it has killed more Muslims than members of any other religious community. How, then, can we define a phenomenon that has made even al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Khomeinist gangs appear “moderate” in comparison? The international community faced a similar question in the 18th century when pirates acted as a law onto themselves, ignoring the most basic norms of human interaction. The issue was discussed in long negotiations that led to the Treaty of Utrecht (1713) and the Treaty of Rastadt (1714) and developed a new judicial concept: the crime against humanity. Those who committed that crime would qualify as “enemies of mankind” — in Latin, hostis generis humanis. Individuals and groups convicted of such a crime were no longer covered by penal codes or even the laws of war. They’d set themselves outside humanity by behaving like wild beasts… Neo-Islamist groups represent a cocktail of nihilism and crimes against humanity. Like the pirates of yesteryear, they’ve attracted criminals from many different nationalities… Having embarked on genocide, the neo-Islamists do not represent an Iraqi or Syrian or Nigerian problem, but a problem for humanity as a whole. They are not enemies of any particular religion, sect or government but enemies of mankind. They deserve to be treated as such (as do the various governments and semi-governmental “charities” that help them). To deal with these enemies of mankind, we need much more than frozen bank accounts and visa restrictions.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"Beyond terrorism: ISIS and other enemies of humanity" http://nypost.com/2014/08/20/beyond-terrorism-isis-and-other-enemies-of-humanity/, New York Post (August 20, 2014). New York Post

Hostility, War, People, Fear

“Anything that we can destroy, but are unable to make is, in a sense, sacred, and all our 'explanations' of it do not explain anything.”

E. F. Schumacher book A Guide for the Perplexed

A Guide for the Perplexed

Sense

“It is another aphorism that no ones knows everything about anything. That need not dull the pleasure and fascination of the fact that a great deal is known about some things.”

George Gaylord Simpson (1902–1984) American paleontologist

Splendid Isolation (1980) New Haven: Yale University Press. p. 38

Pleasure

“In order to improve your game you must study the endgame before anything else; for, whereas the endings can be studied and mastered by themselves, the middlegame and the opening must be studied in relation to the endgame.”

José Raúl Capablanca (1888–1942) Cuban chess player

Last lectures (1966), p. 19

Game, Study

“One is either a German or a Christian. You cannot be both… We don’t want people who keep one eye on the life in the hereafter. We need free men who feel and know that God is in themselves… Do you really believe the masses will ever be Christian again? Nonsense! Never again. That tale is finished… They will betray their God to us. They will betray anything for the sake of their miserable little jobs and incomes.”

Hermann Rauschning (1887–1982) German politician

Source: The Voice of Destruction (1940), pp. 49-50

Life, Men, God, People

“Of all the events which constitute a person's biography, there is scarcely one — none, certainly, of anything like a similar importance — to which the world so easily reconciles itself as to his death.”

Nathaniel Hawthorne book The House of the Seven Gables

Source: The House of the Seven Gables (1851), Ch. XXI : The Departure

Death, World, Personality

“For me this is a fact, writing is necessity, I don’t know why, but it seems it was the only solution offered to me, even if it doesn’t solve anything; still it doesn't leave me…”

Imre Kertész book Kaddish for an Unborn Child

Kaddish for a Child Not Born (1990)

“When you're eight or nine years old and you look at the TV set men are landing on the moon — anything is possible. And that is something we need to not lose sight of, is that the inspiration and permission to dream is immense.”

Randy Pausch book The Last Lecture

… It's important to have specific dreams.
The Last Lecture (2007)

Men, Dreams

“It is a very important consideration that we are consecrated and dedicated to God; it means that we may think, speak, meditate, or do anything only with a view to his glory.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

Page 26.
Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life (1551)

God, Thinking

“In general, when the imagination is at all noble, it is irresistible, and therefore those who can at all resist it ought to resist it. Be a plain topographer if you possibly can; if Nature meant you to be anything else, she will force you to it; but never try to be a prophet.”

John Ruskin book Modern Painters

Volume III, part V, chapter II (1856).
Modern Painters (1843-1860)

Imagination, Nature

“I'd heard of Evergreen Care Center before. Cass and I had always made fun of the stupid ads they ran on TV, featuring some dragged-out woman with a limp perm and big, painted-on circles under her eyes, downing vodka and sobbing uncontrollably. We can't heal you at Evergreen, the very somber voiceover said. But we can help you to heal yourself. It had become our own running joke, applicable to almost anything.”

Sarah Dessen book Dreamland

Dreamland (2000)

Stupidity, Help, Painting

“I think Joe's underappreciated, I think Andy's underappreciated, I think Pete's underappreciated, I don't think people know how good he is. I think Neal [Avron]'s underappreciated, but if anything, I feel overappreciated. I think Patrick Stump gets enough attention.”

Patrick Stump (1984) American musician

AbsolutePunk.net, Patrick Stump, Part 2 - 10.13.08

People, Feeling, Thinking

“Anything can be an instrument, Chigurh said. Small things. Things you wouldnt even notice. They pass from hand to hand. People dont pay attention. And then one day there's an accounting. And after that nothing is the same. Well, you say. It's just a coin. For instance. Nothing special there. What could that be an instrument of? You see the problem. To separate the act from the thing. As if the parts of some moment in history might be interchangeable with the parts of some other moment. How could that be? Well, it's just a coin. Yes. That's true. Is it?”

Cormac McCarthy book No Country for Old Men

No Country for Old Men (2005)

People, History, Problem, Parting

“Although wanting to be an individual, the male is scared of anything about him that's the slightest bit different from other men; it causes him to suspect he's not really a "Man," that he's passive and totally sexual, a highly upsetting suspicion. If other men are A and he's not, he must be not a man; he must be a fag. So he tries to affirm his "Manhood" by being like all the other men. Differentness in other men, as well as in himself, threatens him; it means they're fags, who he must, at all costs, avoid, so he tries to ensure that all other men conform.”

Valerie Solanas (1936–1988) American radical feminist and writer. Attempted to assassinate Andy Warhol.

Source: SCUM MANIFESTO (1967), p. 8.

Men

“My philosophy of life is that the meek shall inherit nothing but debasement, frustration and ignoble deaths; that there is security in personal strength; that you can fight City Hall and win; that any action is better than no action, even if it's the wrong action; that you never reach glory or self-fulfillment unless you're willing to risk everything, dare anything, put yourself dead on the line every time; and that once one becomes strong or rich or potent or powerful it is the responsibility of the strong to help the weak become strong.”

Harlan Ellison book The Harlan Ellison Hornbook

The Harlan Ellison Hornbook, (9 August 1973)

Life, Death, Strong, Time

“Anything but a yes vote to this question would do injury to our reputation among fair-minded people everywhere.”

Harold Holt (1908–1967) Australian politician, 17th Prime Minister of Australia

statement on the referendum on Aboriginal Australians, 26 May 1967
As prime minister
Source: The Life and Death of Harold Holt, p. 213.

People, Question

“If Eggy wanted to get spliced, let him, was the way I looked at it. Marriage might improve him. It was difficult to think of anything that wouldn’t.”

P.G. Wodehouse book Laughing Gas

Laughing Gas (1936)

Marriage, Way, Thinking

“Without attachment to anything beyond its own abysmal exuberance, capitalism identifies itself with desire to a degree that cannot imaginably be exceeded (…)”

Nick Land (1962) British philosopher

"Critique of Transcendental Miserablism" (2007), in Fanged Noumena, pp. 624–5

Imagination

““Best way out,” Elmo observed laconically, “would be to kill everybody who knows anything, then all of us fall on our swords.”
“Sounds a little extreme,” Goblin opined. “But if you want to go first, I’m right behind you.””

Glen Cook book Shadows Linger

Source: Shadows Linger (1984), Chapter 24, “Juniper: Shadow Dancing” (p. 326)

Way

“There has never been anything great in the world except through the courage and resolve of one man who defies the prejudices of the multitude.”

François-Noël Babeuf (1760–1797) French political agitator and journalist of the French Revolutionary period

Il ne s'est jamais rien fait de grand dans le monde que par le courage et la fermeté d'un seul homme qui brave les préjugés de la multitude.
[in Gracchus Babeuf avec les Egaux, Jean-Marc Shiappa, Les éditions ouvrières, 1991, 43, 27082 2892-7]
On prejudices

World, Courage

“Greens are not expected to be anything but nice.”

David Lange (1942–2005) New Zealand politician and 32nd Prime Minister of New Zealand

Referring to the New Zealand Ecological Movement.
Source: Dominion, 30 December 1991, p. 6.

“What they had going certainly came as near as anyone ever has in this imperfect world to a sane, rational way for people to exist without warfare and with a minimum of politics. In the end, those two old dinosaurs are the only ways humans have yet discovered to be social animals. Yes, I do see war as a way of living with one another; by imposing your will on another in terms so unmistakable that the opponent has to either knuckle under to you, die, or beat your brains out. And if that’s a solution to anything, I'd rather live without solutions. Politics is not much better. The only thing going for it is that it occasionally succeeds in substituting talk for fists.”

John Varley (1947) American science fiction author

"The Persistence of Vision"

War, People, World, Way

“Choose your enemies carefully: you'll probably be known much better and far longer for who they were, than for anything else you ever managed to accomplish.”

L. Neil Smith (1946) American writer

"Some New Tactical Reflections".

“The European Union is very popular with politicians, because it's very good to politicians. It was created for their benefit. It's not so good to voters, because it denies them a voice — another reason it's popular with politicians. These days, we in Europe no longer make most of our own laws. We have them handed down to us by people we haven't elected and can't remove. The people we do elect are powerless to change anything, even if they wanted to, and most of them don't want to, because they've got their snouts in the trough of a corrupt organisation whose accounts haven't been signed off for the last sixteen years.”

Pat Condell (1949) Stand-up comedian, writer, and Internet personality

"Come on, Ireland" (20 May 2011) http://youtube.com/watch/?v=R6M8an_XKL8 2011

People, Law, Change

“I grew up in a Hindu household but went to a Roman Catholic school. I grew up with a mother who said, 'I'll arrange a marriage for you at 18,' but she also said that we could achieve anything we put our minds to and encourage us to dream of becoming prime minister or president.”

Indra Nooyi (1955) Indian-born, naturalized American, business executive

Top 15 quotes from PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi

Marriage, School, Dreams

“In the last analysis, what we are communicates far more eloquently than anything we say or do.”

Stephen R. Covey (1932–2012) American educator, author, businessman and motivational speaker

Source: Principle-Centered Leadership (1992), Ch. 4 : Primary Greatness, p. 58

Communication

“We agree with the statement contained in the encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, written by Pope Leo XIII, that "anything which dominates the life of the community should be owned by the community." That is the basis upon which we believe there should be government ownership of monopolistic enterprises.”

Tommy Douglas (1904–1986) Scottish-born Canadian politician

Budget Debate, House of Commons, Ottawa, Ontario, March 22, 1943.

Life, Communication

“People talk about talent as though it were some neutral substance that can be applied to anything. But talent is narrow and only functions with a very few subjects, which it is up to the writer to find.”

Wilfrid Sheed (1930–2011) English-American novelist and essayist

"Howe's Complaint" (1973), p. 15
The Good Word & Other Words (1978)

People

“Europe' in anything other than the geographical sense is a wholly artificial construct. It makes no sense at all to lump together Beethoven and Debussy, Voltaire and Burke, Vermeer and Picasso, Notre Dame and St Paul's, boiled beef and bouillabaisse, and portray them as elements of a 'European' musical, philosophical, artistic, architectural or gastronomic reality. If Europe charms us, as it has so often charmed me, it is precisely because of its contrasts and contradictions, not its coherence and continuity.”

Margaret Thatcher book Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World

Source: Statecraft: Strategies for a Changing World, p. 328

Music, Reality, Sense

“I don't like doing anything that makes you sweat if you don't come at the end of it.”

Russell Brand (1975) British comedian, actor, and author

Russell Brand - On The Road (2007)

“Most of my colleagues go on backpacking trips when they have to do some thinking. I go to a good hardware store and head for the oiliest, dustiest corners. … If they're really good, they don't hassle me. They let me wander around and think. Young hardware clerks have a lot of hubris. They think they can help you find anything…. Old hardware clerks have learned the hard way that nothing in a hardware store ever gets bought for its nominal purpose. You buy something that was designed to do one thing, and you use it for another.”

Neal Stephenson book Zodiac

Source: Zodiac (1988), Chapter 8

Way, Thinking, Learning, Help

“I’ve never found anything in occult literature that seemed to have a bearing. You know, the occult—very much like stories of supernatural horror—is a sort of game. Most religions, too. Believe in the game and accept its rules—or the premises of the story—and you can have the thrills or whatever it is you’re after. Accept the spirit world and you can see ghosts and talk to the dear departed. Accept Heaven and you can have the hope of eternal life and the reassurance of an all-powerful god working on your side. Accept Hell and you can have devils and demons, if that’s what you want. Accept—if only for story purposes—witchcraft, druidism, shamanism, magic or some modern variant and you can have werewolves, vampires, elementals. Or believe in the influence and power of a grave, an ancient house or monument, a dead religion, or an old stone with an inscription on it—and you can have inner things of the same general sort. But I’m thinking of the kind of horror—and wonder too, perhaps—that lies beyond any game, that’s bigger than any game, that’s fettered by no rules, conforms to no man-made theology, bows to no charms or protective rituals, that strides the world unseen and strikes without warning where it will, much the same as (though it’s of a different order of existence than all of these) lightning or the plague or the enemy atom bomb. The sort of horror that the whole fabric of civilization was designed to protect us from and make us forget. The horror about which all man’s learning tells us nothing.”

Fritz Leiber (1910–1992) American writer of fantasy, horror, and science fiction

“A Bit of the Dark World” (pp. 261-262); originally published in Fantastic, February 1962
Short Fiction, Night's Black Agents (1947)

Life, God, World, Religion

“Work democracy does not wish to prevent or prohibit anything. Its only intention is the fulfilment of the biological life functions, of love, work and knowledge.”

Wilhelm Reich book The Mass Psychology of Fascism

Section 3 : Work Democracy versus Politics. The Natural Social Forces for the Mastery of the Emotional Plague.
The Mass Psychology of Fascism (1933), Ch. 10 : Work Democracy

Love, Life, Democracy, Knowledge

“I'd never heard anything like it before. It was like banshee music. This absolutely otherworldly voice, singing about a book, and as a bookish kid, I was always fascinated by anything, any music that seems to be about or inspired by books.”

Neil Gaiman (1960) English fantasy writer

On the song "Wuthering Heights"
The Kate Bush Story (2014)

Books, Music, Singing

“Never affirm anything unless you are sure it is true.”

Teresa of Ávila (1515–1582) Roman Catholic saint

Maxim 15, p. 256
Maxims for Her Nuns (1963)

“Nonsense,” Weston denied, with an involuntary nervous shiver. “That’s completely ridiculous. We had a long discussion at the time we bought Robbie about the First Law of Robotics. You know that it is impossible for a robot to harm a human being; that long before enough can go wrong to alter that First Law, a robot would be completely inoperable. It’s a mathematical impossibility. Besides I have an engineer from U. S. Robots here twice a year to give the poor gadget a complete overhaul. Why, there’s no more chance of anything at all going wrong with Robbie than there is of you or I suddenly going looney—considerably less, in fact. Besides, how are you going to take him away from Gloria?”

Isaac Asimov book I, Robot

“Robbie”, p. 17
I, Robot (1950)

Law, Mathematics, Chance, Time

“We definitely didn't want it to be anything like our first or second records. We wanted to experiment more than we ever had and take any new idea and run with it as far as we could.”

Bert McCracken (1982) American musician

On The Used's album "Lies For The Liars", reported in Market Wire (May 3, 2007) "Band to Unleash New Album -- "Lies For The Liars" -- on Reprise Records May 22nd and Join the Warped Tour for Select Dates This Summer", AP Alert - Financial, Associated Press.

Idea

“There were certain things I didn't like, such as tipping. I thought we should be paid more, and not have to have any tips. But when I proposed that to the boss, I got nothing but laughter. She told everybody, "Richard doesn't want his tips, hee, hee, hee; he doesn't want his tips, ha, ha, ha." The world is full of this kind of dumb smart-alec who doesn't understand anything.”

Richard Feynman (1918–1988) American theoretical physicist

Part 1: "From Rockaway to MIT", "String Beans", p. 25
Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman! (1985)

World, Understanding, Laughter

“They can't promise anything because I've spent it all.”

Robert Muldoon (1921–1992) Prime Minister of New Zealand, politician

Supplementary source: Brian Easton, The State Of The Nation - Issues for the 2005 Election, 12 July 2005, http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0507/S00170.htm, which confirms that Peters was talking about Muldoon.
Source: Winston Peters, Questions for Oral Answer, 20 May 2004, http://web.archive.org/web/20130210043212/http://www.parliament.nz/NR/rdonlyres/2430AC6B-8B63-4AB9-A0C2-7CF38DD8E5BB/89283/47HansD_20040522.pdf page=13131
Context: On the opposition Labour Party's 1972 election promises.

“Paradigm shifts in human thought always depend on iconoclasts who are not afraid to challenge conventional wisdom. Although our thinking in the past generation about the moral status of animals has advanced in certain respects, its fundamental presuppositions have suffered from a debilitating stagnation. … The fact that we humans tend to be comfortable with a regime of animal exploitation dating back thousands of years is not a justification for our continued subjugation of animals. It is an obstacle that we urgently need to overcome. To this end, what we need more than anything else is thinkers with the courage and the determination to break the images in the temple.”

Gary Steiner (1956) American philosopher

Foreword https://books.google.it/books?id=UdYYBQAAQBAJ&pg=PR9 to Animals as Persons: Essays on the Abolition of Animal Exploitation by Gary L. Francione, Columbia University Press, 2009.

Wisdom, Courage, Thinking, Suffering

“…we are in a logic of simulation, which no longer has anything to do with a logic of facts and an order of reason. Simulation is characterized by a precession of the model, of all the models based on the merest fact - the models come first, their circulation, orbital like that of the bomb, constitutes the genuine magnetic field of the event. The facts no longer have a specific trajectory, they are born at the intersection of models, a single fact can be engendered by all the models at once.”

Jean Baudrillard (1929–2007) French sociologist and philosopher

"The Precession of Simulcra,MÖBIUS - SPIRALING NEGATIVETY
1980s, Simulacra and Simulation (1981)

“A lot of people who are in the movie business don't really know much about movies, and they certainly don't know movie history. You have to even find a code when you're talking to these people—you can't use the references that you would use when talking to somebody who knows movie history. When you go in to pitch something, it depends what you invoke. You can't invoke anything really before 1980 with these people because they don't know what you're talking about. It's limiting. They get annoyed. They get offended that you are somehow trying to expose the fact that they don't know things, and make them feel inadequate. Which is of course not the point, or why you do it.”

Joe Dante (1946) film director

"Fun, Yes, But By No Means Civilized": Interview with Joe Dante (Part 2) https://mubi.com/notebook/posts/fun-yes-but-by-no-means-civilized-interview-with-joe-dante-part-2 (July 8 2009)

People, Feeling, History, Business

“Moderate Republicans are reverse Houdinis. They tie themselves up in knots and then tell you they can't do anything because they're tied up in knots.”

Barney Frank (1940) American politician, former member of the House of Representatives for Massachusetts

Quoted in Dionne, E. J., The Washington Post, (16 November 2004)]

“I always felt like Gandalf should have stayed dead. That was such an incredible sequence in Fellowship of the Ring when he faces the Balrog on the Khazad-dûm and he falls into the gulf, and his last words are, “Fly, you fools.” What power that had, how that grabbed me. And then he comes back as Gandalf the White, and if anything he's sort of improved. I never liked Gandalf the White as much as Gandalf the Grey, and I never liked him coming back. I think it would have been an even stronger story if Tolkien had left him dead.”

George Raymond Richard Martin (1948) American writer, screenwriter and television producer

Interview on The Sound of Young America (September 2011) http://www.maximumfun.org/sound-young-america/george-r-r-martin-author-song-ice-and-fire-series-interview-sound-young-america#transcript

Fools, Thinking, Flying, Dead

“[ Computing ] is just a fabulous place for that, because it's a place where you don't have to be a Ph. D. or anything else. It's a place where you can still be an artisan. People are willing to pay you if you're any good at all, and you have plenty of time for screwing around.”

Alan Kay (1940) computer scientist

Alan Kay (1972) in 1972 Rolling Stone article http://www.wheels.org/spacewar/stone/rolling_stone.html 1970s

People, Time

“I was forgetting how it really was, I was remembering it through common, ordinary eyes, I was remembering it as the boy I was before, but now I remember that it wasn't me being weak or me being naked, or anything else that I should be ashamed of.”

Orson Scott Card (1951) American science fiction novelist

Homecoming saga, The Memory Of Earth (1992)

Boy, Forgetting

“Some Calvinist divines identified an "idol" as anything "feigned in the mind by imagination." There is a haunting similarity between such teachings and Galileo's bold attack upon what he called "secondary qualities" in nature.”

Theodore Roszak (1933–2011) American social historian, social critic, writer

Source: The Gendered Atom: Reflections on the Sexual Psychology of Science (1999), Ch.10 The Black Madonna

Imagination, Nature

“Some say it is unfair to hold disadvantaged children to rigorous standards. I say it is discrimination to require anything less–-the soft bigotry of low expectations.”

George W. Bush (1946) 43rd President of the United States

Campaign speech to the NAACP (2000).
2000s, 2000

Children

“When I say it's you I like, I'm talking about that part of you that knows that life is far more than anything you can ever see or hear or touch. That deep part of you that allows you to stand for those things without which humankind cannot survive. Love that conquers hate, peace that rises triumphant over war, and justice that proves more powerful than greed.”

Fred Rogers (1928–2003) American television personality

Source Commencement Address at Dartmouth College June 9th, 2002 http://www.dartmouth.edu/~news/releases/2002/june/060902c.html

Love, Life, Hate, War

“Duchamp realized that there was something false in art, but his limitation was that, rather than demystifying, he amplified it. By taking a manufactured object and placing it out of context, he quite simply symbolized art. His actions tended to “represent” and not “present” the object. Duchamp, like all artists, could not “present” anything at all without “re-presenting” it. And if he symbolized art in this way, it was because as soon as he exhibited a bottle rack, a shovel, or a urinal, he was really stating that anything was art as soon as you pointed at it. By extension, and this is very important, that means that a cow in a field becomes art in a painting, a tree by Courbet becomes art, and a woman by Rubens becomes art; now this cow, this tree, and this woman exist in another way. Duchamp dismantled this process supposedly to take away its sanctity, but he went about it in such a way that by being against art, he was in art. Let’s clarify an important point right away: Duchamp is not anti-art. He belongs to art. The art of extolling the consumer society.”

Daniel Buren (1938) sculptor from France

Source: Art is no longer justifiable or setting the record straight, 2000, p. 66

Art, Way, Tree, Painting

“That's all window dressing. That's not fundamental. That's not getting at change and the transformation that must take place. Sure we have to solve problems. Certainly stamp out the fire. Stamp out the fire and get nowhere. Stamp out the fires puts us back to where we were in the first place. Taking action on the basis of results without theory of knowledge, without theory of variation, without knowledge about a system. Anything goes wrong, do something about it, overreacting; acting without knowledge, the effect is to make things worse. With the best of intentions and best efforts, managing by results is, in effect, exactly the same, as Dr. Myron Tribus put it, while driving your automobile, keeping your eye on the rear view mirror, what would happen? And that's what management by results is, keeping your eye on results.”

W. Edwards Deming (1900–1993) American professor, author, and consultant

The Deming of America, Documentary broadcast on the PBS network (1991)

Knowledge, Problem, Effort, Change

“It's not manufacturers trying to rip anybody off or anything like that. There's nobody getting rich writing software that I know of.”

Bill Gates (1955) American business magnate and philanthropist

Interview with Dennis Bathory-Kitsz in 80 Microcomputing (1980)
1980s

“You can be anything you want to be. You can be a street sweeper, if you want. Just be the best blasted street sweeper you can be... And, you know you can be mayor.”

David Dinkins (1927) former mayor of New York City

quoted by Book of African-American Quotations (Page 47).

“You have to understand that I'm not the girl I used to be. I'm a wife and a mother now, and like everyone else I'm not perfect. I struggle with the choices I've made and I make mistakes, and half the time I wonder who I really am or what I'm doing or whether my life means anything at all. I'm not special at all, Dawson, and you need to know that. You have to understand that I'm just…ordinary.”

Nicholas Sparks (1965) American writer and novelist

Amanda Collier Ridley, Chapter 11, p. 171
2009, The Best of Me (2011)

Life, Girl, Understanding, Time

“Matt Morgan: [To Russell] How have you developed pectoral muscles when you barely do anything for yourself?”

Russell Brand (1975) British comedian, actor, and author

BBC 6 Music Show - 27th August 2006
6 Music Show

“My picture [A Boat Passing a Lock, 1823-6] is liked at the [Royal] Academy, indeed it forms a decided feature and its light can not be put out. Because it is the light of nature — the Mother of all that is valuable in poetry — painting or anything else… my execution annoys most of them and all the scholastic ones – perhaps the scarifies I make for 'lightness' and 'brightness' is too much but these things are the essence of Landscape.”

John Constable (1776–1837) English Romantic painter

Letter to Rev. John Fisher, 1824, as quoted in Leslie Parris and Ian Fleming-Williams, Constable (Tate Gallery Publications, London, 1993), p. 288
1820s

Nature, Light, Painting

“If I were to say anything to people I may say people should vote for those who are respectful to democracy, rule of law, who get on well with people. Telling or encouraging people to vote for a party would be an insult to peoples' intellect. Everybody very clearly sees what is going on.”

Fethullah Gülen (1941) Turkish preacher, former imam, writer, and political figure

"Fethullah Gulen: Powerful but reclusive Turkish cleric", 2014

People, Law, Democracy

“Whenever that (marriage) happens, everyone will come to know. It's really upsetting as every time there are rumours going around about my marriage. It is not like I am hiding anything. Whenever it happens we will tell”

Harbhajan Singh (1980) Indian cricketer

the media Geeta Basra about their impending wedding, quoted on sports.ndtv, "Harbhajan Singh's Passion and Humility a Source of Inspiration for Girlfriend Geeta Basra" http://sports.ndtv.com/cricket/news/243922-harbhajan-singh-s-passion-and-humilty-a-source-of-inspiration-for-girlfriend-geeta-basra, June 17, 2015. About

Marriage, Time

“For, for aught we know, or for aught that the new science can say to the contrary, the gods which play the part of fate to the atoms of our brains may be our own minds. Through these atoms our minds may perchance affect the motions of our bodies and so the state of the world around us. To-day science can no longer shut the door on this possibility; she has no longer any unanswerable arguments to bring against our innate conviction of free-will. On the other hand, she gives no hint as to what absence of determinism or causation may mean. If we, and nature in general, do not respond in a unique way to external stimuli, what determines the course of events? If anything at all, we are thrown back on determinism and causation; if nothing at all, how can anything ever occur? As I see it, we are unlikely to reach any definite conclusions on these questions until we have a better understanding of the true nature of time.”

James Jeans book The Mysterious Universe

Source: The Mysterious Universe (1930), p. 29-30 of 1930 ed.

God, Fate, World, Way

“What is the cost of the pride of the nation? The number does not mean anything as long as we buy the plane, maintain it and look after the welfare of our people.”

Mark Mwandosya (1949) Tanzanian politician

Defending the purchase of the presidential jet when he was the Minister of Transport. 2004-10-06 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3719712.stm

People

“Innovation is a process of rebellion essentially. Unless you rebel, unless you challenge the status quo, how can you innovate anything”

Prakash Javadekar (1951) Indian politician

as quoted in " Students should rebel, challenge status quo to innovate, says Prakash Javadekar http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Students-should-rebel-challenge-status-quo-to-innovate-says-Prakash-Javadekar/articleshow/53098941.cms", Times of India (07 July 2016)

“I'm here that that anything should not be born too easily, which we will call a star, then it comes true half or one year later that it is not and we throw onto the rubbish.”

Róbert Puzsér (1974) hungarian publicist

Quotes from him, Csillag születik (talent show between 2011-2012)

Star

“Maybe it wasn’t anything remotely to do with religion, mysticism or metaphilosophy after all; maybe it was more banal; maybe it was just…accounting.”

Iain Banks Culture series

Source: Culture series, Excession (1996), Chapter 11 “Regarding Gravious” section VI (p. 364).

Religion

“Incolore sighed. “The loyalty of the systematically betrayed. Is there anything sadder?””

Michael Swanwick book The Iron Dragon's Daughter

Source: The Iron Dragon's Daughter (1993), Chapter 21 (p. 378)

Loyalty

“I’ve negotiated bank deals all over the globe. Everything is a compromise. … I never take anything off the table. They say good luck, put your government together. Fine — I’ve loved it. So we have jumped in with vigor. I have now had CEOs who have called me, several have come to visit me, and made it clear to me that I better get this workforce development fixed or they have to take other options available to them. Obviously, the biggest challenge is state government is so immense, so many different departments, so many people involved. It’s a challenge but not an overwhelming challenge — I actually enjoy it. I haven’t taken time off since the election. Many of my predecessors have said ‘You need to do that.’ It’s really not my personality.”

Terry McAuliffe (1957) American businessman and politician

Quoted on Times Dispatch, "An interview with Gov.-elect Terry McAuliffe" http://www.timesdispatch.com/news/state-regional/virginia-politics/an-interview-with-gov--elect-terry-mcauliffe/article_1165648d-8a21-57a1-baec-bfef6a7baa91.html, December 22, 2013

Love, People, Time, Personality

“I learned that poets aren’t God, but if there is a God…or anything approaching a God…he’s a poet. And a failed one at that.”

Dan Simmons book The Fall of Hyperion

Source: The Fall of Hyperion (1990), Chapter 45 (p. 504)

God, Learning

“I'm not exactly sure what has driven me so hard… I've never questioned it. I've never had a back-up plan. I was never going to do anything else.”

KT Tunstall (1975) Scottish singer-songwriter and guitarist

KTTunstall.com

Question

“It is absurd that so much money has been wasted on manipulating public opinion, on simulating emotion. This nation is notorious for its ability to make or fake anything cheaply. “Made-in-China” goods now fill homes around the world. But our giant country has a small problem. We can’t manufacture the happiness of our people.”

Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist

2000-09, Happiness Can’t Be Faked, 2008

Money, Happiness, People, World

“Pobedonostev: Aha! You are very well recommended Golivinski. You are just what we need here! Russia’s bureaucracy and its state apparatus have been infiltrated by Jews. Believe me. I’ve been studying the Jewish threat.
As guardians of Christina Russia we must deal with them… but it will not be easy…they’re more intelligent and smarter than the average Russian. So how?? How??
Golivinski: Jews are clever but it can be done by means of their own methods… by philisophical writings, news items…and such!
Pobedonostev: Precisely!
Golivinski: For example, we could influence the readers of our Russian newspapers by planting anti-jew articles in their columns…written in the paper’s style,’’’ of course!
and we could even publish a fake newspaper that will print news about Jewish activity!
Pobedonostev: Brilliant, my boy…come, I will assign you at once to my press chief, Mikhail Soloviev!
Soloviev, I have a young assistant for you, his name Mathieu Golovinski!
Soloviev: I can use help!
I hope he’s clever. Thank you, Pobedonostev…
Now, Golovinski, to begin with…I hate jews. They are a sly race whop will creep in and destroy the purity of our Russian culture!
So, I want you to write me a piece on this subject…and make sure it makes a clear case!
Golivinski: Excuse me sir!
Soloviev:Back so soon? What is it Golovinski?
Golovinski: Here is the article you asked for
Soloviev: In only one hour? Let em read it.
Where did you get these official statistics?
Golivinski: Oh, I made them up! No one would dare to challenge them.
Soloviev: Good work! From here on you will write for our regular campaign against the new modernization!
Golvinski: Why that?
Soloviev: All liberal, capitalistic, socialistic movements are directed by jews. We must expose them.
They are the anti-christ!
Golivinski: But sir, shouldn’t we keep this political?
Soloviev: In Russia religion and politics are the same!
Our people will believe anything negative about the Jews! Go ahead boy!”

Will Eisner (1917–2005) American cartoonist

Source: The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion (10/2/2005), pp. 42-48

Hate, People, Religion, Hope

“He is no parasite on anything, whose work is real: a mechanic, a doctor, a builder, a tailor, a dishwasher. What, in comparison, does a writer produce? Semblances. This is a serious occupation?”

Stanisław Lem (1921–2006) Polish science fiction author

"Rien du tout, ou la conséquence" ("Nothing, or the Consequence"), in A Perfect Vacuum (1971), tr. Michael Kandel (1978)

“People will mock anything new if it goes against their values and beliefs, once they get used to it they defend it as hard as they used to ridicule it”

Ali Al-Wardi (1913–1995) Iraqi sociologist

People

“[Judy, 8, is watching TV] He tells Judy, "Better pack it in, sweetie. Another big day tomorrow: we're going to go to the beach and sailing." But his voice comes out listless, and perhaps that is the saddest loss time brings, the lessening of excitement about anything.”

John Updike book Rabbit at Rest

Rabbit at Rest (1990)

Loss, Time

“I use cracks on the sidewalk to walk down the street. I'd always walk on the lines. I never take anything but a calculated risk, and do it because it gives me a sense of identity. Fear is a man's best friend.”

John Cale (1942) Welsh composer, singer-songwriter and record producer

Attributed without citation at John Cale - Quotes, xs4all.nl, 16 November 2012 http://werksman.home.xs4all.nl/cale/quotes/index.html,

Fear, Sense

“I won't eat anything that has intelligent life, but I'd gladly eat a network executive or a politician.”

Marty Feldman (1934–1982) British actor and comedian

As quoted in He Who Laughs Lasts by Shawn Lovley, p. 51.

Life, Intelligence

“All that was clear that the profits to be had from smart people making complicated bets overwhelmed anything that could be had from servicing customers, or allocating capital to productive enterprise.”

Michael Lewis book The Big Short

Epilogue, Everything Is Correlated, p. 258
The Big Short (2010)

People

“Education is the instruction of the intellect in the laws of Nature, under which name I include not merely things and their forces, but men and their ways; and the fashioning of the affections and of the will into an earnest and loving desire to move in harmony with those laws. For me, education means neither more nor less than this. Anything which professes to call itself education must be tried by this standard, and if it fails to stand the test, I will not call it education, whatever may be the force of authority, or of numbers, upon the other side.”

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895) English biologist and comparative anatomist

1860s, A Liberal Education and Where to Find It (1868)

Love, Men, Education, Law

“But that has changed when a few months later during a lull in the battle of the attack on Verdun, he was telling his comrade a dirty anecdote. To his amazement, his buddy did not laugh: “Kutscher, didn’t you find that one funny?” The reaction of poor fellow to joke was no longer a laughing matter: a shrapnel of an enemy grenade struck him right into the heart - he collapsed dead to the ground. "I still see myself on the edge of the trench. A bright light, brighter than the atomic bomb struck me: he is now standing before holy God! And the next thought was: if we had sat in different arrangement, then the splinter grenade would have hit me instead, and then I would be standing face-to-face before God right now! My friend was laying dead in front of my eyes. For the first time in many years, I folded my hands and uttered a prayer, which consisted of only one sentence: "Dear God, I beg You, do not let me fall before I'll be sure not go to hell!"" A few days later, he then entered with a New Testament in the hand a broken French farmhouse, fell to his knees and prayed: Jesus! The Bible says that you have come from God in order to save sinners. I am a sinner. I cannot promise anything in the future, because I have a bad character. But I do not want to go to hell, if I get a shot. And so, Lord Jesus, I surrender myself to you from head to foot. Do with me whatever you want!"”

Wilhelm Busch (pastor) (1897–1966) German pastor and writer

Since there was no bang, no big movement, I just went out. I had found the Lord, a gentleman to whom I belonged."
Jesus Our Destiny
Source: [ВИЛЬГЕЛЬМ (Wilhelm), БУШ (Busch), Приди домой (Come home), CLV, Christliche Literatur -Verbreitung, Bielefeld, 8, 158, 1995, http://www.manna.lv/nopirkt/Pridi-domoj/389397721X.html, Russian, 3-89397-721-X, 2011-11-19]

God, Hell, Light, Change

“People can inhabit anything. And they can be miserable in anything and ecstatic in anything. More and more I think that architecture has nothing to do with it. Of course, that's both liberating and alarming. But the generic city, the general urban condition, is happening everywhere, and just the fact that it occurs in such enormous quantities must mean that it's habitable. Architecture can't do anything that the culture doesn't. We all complain that we are confronted by urban environments that are completely similar. We say we want to create beauty, identity, quality, singularity. And yet, maybe in truth these cities that we have are desired. Maybe their very characterlessness provides the best context for living.”

Rem Koolhaas (1944) Dutch architect (b.1944)

From Bauhaus to Koolhaas Interview in Wired magazine http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.07/koolhaas.html (4 July 1996)

People, Truth, Beauty, Thinking

“How are you going to teach virtue if you teach the relativity of all ethical ideas? Virtue, if it implies anything at all, implies an ethical absolute. A person whose idea of what is proper varies from day to day can be admired for his broadmindedness, but not for his virtue.”

Robert M. Pirsig book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance (1974), Ch. 29

Idea, Personality

“My old skill at self-delusion overrode my doubts as I told myself that Dexter probably believed in me. I could believe anything then. I still can as long as it is improbable.”

Tom Baker (1934) English actor

“"You don't understand," he said, "who I am or what I am. I'll show you. By Heaven! I'll show you." Then he put his open palm over his face and withdrew it. The centre of his face became a black cavity. "Here," he said. He stepped forward and handed Mrs. Hall something which she, staring at his metamorphosed face, accepted automatically. Then, when she saw what it was, she screamed loudly, dropped it, and staggered back. The nose—it was the stranger's nose! pink and shining—rolled on the floor.Then he removed his spectacles, and everyone in the bar gasped. He took off his hat, and with a violent gesture tore at his whiskers and bandages. For a moment they resisted him. A flash of horrible anticipation passed through the bar. "Oh, my Gard!" said some one. Then off they came.It was worse than anything. Mrs. Hall, standing open-mouthed and horror-struck, shrieked at what she saw, and made for the door of the house. Everyone began to move. They were prepared for scars, disfigurements, tangible horrors, but nothing! The bandages and false hair flew across the passage into the bar, making a hobbledehoy jump to avoid them. Everyone tumbled on everyone else down the steps. For the man who stood there shouting some incoherent explanation, was a solid gesticulating figure up to the coat-collar of him, and then—nothingness, no visible thing at all!”

H. G. Wells book The Invisible Man

Source: The Invisible Man (1897), Chapter 7: The Unveiling of the Stranger

Understanding, Housing, Falseness

“(…) anything that systematically enhances moral hazard is simply manufacturing craziness.”

Nick Land (1962) British philosopher

"Suspended Animation (Part 5)" https://web.archive.org/web/20121111032650/http://www.thatsmags.com/shanghai/article/1524/suspended-animation-part-5 (2011)

“Knowledge isolates phenomena and things to observe with.... nothing is isolatable or can be removed from its environment. Anything which becomes isolated ceases to exist. It is like the violent refusal of someone to play a game in which everyone cheats.”

Karel Appel (1921–2006) Dutch painter, sculptor, and poet

Karel Appel – the complete sculptures,' (1990) not-paged

Game, Knowledge, Cheating

“The young generations of the world, who had in them the freshness of young children, and yet the depth of earnest men, who did not think that they had finished off all things in Heaven and Earth by merely giving them scientific names, but had to gaze direct at them there, with awe and wonder: they felt better what of divinity is in man and Nature; they, without being mad, could worship Nature, and man more than anything else in Nature.”

Thomas Carlyle (1795–1881) Scottish philosopher, satirical writer, essayist, historian and teacher

1840s, Heroes and Hero-Worship (1840), The Hero as Divinity

Men, Children, World, Nature

“Science Fiction Gods; Do they take much of an interest in us? I doubt it. How much entertainment does an ant's nest provide you with?
'Adepticus Sir, that bunch of Ornithoids on Artoc 4 that you asked me to observe, well they've just trashed their planet.'
'Oh that is a pity Initiatus Jones. What was it this time, ecological screw up or nuclear winter?'
'Worse than that sir, i looks lke they were mucking around with vacuum energy without having first invented the Mobius sphere.'
'Ah yes, the old classic mistake, we loose a few like that.'
'Could we not have tipped them off about it Sir?'
'I'm afraid not Jones, stupidity must remain its own reward, it's regrettable but there you are. Did you salvage anything?'
'They composed some fairly good poetry a couple of centuries ago, and some rather fine cloud sculptures fairly recently, I've logged some records in the archives.'
'Splendid Jones, I'll peruse them this evening. What about those Apes on Sol 3, how are they getting on?'
'Quit a bit of warfare as usual Sir, mostly based on chemical explosives these days, but with the occasional use of plutonium. Many of them have developed a belief in a big bang theory, and they reckon that they have the maths to prove it.'
'Really? Smith in anthropology will probably find that hilarious, I'm sure she would appreciate the data. It was one of her old Stomping grounds you know?'
'No I didnt know that Sir'
'It was a long time ago Jones, and a bit of a fiasco actually, she gave them a piece of her mind about some of their barbaric behavior which then abruptly became worse. Ever since then they have been obsessed with the number plate on her craft, it read 'JHVH'. The department gave her a desk job after that.”

Peter J. Carroll (1953) British occultist

Source: The Apophenion (2008), p. 107-108

God, Stupidity, Behavior, Science

“One can imagine having a procedural rule that anything ambiguous should be treated as the Taj Mahal unless we see that it is labelled "fog"…The motorist replies: "What sort of rule is this? Surely the best guarantee I can have that the fog is fog is if I fail to see the sign saying 'fog' because of the fog."”

Michael Frayn (1933) British writer

James Fenton (ed.) The Original Michael Frayn (Edinburgh: Salamander Press, 1983) p. 67.

Imagination

“I'm not concerned about avoiding anything that happened three years ago or worried about letdowns or things of that nature. When you use the term 'letdown' you proceed with the assumption that this is a continuation of something that happened in the past.”

Mike Tomlin (1972) head coach of the National Football League's Pittsburgh Steelers

Referring to the Steelers' poor start in 2006 following their Super Bowl win, as quoted in "Tomlin looks ahead" by Ed Bouchette, in The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (1 August 2009) http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/09213/987980-66.stm

Nature, Past

“Black unemployment is terrible. The black frame of mind is terrible, they're depressed, they're down — Obama's not doing anything for 'em. How is that hoax and change workin' for ya? They're all livid. I mean, they thought there were gonna be an exact 180-degree economic reversal and it's done nothing but get bad for everybody, but they're especially upset about it because they look at him as one of them, and now they feel abandoned. And I'm sure Tiger Woods' choice of females not helping 'em out with their attitudes there either.”

Rush Limbaugh (1951) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, author, and television personality

On the Black state of mind, The Rush Limbaugh Show, December 8, 2009 http://mediamatters.org/mmtv/200912080019

Feeling, Change, Help

“If you were sitting where I’m sitting and you heard what I have heard at every dinner conversation, every lunch conversation, on every lone walk, you would say this woman has never been satisfied with the status quo in anything. She always wants to move the ball forward. That is just who she is.”

Bill Clinton (1946) 42nd President of the United States

2010s, (July 26, 2016)

“Xenophanes speaks thus:
And no man knows distinctly anything,
And no man ever will.”

Diogenes Laërtius (180–240) biographer of ancient Greek philosophers

Pyrrho, 8.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 9: Uncategorized philosophers and Skeptics

“In our constant struggle to believe we are likely to overlook the simple fact that a bit of healthy disbelief is sometimes as needful as faith to the welfare of our souls. I would go further and say that we would do well to cultivate a reverent skepticism. It will keep us out of a thousand bogs and quagmires where others who lack it sometimes find themselves. It is no sin to doubt some things, but it may be fatal to believe everything. Faith is at the root of all true worship, and without faith it is impossible to please God. Through unbelief Israel failed to inherit the promises. “By grace are ye saved through faith.” “The just shall live by faith.” Such verses as these come trooping to our memories, and we wince just a little at the suggestion that unbelief may also be a good and useful thing. … Faith never means gullibility. The man who believes everything is as far from God as the man who refuses to believe anything. Faith engages the person and promises of God and rests upon them with perfect assurance. Whatever has behind it the character and word of the living God is accepted by faith as the last and final truth from which there must never be any appeal. Faith never asks questions when it has been established that God has spoken. 'Yea, let God be true, but every man a liar' (Rom. 3:4). Thus faith honors God by counting Him righteous and accepts His testimony against the very evidence of its own senses. That is faith, and of such we can never have too much. Credulity, on the other hand, never honors God, for it shows as great a readiness to believe anybody as to believe God Himself. The credulous person will accept anything as long as it is unusual, and the more unusual it is the more ardently he will believe. Any testimony will be swallowed with a straight face if it only has about it some element of the eerie, the preternatural, the unearthly.”

Aiden Wilson Tozer (1897–1963) American missionary

Source: The Root of the Righteous (1955), Chapter 34.

God, Truth, Faith, Soul

“It has never been in my power to study anything, — mathematics, ethics, metaphysics, gravitation, thermodynamics, optics, chemistry, comparative anatomy, astronomy, psychology, phonetics, economics, the history of science, whist, men and women, wine, metrology, except as a study of semeiotic.”

Charles Sanders Peirce (1839–1914) American philosopher, logician, mathematician, and scientist

Letter to Victoria (23 December 1908)

Women, Men, History, Mathematics

“So raise your glass if you are wrong in all the right ways,
All my underdogs.
We will never be, never be anything but loud
And "Nitty-Gritty",
Dirty little freaks.
Won't you come and come and
Raise your glass!
Just come on and come on and
Raise your glass.”

Pink (singer) (1979) American singer-songwriter

Raise Your Glass, written by Pink, Max Martin, and Shellback
Song lyrics, Greatest Hits... So Far!!! (2010)

Way

“What merit there is in my thinking is derived from two peculiarities: (1) My inability to be familiar with anything. I simply can't take things for granted. (2) My endless patience. I assume that the only way to find an answer is to hang on long enough and keep groping.”

Eric Hoffer (1898–1983) American philosopher

Entry (1951)
Eric Hoffer and the Art of the Notebook (2005)

Way, Thinking, Patience

“From then on, when anything went wrong with a computer, we said it had bugs in it.”

Grace Hopper (1906–1992) American computer scientist and United States Navy officer

On the removal of a 2-inch-long moth from the Harvard Mark II experimental computer at Harvard in 1947, as quoted in Time (16 April 1984). Note that the term "bug" was in use by people in several technical disciplines long before that; Thomas Edison used the term, and it was common AT&T parlance in the 1920s to refer to bugs in the wires. Hopper is credited with popularizing the term's use in the computing field.

“There's a great deal of criticism about the United States, but there is one thing that nobody criticizes the United States. Nobody thinks the United States went to strike against Iraq in order to gain land or water or oil, nobody thinks America has any ambitions about real estate. As it happened in the 20th century, the American boys went to fight in two world wars, many of them lost their lives. The United States won the wars, won the land, but you gave back every piece of it. America didn't keep anything out of her victories for herself. You gave back Japan, an improved Japan, you gave Germany, an improved Germany, you've heard the Marshall Plan. And today, I do not believe there is any serious person on earth who thinks the United States, whether you agree or don't agree with this strike, has any egoistic or material purposes in the war against Iraq. The reason is, for this strike, that you cannot let the world run wild. And people who are coming from different corners of our life, attack and kill women and children and innocent people, just out of the blue. And I think the whole world is lucky that there is a United States that has the will and the power to handle the new danger that has arrived on the 21st century.”

Shimon Peres (1923–2016) Israeli politician, 8th prime minister and 9th president of Israel

Speech at Harvard University (20 October 2004)

Life, Women, War, Children

Quotes about anything page 32

Quotes about anything
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