Quotes about effective
page 29

“Much of what we loosely call the Western world will not survive this century, and much of it will effectively disappear within our lifetimes, including many if not all European countries.”

Mark Steyn (1959) Canadian writer

It's the Demography, Stupid (2006)

World, Country

“Fame doesn't affect my relationships with people much because I've got my head on straight, but there is some sort of undertone that has a weird effect when you're trying to walk through life – I'm not interested in seeing "the media" manifest itself in my life. I don't even like to call acting a career. I prefer to think of it as a project, or else I'd start worrying about things like money. I like contributing to causes, people and the world around me. Just kind of sharing it all, that's what's important.”

River Phoenix (1970–1993) American actor, musician, and activist

Hard Rock Times (1991)

Life, Money, People, World

“Necessity, which frequently exists only in the mind, is less often the mother of invention than of obstinacy, and the obstinacy of those three years exacted from France a penalty which continued to exert its effects over the years, especially in World War II, and which cannot be fully summed up even now.”

Bernard Brodie (1910–1978) American nuclear strategist

Pg. 18
Strategy in the Missile Age

War, World, Penalty

“Over the years, many nations have made well-intentioned efforts to promote these goals. Yet the success of these efforts must be measured by more than intentions, they must be measured by results. My Nation has placed an insistence on results at the heart of our foreign assistance programs. We launched a new initiative called the Millennium Challenge Account, which directs our help to countries that demonstrate their ability to produce results by governing justly, and fighting corruption, and pursuing market-based economic policies, as well as investing in their people. Every country and institution that provides foreign assistance, including the United Nations, will be more effective by showing faith in the people of the developing world and insisting on performance in return for aid.”

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

2000s, 2008, Address to the United Nations General Assembly (September 2008)

People, World, Faith, Effort

“Men, unacquainted with Vedanta, do not see that all things and all individual selves have Brahman as their self. They think that all terms exhaust their significance by signifying the various objects by themselves, which objects are in reality a part and not the whole of the meaning of terms. Now by the study of Vedanta, they understand that all such objects are the effects of Brahman, that Brahman is the inner ruler of them all and that they are animated by Brahman as their very soul. Therefore they come to understand that all terms signify Brahman itself having as its modes the entities, to which latter alone the terms are applied in common usage.”

Ramanuja (1017–1137) Hindu philosopher, exegete of Vishishtadvaita Vedanta school

Source: Vedartha Sangraham, 11th century, p. 14.

Men, Soul, Understanding, Thinking

“I have not been afraid of excess: excess on occasion is exhilarating. It prevents moderation from acquiring the deadening effect of a habit.”

W. Somerset Maugham book The Summing Up

Source: The Summing Up (1938), p. 48

“Experience also shows that to be effective, we must adopt a model of partnership, not paternalism. This approach is based on our conviction that people in the developing world have the capacity to improve their own lives, and will rise to meet high expectations if we set them. America has sought to apply this model in our Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief. Every nation that receives American support through this initiative develops its own plan for fighting HIV/AIDS and measures the results. And so far, these results are inspiring. Five years ago, 50,000 people in sub-Sahara Africa were receiving treatment for HIV/AIDS. Today, that number is nearly 1.7 million. We're taking a similar approach to fighting malaria, and so far, we've supported local efforts to protect more than 25 million Africans.”

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

2000s, 2008, Address to the United Nations General Assembly (September 2008)

People, World, Support, Effort

“The phase transition paradigm: The standard model of fundamental physics incorporates, as one of its foundational principles, the idea that “empty space” or “vacuum” can exist in different phases, typically associated with different amounts of symmetry. Moreover, the laws of the standard model itself suggest that phase transitions will occur, as functions of temperature. Extensions of the standard model to build in higher symmetry (gauge unification or especially supersymmetry) can support effective vacua with radically different properties, separated by great distance or by domain walls. That would be a form of failure of universality, in our sense, whose existence is suggested by the standard model.”

Frank Wilczek (1951) physicist

"Multiversality" (2013)

Law, Idea, Failure, Support

“Neither perfect knowledge of the past nor complete awareness of the current state of the arts gives sufficient foresight to indicate profitable action. Even for this more restricted objective, the pervasive effects of uncertainty prevent the ascertainment of actions which are supposed to be optimal in achieving profits. Now the consequence of this is that modes of behavior replace optimum equilibrium conditions as guiding rules of action. Therefore, in the following sections two forms of conscious adaptive behavior are emphasized.”

Armen Alchian (1914–2013) American economist

"Uncertainty, Evolution, and Economic Theory", 1950

Art, Behavior, Optimism, Knowledge

“Cognitive load theory has been designed to provide guidelines intended to assist in the presentation of information in a manner that encourages learner activities that optimize intellectual performance. The theory assumes a limited capacity working memory that includes partially independent subcomponents to deal with auditory/verbal material and visual/2- or 3-dimensional information as well as an effectively unlimited long-term memory, holding schemas that vary in their degree of automation. These structures and functions of human cognitive architecture have been used to design a variety of novel instructional procedures based on the assumption that working memory load should be reduced and schema construction encouraged. This paper reviews the theory and the instructional designs generated by it.”

John Sweller (1946) educational psychologist

John Sweller, Jeroen van Merrienboer, and Fred Paas. "Cognitive architecture and instructional design." Educational psychology review 10.3 (1998): 251-296.

Optimism, Memory

“Four basic operations in the effective use of graphic records (documents), to store information and make it available, have been listed by Hyslop: A, recording information in documents; B, storing recorded information—documentary items; C, identifying items containing information relevant to a given problem, situation, or subject; D, providing the identified items from storage. Information storage and retrieval in the wide sense covers all these operations. In the narrow sense used in this paper, information retrieval means only C, identifying documentary items by subject.”

Brian Campbell Vickery (1918–2009) British information theorist

Source: The Structure of Information Retrieval Systems (1959), p. 1275.

Problem, Sense

“There is an inside and an outside to every form. When they are in special accord, as for instance a nut in its shell or a child in the womb, or in the structure of shells or crystals, or when one senses the architecture of bones in the human figure, then I am most drawn to the effect of light. Every shadow cast by the sun from an ever-varying angle reveals the harmony of the inside to outside. Light gives full play to our tactile perceptions through the experience of our eyes, and the vitality of forms is revealed by the interplay between space and volume”

Barbara Hepworth (1903–1975) English sculptor

Extract from Barbara Hepworth: Carvings and Drawings, (from Chapter 1: The excitement of discovering the nature of carving, 1903-1930), with an introduction by Herbert Read, London, 1952
1947 - 1960

Sense, Light, Sun

“We analyzed the first stage of our construction, confined to two-dimensional space, and found it to be as durable and resistant as the earth itself. We build in this space just as we would on the ground, and therefore must take as our point of departure the concepts of gravity and force of attraction, as the foundation of everything built on the land. In PROUN the reciprocity of the effects of gravity [Newton, 'for every action an equal and opposite reaction'] manifests itself in a new capacity. We see that on the surface (plane) of the picture, the PROUN ceases to exist as such and becomes a building surveyed from every direction — considered from above or examined from below. The result of this turns out to be the destruction of the single axis that leads to the horizon.”

El Lissitsky (1890–1941) Soviet artist, designer, photographer, teacher, typographer and architect

1915 - 1925, Theses on the 'PROUN': from painting to architecture' (1920)

Departure

“Atheism … in its philosophic aspect refuses allegiance not merely to a definite concept of God, but it refuses all servitude to the God idea, and opposes the theistic principle as such. Gods in their individual function are not half as pernicious as the principle of theism which represents the belief in a supernatural, or even omnipotent, power to rule the earth and man upon it. It is the absolutism of theism, its pernicious influence upon humanity, its paralyzing effect upon thought and action, which Atheism is fighting with all its power.”

Emma Goldman (1868–1940) anarchist known for her political activism, writing, and speeches

The Philosophy of Atheism (1916)

God, Idea, Fight

“He was not a friend to Paine's doctrines, but he was not to be deterred by a name from acknowledging that he considered the rights of man as the foundation of every government, and those who stood out against those rights as conspirators against the people. The dearest right of Englishmen was to the possession of their constitution, while it was maintained on its true principles; but if it was abused, the effect must infallibly be to inflame men's minds, and ministers alone would be responsible for the consequences which might ensue. If the people complained of grievances, let those grievances be removed, and their discontents would cease. If the people were put in possession of their rights, there would be no longer any fear of internal or foreign danger…The retreat of the duke of Brunswick, which he, along with his right hon. friend, and every friend of freedom, considered as matter of joy and exultation, had indeed thrown them into confusion.”

Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Speech in the House of Commons (12 December 1792), quoted in The Parliamentary History of England, from the Earliest Period to the Year 1803. Vol. XXX (London: 1817), pp. 41-42.
1790s

Men, Pain, People, Fear

“Effectiveness relates to the accomplishment of the cooperative purpose which is social and non-personal in character. Efficiency relates to the satisfaction of individual motives and is personal in character.”

Chester Barnard book The Functions of the Executive

Source: The Functions of the Executive (1938), p. 60

Motivation, Personality

“I took that opportunity to tell him something that, er, I had long thought of telling somebody that was about to enter the world of really high secrecy. And I said, 'Henry, you're about to get a lot of clearence higher than top secret that you did not know existed. That's going to have a sequence of effects on you. First, a great exhileration that you're getting all this amazing information that you didn't know even existed. And the next phase is you'll feel like a fool for not having known about any of this. but that won't last long. Fairly soon, you'll come to think that everyone else is foolish. What would this expert be telling me if he knew what I knew? So in the end, you stop listening to them.”

Daniel Ellsberg (1931) American economist and whistleblower

On talking to Henry Kissinger about the effects of gaining high security clearence after Kissinger's first National Security Council with then president Nixon. 'The Most Dangerous Man in America - Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers' 2009 Documentary.

Secret, World, Fools, Feeling

“The thing about herbs is that there is nothing supernatural or implausible about the fact that any particular herb can have a medicinal effect. But the truth of the matter is that herbs are drugs. There's nothing magical about them. The fact that they are "natural" is irrelevant — it's meaningless. They are drugs. They are drugs that have not been purified, identified, … and quantified. … Probably for most plants … there are hundreds of chemicals in there with varying degrees of potency.”

Steven Novella (1964) American neurologist, skepticist

SGU, Podcast #78 – January 15th, 2007 http://www.theskepticsguide.org/podcast/sgu/78 The Skeptics' Guide to the Universe, Podcast, 2000s

Truth, Nature

“Systems science and technology constitute one aspect of systems thinking, but the humanities and arts make up the other. The fact that design plays such a large part in the systemic treatment of problems makes it apparent that art has a major role in it as well. Ethics and aesthetics are integral aspects of evaluating systems… the systems approach involves the pursuit of truth (science) and its effective use (technology), plenty (economics), the good (ethics and morality), and beauty and fun (aesthetics). To compare systems methodology with that of any of the so-called ‘hard’ disciplines—for example, physics—is to misunderstand the nature of systems. The worry is not that the systems approach is not scientific in the sense which physics or chemistry or biology is, but that some try to make it scientific in that sense. To the extent they succeed, they destroy it.”

Russell L. Ackoff (1919–2009) Scientist

Ackoff (1999). "Disciplines, the two cultures and the scianities". Systems Research and Behavioral Science. 16 (6), p. 537. Cited in: Sherryl Stalinski (2005) A Systems View of Social Systems, Culture and Communities. Saybrook Graduate School. p. 5.
1990s

Truth, Beauty, Art, Nature

“Storytelling is very difficult. But adding the flavor helps to relay the storytelling, meaning in a cut scene, with a set camera and effects, you can make the users feel sorrow, or make them happy or laugh. This is an easy approach, which we have been doing. That is one point, the second point is that if I make multiple storylines and allow the users to select which story, this might really sacrifice the deep emotion the user might feel; when there's a concrete storyline, and you kind of go along that rail, you feel the destiny of the story, which at the end, makes you feel more moved. But when you make it interactive — if you want multiple stories where you go one way or another — will that make the player more moved when he or she finishes the game? These two points are really the key which I am thinking about, and if this works, I think I could probably introduce a more interactive storytelling method.”

Hideo Kojima (1963) Japanese video game designer

Source: "Hideo Kojima: The Kikizo Interview 2008 (Page 3)". https://web.archive.org/web/20111009180041/http://archive.videogamesdaily.com/features/hideo-kojima-interview-2008-p3.asp Kikizo. August 24, 2008. Archived from the original on October 9, 2011. Retrieved August 7, 2009.

Happiness, Way, Feeling, Game

“What I want to produce is something compelling, something full, an excitement and intoxication of color – something powerful. The paintings I did in Paris are too cool, too solitary and empty. They are the reaction to a restless and superficial period in my life and seem to strain for a simple, grand effect. I wanted to conquer Impressionism by trying to forget it. What happened was that it conquered me. We must work with digested and assimilated Impressionism..”

Paula Modersohn-Becker (1876–1907) German artist

In a letter to Bernhard Hoetger, from Paris, Summer 1907; as quoted in Voicing our visions, – Writings by women artists; ed. Mara R. Witzling, Universe New York, 1991, p. 207
1906 + 1907

Life, Color, Painting, Forgetting

“Boldness will be at a disadvantage only in an encounter with deliberate caution, which may be considered bold in its own right, and is certainly just as powerful and effective; but such cases are rare.”

Carl von Clausewitz book On War

On War (1832), Book 3

“I have from the beginning been adverse to distant expeditions for the purpose of expanding our colonial possessions. They are necessarily attended with a further division of our force, and with a diminution of our means of acting in Europe. Whilst we are acquiring colonies, the enemy is subjugating the Continent; and though I am by no means disposed to raise doubts of our ability to maintain the contest in this manner, I cannot help fearing the effect of any system which might enable the French, either completely to subdue the remaining Powers of the Continent, or to engage them in opinion against this country…In Europe the most formidable danger exists. It is there that every effort should be made to stop the career of the enemy. Our interest and our reputation are equally at stake. Our allies have a right to look to us for support, and our honour requires that we should not appear to be wanting to the common cause. With a view, therefore, to a continuance of the war on the Continent, I am strongly of opinion that we should immediately collect and prepare for embarkation the largest possible British force that can be made applicable to such a service.”

Charles Grey, 2nd Earl Grey (1764–1845) Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland

Minute written whilst Foreign Secretary (autumn 1806) and docketed as 'objections intended to have been submitted to the King, if the plan for more extended operations in South America had been persevered in', quoted in Lieutenant-General Hon. C. Grey, Some Account of the Life and Opinions of Charles, Second Earl Grey (London: Richard Bentley, 1861), pp. 135-136.
1800s

War, Fear, Support, Effort

“With savages, the weak in body or mind are soon eliminated; and those that survive commonly exhibit a vigorous state of health. We civilised men, on the other hand, do our utmost to check the process of elimination; we build asylums for the imbecile, the maimed, and the sick; we institute poor-laws; and our medical men exert their utmost skill to save the life of every one to the last moment. There is reason to believe that vaccination has preserved thousands, who from a weak constitution would formerly have succumbed to small-pox. Thus the weak members of civilised societies propagate their kind. No one who has attended to the breeding of domestic animals will doubt that this must be highly injurious to the race of man. It is surprising how soon a want of care, or care wrongly directed, leads to the degeneration of a domestic race; but excepting in the case of man himself, hardly any one is so ignorant as to allow his worst animals to breed.

The aid which we feel impelled to give to the helpless is mainly an incidental result of the instinct of sympathy, which was originally acquired as part of the social instincts, but subsequently rendered, in the manner previously indicated, more tender and more widely diffused. Nor could we check our sympathy, even at the urging of hard reason, without deterioration in the noblest part of our nature. The surgeon may harden himself whilst performing an operation, for he knows that he is acting for the good of his patient; but if we were intentionally to neglect the weak and helpless, it could only be for a contingent benefit, with an overwhelming present evil. We must therefore bear the undoubtedly bad effects of the weak surviving and propagating their kind; but there appears to be at least one check in steady action, namely that the weaker and inferior members of society do not marry so freely as the sound; and this check might be indefinitely increased by the weak in body or mind refraining from marriage, though this is more to be hoped for than expected.”

Charles Darwin book The Descent of Man, and Selection in Relation to Sex

volume I, chapter V: "On the Development of the Intellectual and Moral Faculties during Primeval and Civilised Times" (second edition, 1874) pages 133-134 http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=156&itemID=F944&viewtype=image The last sentence of the first paragraph is often quoted in isolation to make Darwin seem heartless. The Descent of Man (1871)

Life, Men, Marriage, Health

“In such a postwar climate, it was probably natural for the U. S. to do most of its defense spending for air power and atomic weapon systems. It is true that current events, such as the Communist-led civil war in Greece, the Communist coup in Czechoslovakia and the Russian blockade of Berlin, should have been reminders of the need to meet challenges to which the Atomic bomb would be no reply. However, the lesson, if perceived, was not effective and conventional forces were sacrificed to the needs of atomic power.”

Maxwell D. Taylor (1901–1987) United States general

Source: The Uncertain Trumpet (1960), p. 13

War, Nature

“In the mass movement into the suburban areas a new kind of community was produced, which caricatured both the historic city and the archetypal suburban refuge: a multitude of uniform, unidentifiable houses, lined up inflexibly, at uniform distances, on uniform roads, in a treeless communal waste, inhabited by people of the same class, the same income, the same age group, witnessing the same television performances, eating the same tasteless prefabricated foods, from the same freezers, conforming in every outward and inward respect to a common mold, manufactured in the central metropolis. Thus the ultimate effect of the suburban escape in our time is, ironically, a low-grade uniform environment from which escape is impossible.”

Lewis Mumford book The City in History

pg 486
The City in History (1961)

People, Age, Food, Communication

“The course of our country in recent years has been an example of these principles. We have avoided entanglements by reserving to our own decision when and how we should help. We have not failed to help. We have contributed hundreds of millions of dollars to foreign charities. We have given freely of our counsel to the settlement of difficulties in Latin America and the adjustment of war problems in Europe. We are still pursuing that course. It has been a practical course, and it has secured practical results. One of these most important results is found in the disarmament treaties, which have saved our own country to date about $300,000,000, and likewise relieved other nations. Another important result has been the adoption of the Dawes plan for the settlement of reparations. The effect these will have in averting war and promoting peace cannot possibly be overestimated. They stand out as great monuments, truly directing the course of men along the way to more civilization, more enlightenment, and more righteousness. They appear to me properly to mark the end of the old order, and the beginning of a new era. We hope they are the end of aggressive war and the beginning of permanent peace.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, Ordered Liberty and World Peace (1924)

Men, War, Peace, Hope

“The creation of Pakistan is not the end of this problem. H. S. Suhrawardy said in 1946 that Pakistan was 'not the last but only the latest demand' of Indian Muslims…. He recommended the creation of a number of 'Muslim-majority pockets' in India. The birth of the Mallapuram district is therefore only a sign of further demands to come. …. The relaxation, on the eve of a mid-term poll, of the service rules enjoining monogamy on Central Government servants whose religion permitted polygamy was effected by the Government of India under the pressure of these organizations.”

Hamid Dalwai (1932–1977) Indian social reformer, thinker and writer

Quoted in B. Madhok: Indianisation, and quoted from Elst, Koenraad (2014). Decolonizing the Hindu mind: Ideological development of Hindu revivalism. New Delhi: Rupa.p. 364-6

Religion, Birth, Problem

“When the enemy is demoralized from within… A single blow must destroy him. Aerial attacks, stupendous in their mass effect, surprise, terror, sabotage, assassinations from within, the murder of leading men… that is the war of the future.”

Hermann Rauschning (1887–1982) German politician

Source: The Voice of Destruction (1940), p. 10

Men, War, Future

“A reason to have computers understand natural language is that it’s an extremely effective way of communicating. What I came to realize is that the success of the communication depends on the real intelligence on the part of the listener, and that there are many other ways of communicating with a computer that can be more effective, given that it doesn’t have the intelligence.”

Terry Winograd (1946) American computer scientist

Interview in Bill Moggridge, Designing Interactions (2007), ch. 7 http://www.designinginteractions.com/interviews/TerryWinograd

Way, Intelligence, Communication, Understanding

“An ad that pretends to be art is — at absolute best — like somebody who smiles warmly at you only because he wants something from you. This is dishonest, but what's sinister is the cumulative effect that such dishonesty has on us: since it offers a perfect facsimile or simulacrum of goodwill without goodwill's real spirit, it messes with our heads and eventually starts upping our defenses even in cases of genuine smiles and real art and true goodwill. It makes us feel confused and lonely and impotent and angry and scared. It causes despair.”

David Foster Wallace book A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again

A Supposedly Fun Thing I'll Never Do Again
Essays

Smile, Art, Feeling, Perfection

“A branch of physics that I was working in for many years has lately become much less active. Many problems have been solved and others are so difficult that nobody knows what to do about them. This means that I do much less physics today than 15 years ago. By contrast, fractal tools have plenty to do. There is a joke that your hammer will always find nails to hit. I find that perfectly acceptable. The hammer I crafted is the first effective tool for all kinds of roughness and nobody will deny that there is at last some roughness everywhere.”

Benoît Mandelbrot (1924–2010) Polish-born, French and American mathematician

A Theory of Roughness (2004)

Problem

“Bare Attention first allows things to speak for themselves, without interruption by final verdicts pronounced too hastily. Bare Attention gives them a chance to finish their speaking, and one will thus get to learn that, in fact, they have much to say about themselves, which formerly was mostly ignored by rashness or was drowned in the inner and outer noise in which ordinary man normally lives. Because Bare Attention sees things without the narrowing and leveling effect of habitual judgments, it sees them ever anew, as it for the first time; therefore it will happen with progressive frequency that things will have something new and worthwhile to reveal. Patient pausing in such an attitude of Bare Attention will open wide horizons to one’s understanding, denied to the strained efforts of an impatient intellect. Owing to a rash or habitual limiting, labeling, misjudging, and mishandling of things, important sources of knowledge often remain closed.”

Nyanaponika Thera (1901–1994) German Buddhist monk

Source: The Heart of Buddhist Meditation (1965), p. 35

Understanding, Knowledge, Effort, Learning

“In esoteric circles, there is much learned talk about the Law of Karma which is, after all, only the Eastern name for the great Law of Cause and Effect; the emphasis is ever upon evil karma and how to avoid it. Yet I would guarantee that… there is far more general good karma than evil; I say this in spite of the world war, the unutterable horror by which we have been and are still surrounded… The evil and the misery will pass but happiness will remain; above everything else will come the realisation that… ours is now the opportunity to build a new and better world.”

Alice A. Bailey (1880–1949) esoteric, theosophist, writer

Source: The Unfinished Autobiography (1951), Chapter I, Part 1

War, Happiness, World, Law

“Treating cartography as a formal communication system implies that we can improve map communication if we can reduce the filtering or loss of information at various points in the system where in the system should have a positive effect, and an information loss should be impossible to overcome. Most efforts to study cartographic communication have been directed to the middle stages in the system: the cartographer's transformation of selected information into the map and the initial extraction of information from the map by the user.”

Alan MacEachren (1952) American geographer

Source: How Maps Work: Representation, Visualization, and Design (1995), p. 5

Communication, Effort, Study, Loss

“I started with a kind of artistic approach… I visualized the best-looking shapes and sizes. I worked with the variables until it got to the point where, if I changed one of them, it didn't get any better… [only then I] figure out the mathematical formula to produce that effect.”

Arthur H. Robinson (1915–2004) American geographer

Robinson (1988) in The New York Times as cited in: John Noble Wilford (2004) " Arthur H. Robinson, 89, Geographer Who Reinterpreted World Map, Dies http://www.nytimes.com/2004/11/15/obituaries/15robinson.html?_r=0" in: The New York Times November 15, 2004: About the development of the Robinson projection.

Mathematics, Change

“If there is anything more dangerous to the life of the mind than having no independent commitment to ideas, it is having an excess of commitment to some special and constricting idea. The effect is as observable in politics as in theology: the intellectual function can be overwhelmed by an excess of piety expended within too contracted a frame of reference.”

Richard Hofstadter (1916–1970) American historian

Source: Anti-Intellectualism in American Life (1974), p. 29

Life, Idea

“If it is to be effective as a tool of thought, a notation must allow convenient expression not only of notions arising directly from a problem, but also of those arising in subsequent analysis, generalization, and specialization.”

Kenneth E. Iverson (1920–2004) Canadian computer scientist

§1.1
Notation as a Tool of Thought (1979)

Problem

“Beware! By Allah the son of Abu Quhafah (Abu Bakr) dressed himself with it (the caliphate) and he certainly knew that my position in relation to it was the same as the position of the axis in relation to the hand-mill. The flood water flows down from me and the bird cannot fly upto me. I put a curtain against the caliphate and kept myself detached from it.
Then I began to think whether I should assault or endure calmly the blinding darkness of tribulations wherein the grown up are made feeble and the young grow old and the true believer acts under strain till he meets Allah (on his death). I found that endurance thereon was wiser. So I adopted patience although there was pricking in the eye and suffocation (of mortification) in the throat. I watched the plundering of my inheritance till the first one went his way but handed over the Caliphate to Ibn al-Khattab after himself.
(Then he quoted al-A`sha's verse):
My days are now passed on the camel's back (in difficulty) while there were days (of ease) when I enjoyed the company of Jabir's brother Hayyan.
It is strange that during his lifetime he wished to be released from the caliphate but he confirmed it for the other one after his death. No doubt these two shared its udders strictly among themselves. This one put the Caliphate in a tough enclosure where the utterance was haughty and the touch was rough. Mistakes were in plenty and so also the excuses therefore. One in contact with it was like the rider of an unruly camel. If he pulled up its rein the very nostril would be slit, but if he let it loose he would be thrown. Consequently, by Allah people got involved in recklessness, wickedness, unsteadiness and deviation.
Nevertheless, I remained patient despite length of period and stiffness of trial, till when he went his way (of death) he put the matter (of Caliphate) in a group and regarded me to be one of them. But good Heavens! what had I to do with this "consultation"? Where was any doubt about me with regard to the first of them that I was now considered akin to these ones? But I remained low when they were low and flew high when they flew high. One of them turned against me because of his hatred and the other got inclined the other way due to his in-law relationship and this thing and that thing, till the third man of these people stood up with heaving breasts between his dung and fodder. With him his children of his grand-father, (Umayyah) also stood up swallowing up Allah's wealth like a camel devouring the foliage of spring, till his rope broke down, his actions finished him and his gluttony brought him down prostrate.
At that moment, nothing took me by surprise, but the crowd of people rushing to me. It advanced towards me from every side like the mane of the hyena so much so that Hasan and Husayn were getting crushed and both the ends of my shoulder garment were torn. They collected around me like the herd of sheep and goats. When I took up the reins of government one party broke away and another turned disobedient while the rest began acting wrongfully as if they had not heard the word of Allah saying:
That abode in the hereafter, We assign it for those who intend not to exult themselves in the earth, nor (to make) mischief (therein); and the end is (best) for the pious ones. (Qur'an, 28:83)
Yes, by Allah, they had heard it and understood it but the world appeared glittering in their eyes and its embellishments seduced them. Behold, by Him who split the grain (to grow) and created living beings, if people had not come to me and supporters had not exhausted the argument and if there had been no pledge of Allah with the learned to the effect that they should not acquiesce in the gluttony of the oppressor and the hunger of the oppressed I would have cast the rope of Caliphate on its own shoulders, and would have given the last one the same treatment as to the first one. Then you would have seen that in my view this world of yours is no better than the sneezing of a goat.”

Ali book Nahj al-Balagha

Known as the Sermon of ash-Shiqshiqiyyah (roar of the camel), It is said that when Amir al-mu'minin reached here in his sermon a man of Iraq stood up and handed him over a writing. Amir al-mu'minin began looking at it, when Ibn `Abbas said, "O' Amir al-mu'minin, I wish you resumed your Sermon from where you broke it." Thereupon he replied, "O' Ibn `Abbas it was like the foam of a Camel which gushed out but subsided." Ibn `Abbas says that he never grieved over any utterance as he did over this one because Amir al-mu'minin could not finish it as he wished to.
Nahj al-Balagha

Death, Hunger, Children, People

“The contrivances which are necessary to counteract the wind effects can only be understood by actual practice in the wind.”

Otto Lilienthal (1848–1896) German aviation pioneer

The Romance of Aeronautics (1912)

“The utmost possible regarding an individual is a statement as to some order of probability about the future. Heisenberg's principle has been seized upon as a basis for wild statements to the effect that the doctrine of arbitrary free will and totally uncaused activity are now scientifically substantiated. Its actual force and significance is generalization of the idea that the individual is a temporal career whose future cannot logically be deduced from its past.”

John Dewey (1859–1952) American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer

Time and Individuality (1940)

Idea, Past, Future

“…we might now formulate a maxim to the effect that art -- that is, in our case, pictorial representation --- employs the image of concrete things to create abstract ideas.”

Alfred Horsley Hinton (1863–1908) British photographer

Source: Practical Pictorial Photography, 1898, The application of the foregoing principles, p. 13

Art, Idea

“The state of emergency had negative effects on our democracy and economy, because of the state of emergency, the number of foreign investments to our country has been reduced and inflation, interest rates and the current deficit are higher now. The main reason is because Turkey is getting far away from democracy.”

Akif Hamzaçebi

As quoted in Turkey approves controversial security law http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/turkey-approves-controversial-security-law-1364915043 (24 July 2018), Middle East Eye.

Democracy, Country

“And wherefore? Because we are thoroughly convinced that laws, education, and religion exercise a salutary influence on society, and that moral causes have their certain effects.”

Adolphe Quetelet (1796–1874) Belgian astronomer, mathematician, statistician and sociologist

Preface of M. Quetelet
A Treatise on Man and the Development of His Faculties (1842)
Context: From the examination of numbers, I believed myself justified in inferring, as a natural consequence, that, in given circumstances, and the influence of the same causes, we may reckon upon witnessing the repetition of the same effects, reproduction of the same crimes, and the same convictions. What has resulted from this exposition? Timorous persons have raised the cry of fatalism. If, however, some one said, "Man is born free; nothing force his free-will; he underlies the influence of external causes; cease to assimilate him to a machine, or to pretend to modify his actions. Therefore, ye legislators, repeal your laws; overturn your prisons; break your chains in pieces; your convictions penalties are of no avail; they are so many acts barbarous revenge. Ye philosophers and priests, speak no more of ameliorations, social or religious; you are materialists, because you assume to society like a piece of gross clay; you are fatalists, because you believe yourselves predestined to influence man in the exercise of his free-will, and to the course of his actions." If, I say, any one held such language to us, we should be disgusted with its excessive folly. And wherefore? Because we are thoroughly convinced that laws, education, and religion exercise a salutary influence on society, and that moral causes have their certain effects.

Education, Religion, Law, Exercises

“But before we attempt to set ourselves up as exponents of universal reform, it would be wise to remember that progress is of slow growth, and also to remember that moderation, patience, forbearance, and charity are virtues in their own right. The only action which can be effective in the long run is that which helps others to help themselves. Before we assume too great responsibilities in the governing of others, it would be the part of wisdom very completely to discharge our responsibilities for governing ourselves. A large amount of work has to be done at home before we can start in on the neighbors, and very considerable duties have to be performed in America before we undertake the direction of the rest of the world. But we must at all times do the best we can for ourselves without forgetting others, and the best we can for our own country without forgetting other nations.”

Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933) American politician, 30th president of the United States (in office from 1923 to 1929)

1920s, The Reign of Law (1925)

Wisdom, World, Home, Universe

“About one-fifth of all the heat that enters the average house comes through windows. …external shading is by far the most efficient method for controlling interior heat build-up. The air-wash between the shading screen and the window is also very effective. The screen should have a light-colored finish… Insulation boards placed next to the window pane at night, will help prevent heat losses through glazed openings. Overhangs and horizontal sunshades placed above south-facing windows serve effectively as heat reducers.”

Ken Kern American writer

The Owner Built Home: A How-to-do-it Book (1972)

Color, Light, Loss, Help

“As a result of [my campaign's] discussions and other interactions with gay and lesbian voters across the state, I am more convinced than ever that as we seek to establish full equality for America's gay and lesbian citizens, I will provide more effective leadership than Ted Kennedy.”

Mitt Romney (1947) American businessman and politician

Letter to Log Cabin Republicans Club, 1994 http://thinkprogress.org/lgbt/2012/01/08/400048/marriage-equality-opponent-mitt-romney-to-gay-people-i-dont-discriminate 1994 United States Senate campaign

“Our Nation has had a long and unfortunate history of sex discrimination, rationalized by an attitude of 'romantic paternalism' which, in practical effect, put women, not on a pedestal, but in a cage.”

William J. Brennan (1906–1997) American judge

Writing for the court, Frontiero v. Richardson, 411 U.S. 677 (1973).

Women, Sex, History

“Population regulates itself by the funds which are to employ it, and therefore always increases or diminishes with the increase or the diminution of capital. Every reduction of capital is therefore necessarily followed by a less effective demand for corn, by a fall in price, and by diminished cultivation.”

David Ricardo (1772–1823) British political economist, broker and politician

Source: The Principles of Political Economy and Taxation (1821) (Third Edition), Chapter II, On Rent, p. 41

“The aggression of the Zionist entity against the nuclear reactor on 7 June 1981 will not stop the course of scientific and technical progress in Iraq. Rather, it is an additional strong stimulus to develop this course, and to provide it with even greater resources and with more effective protection. Despite our loss, this aggression confirms that Iraq really stands on the right path, offering the Arab nation a model and helping its governments to define the right or the best approach. This would open before us, the Arabs, brighter prospects for the future. It confirms what we have always said, that the long conflict between the Arab nation and Zionism will eventually result in our victory. The Arab nation expresses the right and the forward movement of history while the Zionist entity expresses aggression, crime and racialist and expansionist theories which the free peoples have renounced as part of the hated colonial past, and which has to end despite all resources at its disposal and the efforts by imperialism to keep it alive.”

Saddam Hussein (1937–2006) Iraqi politician and President

President Saddam Hussein's Speech on National Day (1981)

Hate, People, History, Effort

“and here I give it under my hand that I will most willingly begin upon a new canvas [after his first portrait of Lady Dartmouth was criticized and rejected]. But I only for the present beg your Lordship will give me leave to try an experiment upon that picture to prove the amazing effect of dress. I meant to treat it as a cast-off picture and dress it (contrary, I know, to Lady Dartmouth's taste) in the modern way; the worst consequence that can attend it will be her ladyship's being angry with me for a time. I am vastly out in my notion if the face does not immediately look like; but I must know if Lady Dartmouth powders or not in common. I only beg to know that and to have the [first] picture sent down [back] to me..”

Thomas Gainsborough (1727–1788) English portrait and landscape painter

Quote from Gainborough's letter to Lord Dartmouth, 13 April 1771; as cited in Thomas Gainsborough, by William T, Whitley https://ia800204.us.archive.org/6/items/thomasgainsborou00whitrich/thomasgainsborou00whitrich.pdf; New York, Charles Scribner's Sons – London, Smith, Elder & Co, Sept. 1915, p. 74 1770 - 1788

Way, Time

“If you ask adults how many teachers — out of the scores in elementary, middle school, high school, college and graduate school — made a singular impression on who and what they are, it's never more than three or four teachers. Everybody else is a distant second to this set.When we finally create a cloning machine, we should clone those teachers. Maybe that's 100 years from now, but that's at the top of my list. Until that happens, the educational system has not fully understood the causes and effects of achievement and success in life. There remains a culture that equates high grades with success in school and correlates success in school with success in life. That mentality is so deep within us that it may be inextricable from our behavior.”

Neil deGrasse Tyson (1958) American astrophysicist and science communicator

Global Ideas from Pluto's Challenger (May 21, 2009)

Life, Education, School, Behavior

“The basic managerial idea introduced by systems thinking, is that to manage a system effectively, you might focus on the interactions of the parts rather than their behavior taken separately.”

Fred Emery (1925–1997) Australian psychologist

Russell L. Ackoff and Fred Emery (1972) On purposeful systems, cited in: Lloyd Dobyns, Clare Crawford-Mason (1994) Thinking about quality: progress, wisdom, and the Deming philosophy. p. 40.

Behavior, Idea, Thinking, Parting

“Hard systems viewpoints are basically those held by designers and engineers who are trying to create systems to meet an understood need in an effective and economic manner. Those in the soft camp caricature the approach as head-down, concerned with optimization, obsessed with quantitative metrics and highly pragmatic. So much so, in fact, that the term system thinking has been purloined by the soft camp as though they alone thought! The soft camp use the term engineer’s philosophy, not too endearingly, to describe the hard approach, in which the requirement is stated by a customer and the engineer satisfies the requirement without question.”

Derek Hitchins (1935) British systems engineer

Source: Putting systems to work (1992), p. 6; as cited in: Stuart Anderson (2006) "Heterogeneous Modelling of Evolution for Socio-technical Systems"

Optimism, Question, Thinking

“Idealism is constituted by the metaphysical value it sets upon ideals, not by the aesthetic or the ethical, and rather by its method of putting them on the throne of things than by the mere intent to have them there. It is always distinct from mysticism (which at the core is simply emotionalism), and still more so from voluntarism. Its method is, at bottom, to vindicate the human ideals by showing them to be not merely ideals but realities, and to effect this by exhibiting conscious being as the only absolute reality;”

George Holmes Howison (1834–1916) American philosopher

Source: The Limits of Evolution, and Other Essays, Illustrating the Metaphysical Theory of Personal Ideaalism (1905), Appendix C: The System vs. The View of the Oxford Essayists, p.407

Reality

“He who tears down the cross, what is there left to lift him to heaven? The church claiming to be a Christian church is false to the title, if she make the cross of Christ of none effect.”

Herrick Johnson (1832–1913) American clergyman

Source: Dictionary of Burning Words of Brilliant Writers (1895), P. 173.

Tear, Christ, Falseness

“I don't know what effect these men will have on the enemy, but by God, they terrify me.”

Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (1769–1852) British soldier and statesman

Said to be his remarks on a draft of new troops sent to him in Spain (1809), as quoted in A New Dictionary of Quotations on Historical Principles from Ancient and Modern Sources (1942) by H. L. Mencken, this quote is disputed, and may be derived from a comment made to Colonel Robert Torrens about some of his generals in a despatch (29 August 1810): "As Lord Chesterfield said of the generals of his day, "I only hope that when the enemy reads the list of their names, he trembles as I do."
Disputed

Men, God

“Perhaps the best testimony to the effectiveness of the reforms of 1852 is the fact, that men of a slightly later generation, familiar with the working of the courts half a century after, find it difficult to believe that such abuses as are plainly described by the legislation of that year, should really have existed in the middle of the nineteenth century.”

Edward Jenks (1861–1939) British legal scholar

Source: A Short History Of The English Law (First Edition) (1912), Chapter XIX, Modern Civil Procedure, p. 360

Men

“I recommend that you provide the resources to carry forward, with full vigor, the great health and education programs that you enacted into law last year. I recommend that we prosecute with vigor and determination our war on poverty. I recommend that you give a new and daring direction to our foreign aid program, designed to make a maximum attack on hunger and disease and ignorance in those countries that are determined to help themselves, and to help those nations that are trying to control population growth. I recommend that you make it possible to expand trade between the United States and Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. I recommend to you a program to rebuild completely, on a scale never before attempted, entire central and slum areas of several of our cities in America. I recommend that you attack the wasteful and degrading poisoning of our rivers, and, as the cornerstone of this effort, clean completely entire large river basins. I recommend that you meet the growing menace of crime in the streets by building up law enforcement and by revitalizing the entire federal system from prevention to probation. I recommend that you take additional steps to insure equal justice to all of our people by effectively enforcing nondiscrimination in federal and state jury selection, by making it a serious federal crime to obstruct public and private efforts to secure civil rights, and by outlawing discrimination in the sale and rental of housing. I recommend that you help me modernize and streamline the federal government by creating a new Cabinet-level Department of Transportation and reorganizing several existing agencies. In turn, I will restructure our civil service in the top grades so that men and women can easily be assigned to jobs where they are most needed, and ability will be both required as well as rewarded. I will ask you to make it possible for members of the House of Representatives to work more effectively in the service of the nation through a constitutional amendment extending the term of a Congressman to four years, concurrent with that of the President. Because of Vietnam we cannot do all that we should, or all that we would like to do. We will ruthlessly attack waste and inefficiency. We will make sure that every dollar is spent with the thrift and with the commonsense which recognizes how hard the taxpayer worked in order to earn it. We will continue to meet the needs of our people by continuing to develop the Great Society. Last year alone the wealth that we produced increased $47 billion, and it will soar again this year to a total over $720 billion. Because our economic policies have produced rising revenues, if you approve every program that I recommend tonight, our total budget deficit will be one of the lowest in many years. It will be only $1.8 billion next year. Total spending in the administrative budget will be $112.8 billion. Revenues next year will be $111 billion. On a cash basis—which is the way that you and I keep our family budget—the federal budget next year will actually show a surplus. That is to say, if we include all the money that your government will take in and all the money that your government will spend, your government next year will collect one-half billion dollars more than it will spend in the year 1967. I have not come here tonight to ask for pleasant luxuries or for idle pleasures. I have come here to recommend that you, the representatives of the richest nation on earth, you, the elected servants of a people who live in abundance unmatched on this globe, you bring the most urgent decencies of life to all of your fellow Americans.”

Lyndon B. Johnson (1908–1973) American politician, 36th president of the United States (in office from 1963 to 1969)

1960s, State of the Union Address (1966)

Life, Women, Men, Money

“…let it be remembered that as photography is our chosen medium, then if photography unaided will give us the effect we want there is no especial virtue in altering it.”

Alfred Horsley Hinton (1863–1908) British photographer

Source: Practical Pictorial Photography, 1898, Printing the picture and controlling its formation, p. 79

“Should the United States seek so-called energy independence in an elusive effort to insulate this country from the impact of world events on the economy, or should Americans pursue the path of international engagement, seeking ways to better compete within the global market for energy? Like the Council's founders, I believe we must choose the course of greater international engagement … The central reality is this: The global free market for energy provides the most effective means of achieving U. S. energy security by promoting resource development, enabling diversification, multiplying our supply channels, encouraging efficiency, and spurring innovation.”

Rex Tillerson (1952) 69th United States Secretary of State

Addressing the Council on Foreign Relations (March 2007), as quoted in "Mr. Exxon Goes to Washington (Maybe)" by Liam Dennining, in Bloomberg Gadfly https://www.bloomberg.com/gadfly/articles/2016-12-07/rex-tillerson-secretary-of-state-what-it-would-mean

World, Way, Reality, Effort

“We need to recognise that the entire information sector—from music to newspapers to telecoms to internet to semiconductors and anything in-between—has become subject to a gigantic market failure in slow motion. A market failure exists when market prices cannot reach a self-sustaining equilibrium. The market failure of the entire information sector is one of the fundamental trends of our time, with far-reaching long-term effects, and it is happening right in front of our eyes.”

Eli Noam (1946) professor of Finance and Economics at the Columbia Business School

Eli Noam in: " Eli Noam: Market failure in the media sector http://www.citi.columbia.edu/elinoam/FT/2-16-04/MarketFailure.htm" at news.ft.com, February 16 2004 The context of this quote was a digression on the media, telecommunication, information technology, and internet industries.

Music, Failure, Time

“The Court is at liberty to transpose and mould clauses and words in a will so as to make the whole take effect.”

Sir Francis Buller, 1st Baronet (1746–1800) British judge

Doe v. Wilkinson (1788), 2 T. R. 223.

“I have just returned from a visit to Germany. … I have now seen the famous German leader and also something of the great change he has effected. Whatever one may think of his methods — and they are certainly not those of a Parliamentary country — there can be no doubt that he has achieved a marvellous transformation in the spirit of the people, in their attitude towards each other, and in their social and economic outlook.
One man has accomplished this miracle. He is a born leader of men. A magnetic dynamic personality with a single-minded purpose, a resolute will, and a dauntless heart. He is the national Leader. He is also securing them against that constant dread of starvation which is one of the most poignant memories of the last years of the war and the first years of the Peace. The establishment of a German hegemony in Europe which was the aim and dream of the old prewar militarism, is not even on the horizon of Nazism.”

David Lloyd George (1863–1945) Former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

As quoted in The Daily Express (17 November 1936)
Later life

Men, War, People, Peace

“Really, I'm not out to destroy Microsoft. That will just be a completely unintentional side effect.”

Linus Torvalds (1969) Finnish-American software engineer and hacker

New York Times, 2003-09-28, The Way We Live Now: Questions for Linus Torvalds http://www.nytimes.com/2003/09/28/magazine/the-way-we-live-now-9-28-03-questions-for-linus-torvalds-the-sharer.html, 2000s, 2000-04

“It is often sadly remarked that the bad economists present their errors to the public better than the good economists present their truths. It is often complained that demagogues can be more plausible in putting forward economic nonsense from the platform than the honest men who try to show what is wrong with it. But the basic reason for this ought not to be mysterious. The reason is that the demagogues and bad economists are presenting half-truths. They are speaking only of the immediate effect of a proposed policy or its effect upon a single group. As far as they go they may often be right. In these cases the answer consists in showing that the proposed policy would also have longer and less desirable effects, or that it could benefit one group only at the expense of all other groups. The answer consists in supplementing and correcting the half-truth with the other half. But to consider all the chief effects of a proposed course on everybody often requires a long, complicated, and dull chain of reasoning. Most of the audience finds this chain of reasoning difficult to follow and soon becomes bored and inattentive. The bad economists rationalize this intellectual debility and laziness by assuring the audience that it need not even attempt to follow the reasoning or judge it on its merits because it is only “classicism” or “laissez-faire,” or “capitalist apologetics” or whatever other term of abuse may happen to strike them as effective.”

Henry Hazlitt book Economics in One Lesson

Economics in One Lesson (1946), The Lesson (ch. 1)

Men, Truth, Error

“Beyond all doubt, the urgent need is to unite representatives of all political parties and groups and of people without any party affiliation and establish a provisional democratic coalition government for the purpose of instituting democratic reforms, surmounting the present crisis, mobilizing and unifying all the anti-Japanese forces in the country to fight in effective co-ordination with the allied countries for the defeat of the Japanese aggressors, and thus enabling the Chinese people to liberate themselves from the latter's clutches. After that it will be necessary to convene a national assembly on a broad democratic basis and set up a formally constituted democratic government, which will also be in the nature of a coalition and will have a still wider representation of people from all parties and groups or without any party affiliation, and which will lead the liberated people of the whole country in building an independent, free, democratic, united, prosperous and powerful new China. In short, we must take the line of unity and democracy, defeat the aggressors and build a new China.”

Mao Zedong (1893–1976) Chairman of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China

On Coalition Government (1945)

People, Democracy, Nature, Fight

“I am now further convinced that there is something to be said in general for studying the history of a lost cause. Perhaps our education would be more humane in result if everyone were required to gain an intimate acquaintance with some coherent ideal that failed in the effort to maintain itself. It need not be a cause which was settled by war; there are causes in the social, political, and ecclesiastical worlds which would serve very well. But it is good for everyone to ally himself at one time with the defeated and to look at the “progress” of history through the eyes of those who were left behind. I cannot think of a better way to counteract the stultifying “Whig” theory of history, with its bland assumption that every cause which has won has deserved to win, a kind of pragmatic debasement of the older providential theory. The study and appreciation of a lost cause have some effect of turning history into philosophy. In sufficient number of cases to make us humble, we discover good points in the cause which time has erased, just as one often learns more from the slain hero of a tragedy than from some brassy Fortinbras who comes in at the end to announce the victory and proclaim the future disposition of affairs. It would be perverse to say that this is so of every historical defeat, but there is enough analogy to make it a sober consideration. Not only Oxford, therefore, but every university ought to be to some extent“the home of lost causes and impossible loyalties.””

Richard M. Weaver (1910–1963) American scholar

It ought to preserve the memory of these with a certain discriminating measure of honor, trying to keep alive what was good in them and opposing the pragmatic verdict of the world.
"Up from Liberalism” Modern Age Vol. 3, No. 1 (Winter 1958-1959), p. 25, cols. 1-2.

War, World, Education, Way

“Capitalism imposes its laws of motion on the environment, irrespective of the biogeochemical cycles of the planet and the earth’s metabolism, so that it creates rifts or ruptures in the biogeochemical cycles of the Earth system, disrupting ecosystem relations in ways that transcend the mere scale-effects of economic growth. It is this problem of the metabolic rift that is our deepest challenge. Sustainability is more and more compromised at ever higher levels—a continually accelerating threat to civilization and life itself.”

John Bellamy Foster (1953) Sociology professor and Marxist writer

Interview with Left Voice (2017)

Life, Law, Way, Problem

“Theists’ typical response to these failures (i. e., of prayer to affect rates of healing) is to say either “God won’t let himself be tested” or “That’s not what prayer is about: it’s simply a way to converse with God.” But you can bet that had these studies shown a large positive effect, the religious would be noisily flaunting this as evidence for God. The confirmation bias shown by accepting positive results but explaining away negative ones is an important difference between science and religion.”

Jerry Coyne book Faith vs. Fact: Why Science and Religion are Incompatible

Source: Faith vs. Fact (2015), p. 116

God, Religion, Way, Failure

“The pornography of tough-mindedness, covert action, and preparedness for "peace through strength" has had a predictably hypnotic effect on the legislative branch, turning it from legal watchdog to lapdog.”

Christopher Hitchens (1949–2011) British American author and journalist

"The State Within the State" (1991).
1990s, For the Sake of Argument: Essays and Minority Reports (1993)

Peace

“In an unrestricted science such as biology or geology, the effects under study are so complex that designed experiments with controls are often not possible. Quantitative models are more vulnerable and the chance of unknown factors dominating the observations is much greater.”

Peter Checkland (1930) British management scientist

Source: Systems thinking, systems practice: includes a 30-year retrospective, 1999, p. 65

Study, Science, Chance

“I say if you have the urge to pursue this, do it, especially when you’re very young. If you don’t throw your marbles out and see what happens, for the rest of your life you’ll wonder what could have happened. And that can have negative effects on the rest of your life. Not necessarily devastating, but you’ll always have that nagging thing. When you go out like I did – I went from Arkansas to New York City – and if I had done that and spent five, 10 years trying to do it, I would either have been successful or I would have said, you know, I’m done with this. I gave it my shot. The only failure is not trying. And I encourage all young people, if you have any inkling whatsoever, that you can do this. At least try.”

Rodger Bumpass (1951) American character actor and voice actor

Rodger Bumpass is Squidward Tentacles http://georgiastatesignal.com/rodger-bumpass-is-squidward-tentacles/ (September 8, 2013)

Life, People, Failure, Success

“To see strong acting like this is exhilarating. In a time of flashy directors who slice and dice their films in a dizzy editing rhythm, it is important to remember that films can look and listen and attentively sympathize with their characters. Directors grow great by subtracting, not adding, and Eastwood does nothing for show, everything for effect.”

Roger Ebert (1942–2013) American film critic, author, journalist, and TV presenter

Reviews, Four star reviews Source: Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/mystic-river-2003 of Mystic River (8 October 2003)

Strong, Time

“Lucas and Sargent’s main argument was that Keynesian economics had ignored the full implications of the effect of expectations on behavior. The way to proceed, they argued, was to assume that people formed expectations as rationally as they could, based on the information they had. Thinking of people as having rational expectations had three major implications, all highly damaging to Keynesian macroeconomics. …
The first implication was that existing macroeconomic models could not be used to help design policy. … The second implication was that when rational expectations were introduced in Keynesian models, these models actually delivered very un-Keynesian conclusions. … The third implication was that if people and firms had rational expectations, it was wrong to think of policy as the control of a complicated but passive system. Rather, the right way was to think of policy as a game between policy makers and the economy. …
To summarize: When rational expectations were introduced, Keynesian models could not be used to determine policy; Keynesian models could not explain long-lasting deviations of output from the natural level of output; the theory of policy had to be redesigned, using the tools of game theory.”

Olivier Blanchard (1948) French economist

Source: Macroeconomics (7th Edition, 2017), Ch. 24 : Epilogue: The Story of Macroeconomics

People, Way, Behavior, Game

“Industry must further expand its horizon of thinking and action Industry must further expand its horizon of thinking and action. It must assume the role of an enlightened industrial statesmanship. To the extent that it accepts such broadened responsibilities, to that degree does it assure the maintenance of private enterprise, and with it the exercise of free initiative as the most efficient creator of wealth.
During the past few years it has become the vogue to discredit every instrumentality of accomplishment, be it the individual or the machine. It has been said that American industry is selfish. It would be far more just to say that it has been preoccupied — preoccupied in exploring the secrets of nature and creating a continuous flow of new products.
But, as we look forward, and as we analyze the evolution that has occurred, I am convinced that industry's responsibilities can no longer be adequately discharged, however efficient and effective it may be, with the mere physical production of goods and services.”

Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman

as cited in: Thurman Arnold. The Folklore of Capitalism. (2000), p. 72
New York Times interview, 1935

Secret, Exercises, Nature, Thinking

“Cybernetics is concerned primarily with the construction of theories and models in science, without making a hard and fast distinction between the physical and the biological sciences. The theories and models occur both in symbols and in hardware, and by 'hardware* we shall mean a machine or computer built in terms of physical or chemical, or indeed any handleable parts. Most usually we shall think of hardware as meaning electronic parts such as valves and relays. Cybernetics insists, also, on a further and rather special condition that distinguishes it from ordinary scientific theorizing: it demands a certain standard of effectiveness. In this respect it has acquired some of the same motive power that has driven research on modern logic, and this is especially true in the construction and application of artificial languages and the use of operational definitions. Always the search is for precision and effectiveness, and we must now discuss the question of effectiveness in some detail. It should be noted that when we talk in these terms we are giving pride of place to the theory of automata at the expense, at least to some extent, of feedback and information theory.”

Frank Honywill George (1921–1997) British psychologist

Source: The Brain As A Computer (1962), p.2

Search, Motivation, Question, Thinking

“The forms of social organization produced the market, not the reverse… Instead of markets calling forth efficient forms of social organization, political and social interactions produced the structuring of sociologically effective markets.”

Neil Fligstein (1951) American sociologist

Source: The transformation of corporate control, 1993, p. 300

“The US and Israel have demanded further that Palestinians not only recognize Israel's rights as a state in the international system, but that they also recognize Israel's abstract "right to exist," a concept that has no place in international law or diplomacy, and a right claimed by no one. In effect, the US and Israel are demanding that Palestinians not only recognize Israel in the normal fashion of interstate relations, but also formally accept the legitimacy of their expulsion from their own land. They cannot be expected to accept that, just as Mexico does not grant the US the "right to exist" on half of Mexico's territory, gained by conquest.”

Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist

Interview by Sabahattin Atas, circa September 2003 (see also: Necessary Illusions https://web.archive.org/web/20000307213545/http://www.zmag.org/chomsky/ni/ni-c10-s16.html) http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/200309--.htm. Quotes 2000s, 2003

Law, Fashion

“If you do a good act, it cancels the effects of your evil deeds. If one prays, takes the Name of God and thinks of Him, the effects of evil are cancelled.”

Sarada Devi (1853–1920) Hindu religious figure, spiritual consort of Ramakrishna

[In the Company of the Holy Mother, 68]

God, Thinking, Evil

“I guess it was the big plane crash picture [why Warhol started his 'Death'-series], the front page of a newspaper: '129 DIED'. I was also painting the Marilyns [the Marylin Monroe portraits, Warhol started after her tragic death in 1962] I realized that everything I was doing must have been death. It was Christmas or Labor Day - a holiday - and very time that you turned on the radio they said something like '4 millions are going to die'. That started it. But when you see I gruesome picture over and over again, it doesn't really have any effect.”

Andy Warhol (1928–1987) American artist

Source: 1963 - 1967, What Is Pop Art? Interviews with Eight Painters, Part 1 (1963), pp. 116-19

Death, Time, Holiday, Christmas

“For a number of years I have been familiar with the observation that the quality of programmers is a decreasing function of the density of go to statements in the programs they produce. More recently I discovered why the use of the go to statement has such disastrous effects, and I became convinced that the go to statement should be abolished from all "higher level" programming languages.”

Edsger W. Dijkstra (1930–2002) Dutch computer scientist

1960s

“David Ricardo saw that the escalator worked with different effects on different classes, that some rode triumphantly to the top, while others were carried up a few steps and then kicked back down to the bottom.”

Robert L. Heilbroner book The Worldly Philosophers

Source: The Worldly Philosophers (1953), Chapter IV, Parson Malthus and David Ricardo, p. 71

“Ionizing radiation has always been with us and will be for all foreseeable time. Our genetic system is probably well adjusted by natural selection to normal background radiation. Added radiation will increase the frequency of mutations; most of these will be harmful. Exposure to radiation in large amounts will increase malignant disease; small amounts may possibly do the same. In view of these potentially harmful effects every reasonable effort should be made to reduce the levels of ionizing radiation to which man is exposed to to the lowest levels that can reasonably be attained.”

George Beadle

in Scientific American, September 1959

Disease, Nature, Effort, Time

“Profound as race prejudice is against the Negro American, it is not practically as far-reaching as the prejudice against women. For stripping away the sentimentality which makes Mother’s Day and Best American Mother Contests, the truth is that women suffer all the effects of a minority.”

Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973) American writer

Of Men and Women (1941), Ch. 8

Women, Truth, Suffering

“Yes, they are beautiful… The shirt, the blouse are garments the folds of which yield simple planes and effects that, rightly rendered, are those of true sculpture. But there is something better still, and that is sackcloth. If I had clothed my 'Burghers of Calais' in sackcloth, they would certainly be more beautiful. I did not dare to. Some one else will do this and will succeed. It is sufficient to express an idea and leave it to its destiny.”

Auguste Rodin (1840–1917) French sculptor

Source: Rodin : the man and his art, with leaves from his notebook, 1917, p. 295-296; About the sculpture The Burghers of Calais

Beauty, Idea, Clothes

“The most effective lie is ninety-nine percent true.”

Robert Ferrigno (1947) American writer

Prayers For The Assassin (2006)

Lie

“In any event, by 1930 it was evident that Fascism, for its own purposes, would have to evolve institutions and techniques to restrict the independent power of the possessing classes. This was to be effected not only to render the state truly sovereign, but also to defend those socialist values that Fascist syndicalists and neo-idealists had never abjured.”

A. James Gregor (1929–2019) American political scientist

Source: The Ideology of Fascism: The Rationale of Totalitarianism, (1969), p. 296

“Strictly speaking, the word hypnotism should be reserved only for those patients who actually fall into a state of sleep, and who forget upon awakening all that occurred during this state. When this is lacking, it is a question merely of reverie or dreaming. It would therefore be apposite to establish a terminology, characterising these modifications which result from the hypnotic process; indeed, with regard to those conditions resistant to ordinary medication and suitable for cure by hypnotism, hardly one patient in ten arrives at the unconscious stage of sleep (at least for the whole duration of the process). The word “hypnotism” can then lead them into error and make them believe that they do not benefit in any way from a process of which the characteristic and obvious effects do not appear to be those that the name [i. e., "hypnotic sleep"] indicates.”

James Braid (1795–1860) Scottish surgeon, hypnotist, and hypnotherapist

Original Philosophy of Hypnotism The International College of Hypnosis & Hypnotherapy

Dreams, Way, Error, Question

“How sadly possible it is to delight in the rest of faith while forgetful to fight the good fight; to dwell upon the cleansing and the purity effected by faith, but to have little thought for the poor souls struggling in the mire of sin.”

James Hudson Taylor (1832–1905) Missionary in China

(Hudson Taylor’s Choice Sayings: A Compilation from His Writings and Addresses. London: China Inland Mission, n.d., 71).

Faith, Soul, Fight, Forgetting

“The primary function of a constitution was to mark out the boundaries of governmental powers-hence in England, where there was no constitution, there were no limits (save for the effect of trail by jury) to what the legislature might do.”

Bernard Bailyn book The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution

Source: The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution (1967), Chapter V, TRANSFORMATION, p. 182.

“Work a great deal at evening effects, lamplight, candlelight, etc. The intriguing thing is not to show the source of the light but the effect of the lighting.”

Edgar Degas (1834–1917) French artist

posthumous quotes, The Shop-Talk of Edgar Degas', (1961)

Light

“But topographical details have a strange effect on me : instead of clarifying and sharpening images from past, they give me a harrowing sensation of emptiness and severed relationships.”

Patrick Modiano (1945) French writer

p 44
After the Circus (1992) English translation 2015

Past

“The management system of an organization must have compatible component parts if it is to function effectively. This conclusion has a very important implication; experiments in organizations must involve internally consistent changes. The traditional atomistic research design is not appropriate for experiments involving organizational theory or management systems. Every aspect of a management system is related to every other part and interacts with it.
The results obtained by altering a single variable or procedure while keeping all others the same usually will yield quite different results from those obtained when that variable is changed along with simultaneous and compatible changes in all other aspects of the management system. The true influence of altering one aspect of the system cannot be determined by varying it and it alone… In experiments involving organizational theory and management systems, therefore, a systems approach must be used. The organic integrity of each system must be maintained while experimental variations are being made.”

Rensis Likert (1903–1981) American statistician

Source: The Human Organization, 1967, p. 123

Change, Parting

“Everything depends, of course, on the shape of the hand, and it must be stressed that there is no type of hand which is more suited to the piano than another. One of the greatest pianists that I ever heard—certainly the most remarkable in his control of the widest possible range and variety of tone color—was Josef Hoffman, who had a hand so small that he could reach no more than an octave; Steinway built him a special piano in which the ivories were slightly narrower so that he could reach a ninth. His friend Sergei Rachmaninov had a very large hand, as did Rudolf Serkin, and Sviatoslav Richter could not only reach a twelfth but could play the last chord of the Schumann Toccata without arpeggiation—an effect which would certainly have astonished the composer. My teacher, Moriz Rosenthal, famous for his technique, had a small hand with stubby fingers; Vladimir Horowitz's fingers were exceptionally long, while Robert Casadesus had fingers so thick that he had trouble fitting them in between the black keys. There is no such thing as an ideal pianist's hand.”

Charles Rosen (1927–2012) American pianist and writer on music

Source: Piano Notes: The World of the Pianist (2002), Ch. 1 Body and Mind

Color, Teachers, Dependency

“Every cause produces more than one effect.”

Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) English philosopher, biologist, sociologist, and prominent classical liberal political theorist

On Progress: Its Law and Cause
Essays on Education (1861)

“Fantasy, by its power to move us so deeply, to dramatize, even melo-dramatize, morality, can be one of the most effective means of establishing a capacity for adult values.”

Lloyd Alexander (1924–2007) American children's writer

"Wishful Thinking – Or Hopeful Dreaming?" (1968)

“Freud spoke of oceanic consciousness as that in which we feel our individual existence lost in mystic union with the universe. Nothing could be more appropriate to contemporary experience, when for the first time man has left the boundaries of this globe. The oceanic effect of synaesthetic cinema is similar to the mystical allure of the natural elements: we stare in mindless wonder at the ocean or a lake or river. We are drawn almost hypnotically to fire, gazing as though spellbound. We see cathedrals in clouds, not thinking anything in particular but feeling somehow secure and content. It is similar to the concept of no-mindedness in Zen, which also is the state of mantra and mandala consciousness, the widest range of consciousness.”

Gene Youngblood book Expanded Cinema

Source: Expanded Cinema, 1970, p. 92, as cited in: " Expanded Cinema, Gene Youngblood, Studio Vista, 1970 http://www.hohlwelt.com/en/books/gyngbld.html" at hohlwelt.com, January 21, 2012

Feeling, Nature, Thinking, Universe

“The microphone-amplifier-loudspeaker combination is having an enormous effect on our civilization. Not all of it is good! Consider to what heights of impudence and tyranny, and to what depths of moral depravity, has radio broadcasting and the loudspeaker attained in that recent monstrosity, Transit Radio, Inc. Almost incredible is the loathsome fact that already in 21 cities bus riders must listen to never-ending, blatant advertising and unwelcome jitterbug and bop music.”

Lee De Forest (1873–1961) American inventor

"Dawn of the Electronic Age" http://blog.modernmechanix.com/2006/03/20/dawn-of-the-electronic-age/, Popular Mechanics, January 1952

Music

“Today, the picture is more black. War would riot only mean a threat to our independence, it may mean the end of civilisation and even of human life. There is a force loose in the world whose potentiality for evil no man truly knows. Even in practice and rehearsal for war the effects may well be building up into something of unknown horror.”

Sukarno (1901–1970) first President of the Republic of Indonesia

Speech at the Opening of the Bandung Conference

Life, War, World, Evil

Quotes about effective page 29

Quotes about effective
page 29