Quotes about discussion
page 2

“It is thus seen that the assault upon and reduction of Fort Sumter was in no sense a matter of self-defense on the part of the assailants. They well knew that the garrison in the fort could by no possibility commit aggression upon them. They knew-they were expressly notified-that the giving of bread to the few brave and hungry men of the garrison was all which would on that occasion be attempted, unless themselves, by resisting so much, should provoke more. They knew that this Government desired to keep the garrison in the fort, not to assail them, but merely to maintain visible possession, and thus to preserve the Union from actual and immediate dissolution, trusting, as hereinbefore stated, to time, discussion, and the ballot box for final adjustment; and they assailed and reduced the fort for precisely the reverse object — to drive out the visible authority of the Federal Union, and thus force it to immediate dissolution. That this was their object the Executive well understood; and having said to them in the inaugural address, "You can have no conflict without being yourselves the aggressors," he took pains not only to keep this declaration good, but also to keep the case so free from the power of ingenious sophistry as that the world should not be able to misunderstand it. By the affair at Fort Sumter, with its surrounding circumstances, that point was reached. Then and thereby the assailants of the Government began the conflict of arms, without a gun in sight or in expectancy to return their fire, save only the few in the fort, sent to that harbor years before for their own protection, and still ready to give that protection in whatever was lawful. In this act, discarding all else, they have forced upon the country the distinct issue, "Immediate dissolution or blood."”

Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States

1860s, Fourth of July Address to Congress (1861)

Men, Pain, World, Law

“I will first discuss images according to the Law of Moses, and then according to the gospel. And I say at the outset that according to the Law of Moses no other images are forbidden than an image of God which one worships. A crucifix, on the other hand, or any other holy image is not forbidden. Heigh now! you breakers of images, I defy you to prove the opposite!”

Martin Luther (1483–1546) seminal figure in Protestant Reformation

Source: Against the Heavenly Prophets in the Matter of Images and Sacraments (1525), pp. 85-86

God, Law

“The discussion of the sexual problem is only a somewhat crude prelude to a far deeper question, and that is the question of the psychological relationship between the sexes. In comparison with this the other pales into insignificance, and with it we enter the real domain of woman. Woman's psychology is founded on the principle of Eros, the great binder and loosener, whereas from ancient times the ruling principle ascribed to man is Logos.”

C.G. Jung (1875–1961) Swiss psychiatrist and psychotherapist who founded analytical psychology

Source: "Woman in Europe" (1927), P.254

Sex, Question, Problem, Time

“Out of the air a voice without a face
Proved by statistics that some cause was just
In tones as dry and level as the place:
No one was cheered and nothing was discussed…”

W. H. Auden book The Shield of Achilles

The Shield of Achilles (1952)

“I myself am part of the youth movement. However, after a long discussion, it appears that many of the youth demands and needs, like access to education, jobs, and equitable growth, have been addressed under different goals and targets and youth enjoy the benefits of everything else in the report.”

Tawakkol Karman (1979) Yemeni journalist, politician, human rights activist, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient

2000s, Youth Q&A on the U.N. High-Level Panel on the Post-2015 Agenda Report (2009)

Youth, Education, Appearance, Parting

“It seems to me that this is theoretically right, for whatever the question under discussion — whether religious, philosophical, political, or economic; whether it concerns prosperity, morality, equality, right, justice, progress, responsibility, cooperation, property, labor, trade, capital, wages, taxes, population, finance, or government — at whatever point on the scientific horizon I begin my researches, I invariably reach this one conclusion: The solution to the problems of human relationships is to be found in liberty.”

Frédéric Bastiat book The Law

The Law (1850)

Justice, Question, Problem

“I have read a great deal now on the neurological side and much on the anthropological side and on the philosophical side and we have had all these discussions and all the time I have the feeling that something may break. I mean that some little light at the end of the tunnel may be sensed or some flash of insight may come. I of course know very well that there is no guarantee it will come, but I have already got myself into this state of expectancy that something will come to my imagination which has some germ of truth about it in this most difficult field. ”

John C. Eccles (1903–1997) Australian neurophysioloigst

Source: The Self and Its Brain (1977), p. 467

Truth, Feeling, Imagination, Sense

“I was truly under Hitler's spell, that cannot be denied. I was impressed with him from the moment I first met him, in 1932. He had terrific power, especially in his eyes. Now the tribunal accuses us of conspiracy. I say, how can one have a conspiracy in a dictatorship government? One man and one man only made all the crucial decisions. That was the Fuhrer. In all my dealings with him I never discussed the exterminations or anything of that sort. What I shall never comprehend is that six weeks before the end of the war he assured me we'd win by a nose. I left his presence then and said that from that time forth I was completely at a loss — that I didn't understand a thing. Hitler always, until the end, and even now, had a strange fascination over me. Would you call it abnormal of me? Sometimes, in his presence, when he spoke of all his plans, the good things he would do for the Volk, vacations, highways, new buildings, cultural advantages and so forth, tears would come to my eyes. Would that be because I'm a hysterical weak man?”

Joachim von Ribbentrop (1893–1946) German general

To Leon Goldensohn, July 15, 1946, from "The Nuremberg Interviews" by Leon Goldensohn, Robert Gellately - History - 2004

War, Understanding, Decision, Tear

“In countries and epochs in which communication is impeded, soon all other liberties wither; discussion dies by inanition, ignorance of the opinion of others becomes rampant, imposed opinions triumph.”

Primo Levi book The Drowned and the Saved

The Drowned and the Saved (1986)
Context: In countries and epochs in which communication is impeded, soon all other liberties wither; discussion dies by inanition, ignorance of the opinion of others becomes rampant, imposed opinions triumph. The well-known example of this is the crazy genetics preached in the USSR by Lysenko, which in the absence of discussion (his opponents were exiled to Siberia) compromised the harvests for twenty years. Intolerance is inclined to censor, and censorship promotes ignorance of the arguments of others and thus intolerance itself: a rigid, vicious circle that is hard to break.

Communication, Country

“The city is not built, as is the cottage or the domus, to shelter from the weather and to propagate the species — these are personal, family concerns — but in order to discuss public affairs.”

José Ortega Y Gasset book The Revolt of the Masses

Source: The Revolt of the Masses (1929), Chapter XIV: Who Rules The World?
Context: Greeks and Latins appear in history lodged, like bees in their hives, within cities, poleis. … The polis is not primarily a collection of habitable dwellings, but a meeting-place for citizens, a space set apart for public functions. The city is not built, as is the cottage or the domus, to shelter from the weather and to propagate the species — these are personal, family concerns — but in order to discuss public affairs. … The man of the fields is still a sort of vegetable. His existence, all that he feels, thinks, wishes for, preserves the listless drowsiness in which the plant lives. The great civilisations of Asia and Africa were, from this point of view, huge anthropomorphic vegetations. …Socrates, the great townsman, quintessence of the spirit of the polis, can say: "I have nothing to do with the trees of the field, I have to do only with the man of the city." What has ever been known of this by the Hindu, the Persian, the Chinese, or the Egyptian?

Family, Personality, Weather

“It is a common mistake in going to war to begin at the wrong end, to act first, and wait for disaster to discuss the matter.”

Thucydides History of the Peloponnesian War

Book I, 1.78-[3]
History of the Peloponnesian War, Book I

War, Waiting

“The old problems, such as the relation of science and religion, are still with us, and I believe present as difficult dilemmas as ever, but they are not often publicly discussed because of the limitations of specialization.”

Richard Feynman (1918–1988) American theoretical physicist

remarks (2 May 1956) at a Caltech YMCA lunch forum http://calteches.library.caltech.edu/49/2/Religion.htm <br class="br">Context: In this age of specialization men who thoroughly know one field are often incompetent to discuss another. The great problems of the relations between one and another aspect of human activity have for this reason been discussed less and less in public. When we look at the past great debates on these subjects we feel jealous of those times, for we should have liked the excitement of such argument. The old problems, such as the relation of science and religion, are still with us, and I believe present as difficult dilemmas as ever, but they are not often publicly discussed because of the limitations of specialization.

Religion, Problem, Science

“The interpretation of quantum mechanics has been dealt with by many authors, and I do not want to discuss it here. I want to deal with more fundamental things.”

Paul Dirac (1902–1984) theoretical physicist

P. A. M. Dirac, The inadequacies of quantum field theory, in Paul Adrien Maurice Dirac, B. N. Kursunoglu and E. P. Wigner (Cambridge University, Cambridge, 1987) p. 194

“Already there is uneasy hesitation in these castaways' discussion of their tragedy, in the huge masterpiece of destiny that they are roughly sketching.”

Henri Barbusse book Under Fire

Under Fire (1916), Ch. 24 - The Dawn
Context: Already there is uneasy hesitation in these castaways' discussion of their tragedy, in the huge masterpiece of destiny that they are roughly sketching. It is not only the peril and pain, the misery of the moment, whose endless beginning they see again. It is the enmity of circumstances and people against the truth, the accumulation of privilege and ignorance, of deafness and unwillingness, the taken sides, the savage conditions accepted, the immovable masses, the tangled lines.
And the dream of fumbling thought is continued in another vision, in which everlasting enemies emerge from the shadows of the past and stand forth in the stormy darkness of to-day.

“Islam is my religion, but I believe my religion is my personal business. It governs my personal life, my personal morals. And my religious philosophy is personal between me and the God in whom I believe; just as the religious philosophy of these others is between them and the God in whom they believe. And this is best this way. Were we to come out here discussing religion, we’d have too many differences from the outstart and we could never get together.”

Malcolm X (1925–1965) American human rights activist

The Ballot or the Bullet (1964), Speech in Detroit, Michigan (12 April 1964)
Context: Islam is my religion, but I believe my religion is my personal business. It governs my personal life, my personal morals. And my religious philosophy is personal between me and the God in whom I believe; just as the religious philosophy of these others is between them and the God in whom they believe. And this is best this way. Were we to come out here discussing religion, we’d have too many differences from the outstart and we could never get together. [... ] If we bring up religion, we’ll be in an argument, and the best way to keep away from arguments and differences, as I said earlier, put your religion at home in the closet. Keep it between you and your God. Because if it hasn’t done anything more for you than it has, you need to forget it anyway.

Life, God, Religion, Way

“Really, you should always discuss the defeats because you can learn much more from failure than from success.”

Niki Lauda (1949–2019) Austrian former Formula 1 racing driver

Failure, Learning, Success

“It is chiefly, I regret to say, through journalism that such people find expression. I regret it because there is much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. By carefully chronicling the current events of contemporary life, it shows us of what very little importance such events really are. By invariably discussing the unnecessary, it makes us understand what things are requisite for culture, and what are not.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part II

Life, People, Making love, Communication

“There is much to be said in favor of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. By carefully chronicling the current events of contemporary life, it shows us of what very little importance such events really are. By invariably discussing the unnecessary, it makes us understand what things are requisite for culture, and what are not.”

Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish writer and poet

The Critic as Artist (1891), Part I

Life, Making love, Communication, Understanding

“Men of science in former ages worked in secret, and instead of publishing their discoveries, taught them in secret to carefully selected pupils. Their motives for adopting that policy are readily intelligible, even if the merits of the policy may seem still open to discussion. At all events, their teaching has not been forgotten; it has been transmitted by secret initiation to men of our own time, and while its methods and its practical achievements remain secrets in their hands, it is open to any patient and earnest student of the question to satisfy himself that these methods are of supreme efficacy, and these achievements far more admirable than any yet standing to the credit of modern science.”

Alfred Percy Sinnett book The Occult World

Introduction
The Occult World

Men, Secret, Age, Intelligence

“This Five Year Plan had been drawn up after the most careful thought and investigation. The whole country had been surveyed by scientists and engineers, and numerous experts had discussed the problem of fitting in one part of the programme into another. For, the real difficulty came in this fitting in… But Russia had one great advantage over the capitalist countries. Under capitalism all these activities are left to individual initiative and chance, and owing to competition there is waste of effort. There is no co-ordination between different producers or different sets of workers, except the chance co-ordination which arises in the buyers and sellers coming to the same market… The Soviet Government had the advantage of controlling all the different industries and activities in the whole Union, and so it could draw up and try to work a single co-ordinated plan in which every activity found its proper place. There would be no waste in this, except such waste as might come from errors of calculation or working, and even such errors could be rectified far sooner with a unified control than otherwise.”

Jawaharlal Nehru book Glimpses of World History

Glimpses of World History (1949)

Error, Problem, Effort, Chance

“After the preliminary shock [of the collapse of the stock market], the nations will meet together to discuss the means of coping with the future in ordered fashion. Those who have stood most emphatically behind the rule of market forces will find themselves outvoted in the dispensation which will pertain, and those advocating co-operation will gain the ascendancy. This will not happen overnight. The process will be gradual, but will not be long delayed.”

Benjamin Creme (1922–2016) artist, author, esotericist

Source: Maitreya's Mission Vol. II (1993), p.137

Fashion, Future

“There are grave misgivings that the discussion on ecology may be designed to distract attention from the problems of war and poverty.”

Indíra Gándhí (1917–1984) Indian politician and Prime Minister

First global conference on the human environment (UNCHE) in Stockholm in June 1972 by UN.

War, Problem

“Mathematicians have various ways of judging the merits of new theorems and constructions. One very important criterion is esthetic — some developments just “feel” right, fitting, and beautiful. Just as in other venues where beauty or esthetics are discussed, taste plays an important role in this, but I think I am not alone in being especially excited when apparently different fields suddenly meet in a new concept, a new understanding. It is often of the sparks of such encounters that our esthetic enjoyment of mathematics is born.
Another important criterion for according merit to some particular piece of mathematics is the extent to which it can be useful in applications; this is the criterion almost exclusively used by nonmathematicians.”

Ingrid Daubechies (1954) Belgian physicist and mathematician

(1995) Wavelets and Other Phase Space Localization Methods. In: Chatterji, S.D. (ed.). Proceedings of the International Congress of Mathematicians. Birkhäuser, Basel. [10.1007/978-3-0348-9078-6_8]

Beauty, Way, Feeling, Mathematics

“When the intention is to spread Islam and annihilate non-Muslims, two widely discussed methods are love jihad and narcotics jihad. There is a section of people who want to establish that no such thing exists in our society today. They are trying to conceal the truth and reality.”

Joseph Kallarangatt (1956) Indian Syro-Malabar Catholic Church Bishop

India: Bishop decries ‘love jihad’ and ‘drug jihad,’ ‘In the eyes of a jihadi, non-Muslims are to be destroyed’ https://www.jihadwatch.org/2021/09/india-bishop-decries-love-jihad-and-drug-jihad-in-the-eyes-of-a-jihadi-non-muslims-are-to-be-destroyed (september 13, 2021)

Love, People, Truth, Reality

“If you come to a spiritual teacher — or this book — looking for stimulating ideas, theories, beliefs, intellectual discussions, then you will be disappointed. This is not a book to be read from cover to cover and then put away. Live with it, pick it up frequently, and more importantly, put it down frequently, or spend more time holding it than reading it. Many readers will feel naturally inclined to stop reading after each entry, to pause, reflect, become still. It is always more helpful and more important to stop reading than to continue reading. Allow the book to do its work, to awaken you from the old grooves of your repetitive and conditioned thinking.”

Eckhart Tolle (1948) German writer

Source: Stillness Speaks (2003), intro

Books, Disappointment, Feeling, Idea

“Everything‟s fine,” I said, with a tight smile. “Kiyo was just giving me
his latest explanation about how my son is a terror to be feared.”
Dorian scoffed. “Little Thundro? A terror? Hardly, unless perhaps
we‟re discussing diapers.”

Richelle Mead (1976) American writer

Source: Shadow Heir

Fear, Smile

“Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss other people. Life's too short to worry about what other people do or don't do. Tend your own backyard, not theirs, because yours is the one you have to live in.”

Sherrilyn Kenyon (1965) Novelist

Source: Infamous

Life, People, Idea

“Excuse me, Captain. Are you two going to weep salty tears of admiration over a helmet all night, or do we have matters to discuss?”

Eoin Colfer (1965) Irish author of children's books

Source: The Lost Colony

Tear, Night

“They never discussed it, but both came to understand it as a promise: he would always make sure there was a place for her. She would always be able to say, Someone is coming. I am not alone.”

Celeste Ng book Everything I Never Told You: A Novel

Source: Everything I Never Told You

Understanding

“Naturally, one does not normally discuss plans to commit murder with the intended victim.”

Robert J. Sawyer book Flashforward

Source: Flashforward

Nature

“I will call him Small Bob," said Bob. "He is a good monster."

End of discussion. The Titan hefted his spear and they continued marching into the gloom.”

Rick Riordan book The House of Hades

Source: The House of Hades

“I held the feeling in my heart; the urge to discuss it died out. There was all the time in the world. In the endless repetition of other nights, other mornings, this moment, too, might become a dream.”

Banana Yoshimoto book Kitchen

Source: Kitchen

World, Dreams, Feeling, Time

“We cannot discuss the state of our minorities until we first have a sense of what we are, who we are, what our goals are, and what we take life to be.”

James Baldwin (1924–1987) (1924-1987) writer from the United States

Life, Sense

“A culture fixated on female thinness is not an obsession about female beauty, but an obsession about female obedience. Women's dieting has become what Yale psychologist Judith Rodin calls a 'normative obsession,' a never-ending passion play given international coverage out of all proportion to the health risks associated with obesity, and using emotive language that does not figure even in discussions of alcohol or tobacco abuse. […] Dieting is the most potent political sedative in women's history; a quietly mad population is a tractable one.”

Naomi Wolf book The Beauty Myth

Source: The Beauty Myth (1991), Chapter 6 : 'Hunger', p. 187

Women, Health, Alcohol, Beauty

“Defining relationships over here? I see that even as the world plunges into darkness and peril, you two stand around discussing your love lives. Teenagers.”

Cassandra Clare book City of Heavenly Fire

Magnus Bane, to Clary Fray and Simon Lewis, pg. 61
Source: The Mortal Instruments, City of Heavenly Fire (2014)

Love, World

“While we are alive we should sit among colored lights and taste good wines, and discuss our adventures in far places; when we are dead, the opportunity is past.”

Jack Vance (1916–2013) American mystery and speculative fiction writer

Color, Light, Wine, Past

“For me, Art is the restoration of order. It may discuss all sort of terrible things, but there must be satisfaction at the end. A little bit of hunger, but also satisfaction.”

Toni Morrison (1931–2019) American writer

Interview with Don Swaim (1987)

Hunger, Art

“Never hold discussions with the monkey when the organ grinder is in the room.”

Winston S. Churchill (1874–1965) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

“I dearly love the state of Texas, but I consider that a harmless perversion on my part, and discuss it only with consenting adults.”

Molly Ivins (1944–2007) American journalist

Love, Parting

“If the feminine issue is so absurd, is because the male's arrogance made it "a discussion”

Simone de Beauvoir book The Second Sex

Source: The Second Sex

“I remember discussions withwhich went through many hours till very late at night and ended almost in despair; and when at the end of the discussion I went alone for a walk in the neighbouring park I repeated to myself again and again the question:?”

Werner Heisenberg (1901–1976) German theoretical physicist

Question, Despair, Night

“Then I'm going?" Kendra asked.
The adults in the room exchanged tacit glances before nodding.
Then we only have one more problem left to discuss," Seth said.
Everyone turned to him.
How do I get invited”

Brandon Mull (1974) American fiction writer

Source: Grip of the Shadow Plague

Problem

“I give boring people something to discuss over corn.”

Aimee Bender (1969) Novelist, short story writer

Source: The Girl in the Flammable Skirt

People

“The original question, 'Can machines think?' I believe to be too meaningless to deserve discussion.”

Alan Turing (1912–1954) British mathematician, logician, cryptanalyst, and computer scientist

Source: Mechanical Intelligence: Collected Works of A.M. Turing

Question, Thinking

“You can't really move forward until you look back.

[From Remaking America panel discussion at George Washington University]”

Cornel West (1953) African-American philosopher and political/civil rights activist

Universe

“Parents who discipline their child by discussing the consequences of their actions produce children who have better moral development, compared to children whose parents use authoritarian methods and punishment.”

Simon Baron-Cohen (1958) psychologist and author

Source: Zero Degrees of Empathy: A New Theory of Human Cruelty

Children, Parent

“Not to discuss with a man worthy of conversation is to waste the man. To discuss with a man not worthy of conversation is to waste words. The wise waste neither men nor words.”

Confucius (-551–-479 BC) Chinese teacher, editor, politician, and philosopher

Source: The Analects

Men

“An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.”

Jean Cocteau (1889–1963) French poet, novelist, dramatist, designer, boxing manager and filmmaker

As quoted in Newsweek (16 May 1955) Variant translation: Asking an artist to talk about his work is like asking a plant to discuss horticulture.

Art

“The meeting was like a war council with donuts. Then again, back at Camp Half-Blood they used to have their most serious discussions around the Ping-Pong table in the rec room with crackers and Cheez Whiz, so Percy felt right at home.”

Rick Riordan The Mark of Athena

Source: The Mark of Athena

War, Home

“Today,' Elodin said brightly, 'we will talk about things that cannot be talked about. Specifically, we will discuss why some things cannot be discussed.”

Patrick Rothfuss book The Wise Man's Fear

Source: The Wise Man's Fear

“You cannot reduce the situation to worm jokes, Will. This is Gabriel and Gideon’s father we’re discussing.”
“We’re not just discussing him; we’re chasing him through an ornamental sculpture garden because he’s turned into a worm.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Princess

Source: Clockwork Princess

“A man who has nothing in particular to recommend him discusses all sorts of subjects at random as though he knew everything.”

Sei Shonagon book The Pillow Book

Source: The Pillow Book
Source: The Pillow Book of Sei Shōnagon (1002), p. 44

“I really don't have the time to discuss the errors of your value judgements.”

John Kennedy Toole A Confederacy of Dunces

Source: A Confederacy of Dunces

Error, Time

“Repressively, Lymond himself answered. “I dislike being discussed as if I were a disease. Nobody ‘got’ me,” he said.”

Dorothy Dunnett (1923–2001) British writer

Source: The Game of Kings

Disease

“Believe me, when my ‘personal endowments’ are being discussed, I always pay attention.” ~ Cam Rohan”

Lisa Kleypas (1964) American writer

Source: Mine Till Midnight

Personality

“Why the rifle? Everybody knows you can’t shoot.”
Who were these everybodies and would they like to stand in front of me, preferably within ten feet, so I could discuss this issue in greater detail.”

Ilona Andrews American husband-and-wife novelist duo

Source: Magic Strikes

“Clarissa," he said, "here with the vampire, I see. When things have settled a bit, we really must discuss you choice in pets..”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“I asked the girl if she could bring a sister for me. She did. Sister Maria Teresa. It was a very slow evening. We discussed the New Testament. We agreed that He was very well adjusted for an only child.”

Woody Allen (1935) American screenwriter, director, actor, comedian, author, playwright, and musician

Girl, Sister

“We value virtue but do not discuss it. The honest bookkeeper, the faithful wife, the earnest scholar get little of our attention compared to the embezzler, the tramp, the cheat.”

John Steinbeck book Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Pt. 3
Travels With Charley: In Search of America (1962)
Source: Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Faith, Cheating

“Instant obedience will teach you more about God than a lifetime of Bible discussions.”

Rick Warren (1954) Christian religious leader

Source: The Purpose Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here for?

God

“It’s good.’ She chirps the last bit as if that were all to say about a book: It’s good or it’s bad. I liked it or I didn’t. No discussions of the writing, the themes, the nuances, the structure. Just good or bad. Like a hot dog.”

Gillian Flynn book Gone Girl

Source: Gone Girl

Books, Dogs

“Their relationship consisted
In discussing if it existed.”

Thom Gunn (1929–2004) English poet

“A discussion should be a genuine attempt to explore a subject rather than a battle between competing egos.”

Edward de Bono (1933) Maltese physician

Source: How To Have A Beautiful Mind

“You can't discuss the ocean with a well frog - he's limited by the space he lives in. You can't discuss ice with a summer insect - he's bound to a single season.”

Zhuangzi (-369–-286 BC) classic Chinese philosopher

Source: The Complete Works of Chuang Tzu

Summer, Season

“Every discussion which is made from an egoistic standpoint is corrupted from the start and cannot yield an absolutely sure conclusion. The ego puts its own interest first and twists every argument, word, even fact to suit that interest.”

Paul Brunton (1898–1981) British philosopher

Source: The Notebooks of Paul Brunton

“And try to remember what we discussed, Susannah. A mediator is someone who helps others resolve conflicts. Not someone who, er, kicks them in the face.”

Meg Cabot book Shadowland

Source: Shadowland

Help

“It's time to discuss what it's going to take to get you beneath me"-GC”

Sylvia Day book Bared to You

Source: Bared to You

Time

“My feeling is, quite simply, that if there is a God, He has done such a bad job
that he isn't worth discussing.”

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

God, Feeling

“Cole, who had kissed me. Cole, who had refused to discuss it afterwards. Okay, fine. I had refused. Cole, who was driving me flipping crazy.”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

Source: Alice in Zombieland

Kiss

“Are we fighting?" I asked Morelli.
"No. Were discussing."
"Are you sure?"
"Am I yelling?" Morelli asked. "Is my face purple? Are the cords on my neck standing out? Am I waving my arms around?"
"No."
"The were not fighting.”

Janet Evanovich book Sizzling Sixteen

Source: Sizzling Sixteen

Fight

“I leave the human cockroaches to discuss their heroin and child pornography.”

Alan Moore book Watchmen

Source: Watchmen

“They had only ever discussed books but what, in this life, is more personal than books?”

Gabrielle Zevin (1977) American writer

Source: The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

Life, Books, Personality

“Perhaps," he said, "we should discuss our arrangements, then.”

Cassandra Clare book Clockwork Angel

Source: Clockwork Angel

“Whatever the Clave was discussing, the Council meeting was dragging on brutally late. “But he knows New York. He doesn’t know Alicante—”

Cassandra Clare book City of Glass

Source: City of Glass

“Those who have to ask if faith is true are opening up a discussion they may not be ready for.”

Richelle Mead Shadow Kiss

Source: Shadow Kiss

Faith

“Never argue. In society nothing must be discussed; give only results. (Benjamin Disraeli, 1804–1881)”

Robert Greene book The 48 Laws of Power

Source: The 48 Laws of Power

“The President had an incredibly productive set of meetings and discussions with Prime Minister Joe Trudeau of Canada”

Sean Spicer (1971) American political strategist and former White House Press Secretary and Communications Director for President…

Sean Spicer appears to call Prime Minister 'Joe Trudeau,' Twitter Loses it http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2017/02/14/sean-spicer-joe-trudeau-video_n_14748486.html?ncid=fcbklnkcahpmg00000001 (February 14, 2017) <br class="br">Variant: The President had a very cordial conversation with Prime Minister Trumble...

“The law of England is anxious for the interests of persons against whom charges may be made. If a man commits a crime, there is a legal and constitutional mode by which that crime may be brought into discussion. He is liable to be tried, but though his crime may be as great and as aggravated as possible, he ought to have a full, fair, dispassionate, and temperate investigation of his conduct at the time of trial.”

Sir John Bayley, 1st Baronet (1763–1841) British judge

1 St. Tr. (N. S.) 162.
Trial of Sir Francis Burdett (King v. Burdett) (1820)

Law, Time, Personality

“Poverty Jet Set: A group of people given to chronic travelling at the expense of long-term job stability or a permenant residence. Tend to have doomed and extremely expensive phone call relationships with people named Serge or Ilyana. Tend to discuss frequent flyer programs at parties.”

Douglas Coupland (1961) Canadian novelist, short story writer, playwright, and graphic designer

Definitions

People, Travel

“Get the process of negotiation away from the small specialized group that some people have called the "nuclear theologians," who in effect said this is a complicated issue of seeing how little we can give away, how much we can extract from the other side; it's highly specialized. Only a few people can understand the nature of these weapons, the delivery systems, the targeting, the nature of the MIRV and the CRUISE, on down, and the MX. This kept the whole discussion to a very limited group of people who, in a way, had assumed responsibility for saying whether we should live or die.”

John Kenneth Galbraith (1908–2006) American economist and diplomat

The Ashes of Capitalism and the Ashes of Communism (1986)

People, Way, Understanding, Nature

“Society is indeed a contract. Subordinate contracts for objects of mere occasional interest may be dissolved at pleasure — but the state ought not to be considered as nothing better than a partnership agreement in a trade of pepper and coffee, calico or tobacco, or some other such low concern, to be taken up for a little temporary interest, and to be dissolved by the fancy of the parties. It is to be looked on with other reverence; because it is not a partnership in things subservient only to the gross animal existence of a temporary and perishable nature. It is a partnership in all science; a partnership in all art; a partnership in every virtue, and in all perfection. As the ends of such a partnership cannot be obtained in many generations, it becomes a partnership not only between those who are living, but between those who are to be born. Each contract of each particular state is but a clause in the great primaeval contract of eternal society, linking the lower with the higher natures, connecting the visible and the invisible world, according to a fixed compact sanctioned by the inviolable oath which holds all physical and all moral natures, each in their appointed place. This law is not subject to the will of those, who by an obligation above them, and infinitely superior, are bound to submit their will to that law. The municipal corporations of that universal kingdom are not morally at liberty at their pleasure, and on their speculations of a contingent improvement, wholly to separate and tear asunder the bands of their subordinate community, and to dissolve it into an unsocial, uncivil, unconnected chaos of elementary principles. It is the first and supreme necessity only, a necessity that is not chosen, but chooses, a necessity paramount to deliberation, that admits no discussion, and demands no evidence, which alone can justify a resort to anarchy. This necessity is no exception to the rule; because this necessity itself is a part too of that moral and physical disposition of things, to which man must be obedient by consent or force: but if that which is only submission to necessity should be made the object of choice, the law is broken, nature is disobeyed, and the rebellious are outlawed, cast forth, and exiled, from this world of reason, and order, and peace, and virtue, and fruitful penitence, into the antagonist world of madness, discord, vice, confusion, and unavailing sorrow.”

Edmund Burke book Reflections on the Revolution in France

Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790)

Pleasure, World, Peace, Law

“The young people, who were all Canadians, immediately formed themselves into a committee of the whole, from which they elected a working committee, which discussed the matter for about an hour, though as it was a committee the time seemed to be a year and a day.”

Robertson Davies (1913–1995) Canadian journalist, playwright, professor, critic, and novelist

The Three Warning Circles (1972).

People, Time

“Subsequent hearings have presented to the public a vapid and hollow charade, in which repetition of platitudes has replaced discussion of viewpoints and personal anecdotes have supplanted legal analysis. Such hearings serve little educative function, except perhaps to reinforce lessons of cynicism that citizens often glean from government. Neither can such hearings contribute toward an evaluation of the Court and a determination whether the nominee would make it a better or worse institution. A process so empty may seem ever so tidy — muted, polite, and restrained — but all that good order comes at great cost.”

Elena Kagan (1960) Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States

On hearings of nominees to the Supreme Court after the rejection of Judge Bork, in a review of The Confirmation Mess (1995).

Education, Personality

“Leaders and managers do not have to risk lives, profit, or mission failure because they failed to plan for a crisis. Do not allow yourself to be put on the defense by changing circumstances. No one enjoys wasting time, but don't be reluctant to call a meeting just to discuss something that might happen. Remember the oil filter theory. Rather than disobey your instincts and proceed with the status quo or embark on a risky course, invest some planning time in your business. Control your risks. Identify important decision points. Forecast potential crisis. Apply the six hour model. A little time spent discussing your business is never wasted.”

Wheeler L. Baker (1938) President of Hargrave Military Academy

Source: Crisis Management: A Model For Managers (1993), p. 74

Failure, Business, Decision, Change

“…with like-minded people one cannot discuss. With like-minded people one can only participate in a church service, and, as is widely known, I do not like church services.”

Ayaan Hirsi Ali (1969) Dutch feminist, author

NOS Journaal, official Dutch newsrail, 8 pm, August 30, 2006. "Met gelijkgezinden kun je alleen maar een kerkdienst* houden, en zoals bekend, houd ik niet van kerkdiensten." "Kerkdienst" means church service of a Christian denomination, such as Mass (liturgy) and cannot be used in Dutch to describe a Muslim prayer service.

People

“In his discussion on slavery Aristotle said that when the shuttle wove by itself and the plectrum played by itself chief workmen would not need helpers nor masters slaves. At the time he wrote, he believed that he was establishing the eternal validity of slavery; but for us today he was in reality justifying the existence of the machine. Work, it is true, is the constant form of man's interaction with his environment, if by work one means the sum total of exertions necessary to maintain life; and the lack of work usually means an impairment of function and a breakdown in organic relationship that leads to substitute forms of work, such as invalidism and neurosis. But work in the form of unwilling drudgery or of that sedentary routine which… the Athenians so properly despised—work in these forms is the true province of machines. Instead of reducing human beings to work-mechanisms, we can now transfer the main part of burden to automatic machines. This potentially… is perhaps the largest justification of the mechanical developments of the last thousand years.”

Lewis Mumford book Technics and Civilization

Source: Technics and Civilization (1934), Ch. 6, sct. 4

Life, Reality, Time, Parting

“Seeing the water birds on the lake increase in number day by day, I thought to myself how nice it would be if it snowed before we got back to the Palace—the garden would look so beautiful; and then, two days later, while I was away on a short visit, lo and behold, it did snow. As I watched the rather drab scene at home, I felt both depressed and confused. For some years now I had existed from day to day in listless fashion, taking note of the flowers, the birds in song, the way the skies change from season to season, the moon, the frost and snow, doing little more than registering the passage of time. How would it all turn out? The thought of my continuing loneliness was unbearable, and yet I had managed to exchange sympathetic letters with those of like mind—some contacted via fairly tenuous connections—who would discuss my trifling tales and other matters with me; but I was merely amusing myself with fictions, finding solace for my idleness in foolish words. Aware of my own insignificance, I had at least managed for the time being to avoid anything that might have been considered shameful or unbecoming; yet here I was, tasting the bitterness of life to the very full.”

Murasaki Shikibu book The Diary of Lady Murasaki

trans. Richard Bowring (Penguin Books, 1996)
The Diary of Lady Murasaki

Life, Beauty, Way, Home

“Well, then, some of you will say, and rightly, "Well, what did you use the fund for, Senator? Why did you have to have it?" Let me tell you in just a word how a Senate office operates. First of all, a Senator gets $15,000 a year in salary. He gets enough money to pay for one trip a year, a round trip, that is, for himself, and his family between his home and Washington, DC. And then he gets an allowance to handle the people that work in his office to handle his mail. And the allowance for my State of California, is enough to hire 13 people. And let me say, incidentally, that that allowance is not paid to the Senator. It is paid directly to the individuals that the Senator puts on his payroll. But all of these people and all of these allowances are for strictly official business; business, for example, when a constituent writes in and wants you to go down to the Veteran's Administration and get some information about his GI policy — items of that type, for example. But there are other expenses that are not covered by the Government. And I think I can best discuss those expenses by asking you some questions.Do you think that when I or any other senator makes a political speech, has it printed, should charge the printing of that speech and the mailing of that speech to the taxpayers? Do you think, for example, when I or any other Senator makes a trip to his home State to make a purely political speech that the cost of that trip should be charged to the taxpayers? Do you think when a Senator makes political broadcasts or political television broadcasts, radio or television, that the expense of those broadcasts should be charged to the taxpayers? Well I know what your answer is. It's the same answer that audiences give me whenever I discuss this particular problem: The answer is no. The taxpayers shouldn't be required to finance items which are not official business but which are primarily political business.”

Richard Nixon (1913–1994) 37th President of the United States of America

1950s, Checkers speech (1952)

Money, People, Family, Home

“[Unnamed actress on the set of Grand Prix] never had eyes for me. Hell, she wouldn't even talk to me, after she'd found out that I was just an unimportant actor. Good grief! Then, this is what happened: We were sitting in the foyer of the Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo. She, myself and Antonio. Then an assistant director crossed our path. That actress was trying to get him to take us to the theatre where they were showing the rushes of the day before. After some discussion, she persuaded him. He said: `Be quiet, I'm gonna lose my job…' So we hid in the balcony, looking down, where that wonderful director Frankenheimer was sitting. After some minutes of racing cars, finally her scene came, and she was doing a phone call - she was playing a sophisticated magazine editor -, and suddenly you could hear the director, who had this loud, resonant voice, howling in rage, because he didn't like her at all. `Oh my God, she's awful! She can't walk, she can't talk, look at her hair!' So he turned to that faggot hairdresser, who was like Katherine the Great, and this guy said: `Well, usually she plays this peasant types. I don't know why you cast her for this role in the first place!”

Donald O'Brien (actor) (1930–2003) Italian film and TV actor

And remember, this actress was sitting there with us, and she nearly went crazy! She was squirming with embarrassment. This is an actor's nightmare, you know. The next day she was fired.
Euro Trash Cinema magazine interview (March 1996)

God, Cars, Guy, Hell

“In times like these, he said, it must be hard for the churches to go on telling people that their Heavenly Father cared about the death of even a single sparrow. He'd hate to be a priest, Herr Schindler said, in an era like this, when life did not have the value of a packet of cigarettes. Stern agreed but suggested, in the spirit of the discussion, that the Biblical reference Herr Schindler had made could be summed up by a Talmudic verse which said that he who saves the life of one man, saves the entire world.”

Thomas Keneally book Schindler's Ark

The references are to Matthew 10:29 (or Luke 12:6) and Jerusalem Talmud, Sanhedrin 4:8 (37a).
Source: Schindler's Ark (1982), Ch. 2.

Life, Death, Hate, People

“We have discussed quantity, order and meaning with regard to their contributions to science in general and to psychology in particular. We extracted each of our categories from a different science, but we claimed that despite their different origins, they are all universally applicable. And as a matter of fact, in our treatment of the issues involved in each of our three categories we have found the same general principle: to integrate quantity and quality, mechanism and vitalism, explanation and comprehension or understanding, we had to abandon the treatment of a number of separate facts for the consideration of a group of facts in their specific form of connection. Only thus could quantity be qualitative, and order and meaning be saved from being either introduced into the system of science as new entities, the privileges of life and mind, or discarded as mere figments.
Do we then claim that all facts are contained in such interconnected groups or units that each quantification is a description of true quality, each complex and sequence of events orderly and meaningful? In short, do we claim that the universe and all events in it form one big gestalt?”

Kurt Koffka (1886–1941) German psychologist

Source: Principles of Gestalt Psychology, 1935, p. 21-22

Life, Understanding, Universe, Science

“Discussion is an exchange of knowledge; argument an exchange of ignorance.”

Robert Quillen (1887–1948) American journalist

As quoted in The School Day Begins : A Guide to Opening Exercises, Grades Kindergarten - 12 (1967) by Agnes Krarup

Knowledge

“Dialectics is the way of seeking for truth by talking with others from different points of view, through "Yes" and "No," until a "Yes" has been reached which is hardened in the fire of many "No's" and which unites the elements of truth promoted in the discussion. It is most unfortunate that in recent years the name "dialectical theology" has been applied to a theology that is strongly opposed to any kind of dialectics and mediation and that constantly repeats the "Yes" to its own and the "No" to any other position. This has made it difficult to use the term "dialectical" to denote theological movements of a really dialectical, that is a mediating, character; and it has resulted in the cheap and clumsy way of dividing all theologians into naturalists and supernaturalists, or into liberals and orthodox. The Protestant Era by Paul Tillich 1948 Introduction”

Paul Tillich (1886–1965) German-American theologian and philosopher

The Protestant Era (1948)

Truth, Way

“Sexual harassment legislation feels unfair to men because if they sued over an ethnic joke, or over a woman discussing pornography or asking them out, they’d be laughed out of the company.”

Warren Farrell book The Myth of Male Power

Source: The Myth of Male Power (1993), Part III: Government as substitute husband, p. 289.

Men, Feeling

“[The George E. P. Box paper Fitting empirical data (1960) is] a mature exposition of an important branch of statistics, to which the author has made great contributions. One feature of particular interest is practical discussion of genuinely nonlinear fitting problems and their solution with the help of tact and a special, publicly available, IBM-704 program. Another is insightful comments on the role of prior distributions in statistics.”

Leonard Jimmie Savage (1917–1971) American mathematician

Leonard Jimmie Savage in 1960s; cited in: JOC/EFR (2006) " George Edward Pelham Box http://www-history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/Biographies/Box.html" at history.mcs.st-and.ac.uk, Nov 2006.

Problem, Help, Box