Quotes about method
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“George Stephenson told me as a young man that railways will supersede almost all other methods of conveyance in this country — when mail-coaches will go by railway, and railroads will become the great highway for the king and all his subjects. I know there are great and almost insurmountable difficulties to be encountered; but what I have said will come to pass as sure as you live.”

George Stephenson (1781–1848) English civil engineer and mechanical engineer

John Dixon, quoted by Samuel Smiles, Life of George Stephenson (1875)

Country

“Laws, at best, are attempts to control a population, and work only sporadically with great expense and hardship. Other common behaviorcontrol methods are patriotism, religion, propaganda, and nationalism. All manmade laws are developed to preserve the established order.”

Jacque Fresco (1916–2017) American futurist and self-described social engineer

Source: The Best That Money Can't Buy: Beyond Politics, Poverty, & War (2002), p. 72

Religion, Law

“There are two keys to tackling the (COVID-19) epidemic: early detection and early isolation. They are the most primitive and most effective methods.”

Zhong Nanshan (1936) Chinese pulmonologist

Zhong Nanshan (2020) cited in " Wuhan virus outbreak may reach peak in a week or about 10 days, says expert https://www.thestar.com.my/news/regional/2020/01/29/wuhan-virus-outbreak-may-reach-peak-in-a-week-or-about-10-days-says-expert" on The Star Online, 29 January 2020.

“Any belief or method that is being used to fuel denial is by definition an enemy to awakening, enlightenment, awareness and expansion.”

Teal Swan (1984) American spiritual teacher

“I really believe in the art of storytelling and as an actor, I think it’s such a great opportunity to be able to do what we do because so many people are trying to do that and I’ve worked for so long to try to get interesting opportunities that I just wanna make sure I do the character justice. I guess you could call it method in many ways but for me, it’s just trying to commit to the character in the best way possible, whatever that entails, whether it’s giving yourself acne or diving into a very dark place.”

Calum Worthy (1991) Canadian actor

Calum Worthy (‘The Act’) on the ‘harsh’ sentence Nicholas Godejohn received https://www.goldderby.com/article/2019/calum-worthy-the-act-hulu-nicholas-godejohn-video-interview-transcript/ (April 29, 2019)

People, Making love, Justice, Art

“We must be prepared for new tactics to be implemented by the enemy. We should follow them closely and evaluate the possible methods he can apply using our intelligence.”

Attila (406–453) King of the Hunnic Empire

Turkish Wikipedia
https://quotestats.com/topic/attila-hun-quotes/

Intelligence

“One must indeed be ignorant of the methods of genius to suppose that it allows itself to be cramped by forms. Forms are for mediocrity, and it is fortunate that mediocrity can act only according to routine. Ability takes its flight unhindered.”

Napoleon I of France (1769–1821) French general, First Consul and later Emperor of the French

Napoleon : In His Own Words (1916)

“Death on the cross raised many doubts in the people. Having some bruises on the hands and feet. But it would've been a different story if the methods of hanging was involved. Simply, because it is the most peaceful death that doesn't involve the shedding of the blood.”

Mwanandeke Kindembo (1996) Congolese author

Death, People, Peace

“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

“Tori joined us for dinner --in body, at least. She spent the meal practicing for a role in the next zombie movie, expressionless, methodically moving fork to mouth, sometimes even with food on it.”

Kelley Armstrong book The Summoning

Source: The Summoning

Food

“If we are to achieve things never before accomplished we must employ methods never before attempted”

Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English philosopher, statesman, scientist, jurist, and author

“We of this age have discovered a shorter, and more prudent method to become scholars and wits, without the fatigue of reading or of thinking.”

Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, and poet

Age, Thinking, Reading

“I feel an almost overwhelming interest in the methods of daylight abduction employed by the modern youth.”

Georgette Heyer book Devil's Cub

Source: Devil's Cub

Youth, Feeling

“Sometimes I feel sure he is as mad as a hatter and then, just as he is at his maddest, I find there is a method in his madness.”

Agatha Christie book The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Source: The Mysterious Affair at Styles

Feeling, Madness

“Christ furnished the spirit and motivation while Gandhi furnished the method.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

Source: The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr.

Motivation, Christ

“If that is what this world is, what humans are… There is no future. Understanding and faith… If you take those away, all that's left is fear. I can't accept immoral methods or giving up.”

Masashi Kishimoto book Naruto

Source: Naruto, Band 11

World, Fear, Faith, Understanding

“All human errors are impatience, the premature breaking off of what is methodical, an apparent fencing in of the apparent thing.”

Franz Kafka book The Zürau Aphorisms

2
Variant translation: All human errors are impatience, a premature breaking off of methodical procedure, an apparent fencing-in of what is apparently at issue.
The Zürau Aphorisms (1917 - 1918)

Error

“To pay compliments to the one we love is the first method of caressing, a demi-audacity venturing. A compliment is something like a kiss through a veil.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

Love, Kiss

“A tree growing out of the ground is as wonderful today as it ever was. It does not need to adopt new and startling methods.”

Robert Henri (1865–1929) American painter

Tree

“The way out is through the door. Why is it that no one will use this method?”

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

Way

“You know my methods. Apply them.”

Arthur Conan Doyle book The Sign of the Four

Source: The Sign of Four

“The real purpose of the scientific method is to make sure nature hasn’t misled you into thinking you know something you actually don’t know.”

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

Source: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry Into Values

Nature, Thinking

“As for methods of prayer, all are good, as long as they are sincere.”

Victor Hugo book Les Misérables

Source: Les Misérables

Sincerity

“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

“Once you've started cheating, does it really matter what your methods are?”

Sophie Kinsella book I've Got Your Number

Source: I've Got Your Number

Cheating

“Death didn't bother me much. Strong Christian and all that. Method of death did. Being eaten alive. One of my top three ways not to go out.”

Laurell K. Hamilton book The Laughing Corpse

Source: The Laughing Corpse

Death, Way, Strong

“Books have to be read (worse luck it takes so long a time). It is the only way of discovering what they contain. A few savage tribes eat them, but reading is the only method of assimilation revealed to the West.”

E.M. Forster (1879–1970) English novelist

Books, Way, Time, Reading

“Asia is not going to be civilised after the methods of the West. There is too much Asia and she is too old.”

Rudyard Kipling The Man Who Was

The Man Who Was (1891).
Other works

“Democracy is a poor system of government at best; the only thing that can honestly be said in its favor is that it is eight times as good as any other method the human race has ever tried.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Stranger in a Strange Land

Source: Stranger in a Strange Land

Democracy, Time

“The problem with competition is that it takes away the requirement to set your own path, to invent your own method, to find a new way.”

Seth Godin (1960) American entrepreneur, author and public speaker

"Competition as a crutch" http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/07/competition-as-a-crutch.html Seth's Blog (2012-07-16) <br class="br">Source: Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?

Way, Problem

“In the end, I must proclaim that no good can be achieved of false means. For the substance of our existence is not in the achievement, but in the method.”

Brandon Sanderson book The Way of Kings

Source: The Way of Kings

Falseness

“Isn’t every human being both a scientist and an artist; and in writing of human experience, isn’t there a good deal to be said for recognizing that fact and for using both methods?”

James Agee book Let Us Now Praise Famous Men

Source: Let Us Now Praise Famous Men

“Survivors can't always choose their methods.”

Patricia Briggs (1965) American writer

Source: Dragon Blood

“The first method for estimating the intelligence of a ruler is to look at the men he has around him.”

Niccolo Machiavelli book The Prince

Source: The Prince

Men, Intelligence

“I don't have a method of stepping into the depths of your heart without getting it dirty." -Kuchiki Rukia”

Tite Kubo (1977) Japanese manga artist

Heart

“Humor is an excellent method of keeping a tight rein on unproductive displays of emotion.”

Elizabeth Peters The Hippopotamus Pool

Source: The Hippopotamus Pool

“He invented Kung Fu when translated to English means method by which short, bald guys can kick the bejeezus out of you.”

Christopher Moore book Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Source: Lamb: The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal

Guy

“Every human being must find his own way to cope with severe loss, and the only job of a true friend is to facilitate whatever method he chooses.”

Caleb Carr (1955) Novelist, screenwriter, military historian

Way, Loss

“Probability is not a mere computation of odds on the dice or more complicated variants; it is the acceptance of the lack of certainty in our knowledge and the development of methods for dealing with our ignorance.”

Nassim Nicholas Taleb (1960) Lebanese-American essayist, scholar, statistician, former trader and risk analyst

Source: Fooled by Randomness: The Hidden Role of Chance in Life and in the Markets

Knowledge

“How guilt refined the methods of self-torture, threading the beads of detail into an eternal loop, a rosary to be fingered for a lifetime.”

Ian McEwan book Atonement

Source: Atonement

“She was remorseless, but she lacked method.”

Diana Wynne Jones book Howl's Moving Castle

Source: Howl's Moving Castle

“Grimly, she realized that clocks don't make a sound that even remotely resembles ticking, tocking. It was more the sound of a hammer, upside down, hacking methodically at the earth. It was the sound of a grave.”

Markus Zusak book The Book Thief

Source: The Book Thief

“The underlying point held; experience as well as common sense indicated that the most reliable method of avoiding self-extinction was not to equip oneself with the means to accomplish it in the first place.”

Iain Banks book Consider Phlebas

Source: Culture series, Consider Phlebas (1987), Chapter 4 “Temple of Light” (p. 96).

Sense

“Faith is universal. Our specific methods for understanding it are arbitrary. Some of us pray to Jesus, some of us go to Mecca, some of us study subatomic particles. In the end we are all just searching for truth, that which is greater than ourselves.”

Dan Brown book Angels & Demons

Source: Angels & Demons

Truth, Faith, Search, Understanding

“Music resembles poetry, in each
Are nameless graces which no methods teach,
And which a master hand alone can reach.”

Alexander Pope An Essay on Criticism

Source: An Essay on Criticism

Music

“They envy the distinction I have won; let them, therefore, envy my toils, my honesty, and the methods by which I gained it.”

Sallust (-86–-34 BC) Roman historian, politician

Envy

“You know my method. It is founded upon the observation of trifles.”

Arthur Conan Doyle book The Boscombe Valley Mystery

Source: The Boscombe Valley Mystery

“When the number of factors coming into play in a phenomenological complex is too large, scientific method in most cases fails us. One need only think of the weather, in which case prediction even for a few days ahead is impossible. Nevertheless no one doubts that we are confronted with a causal connection whose causal components are in the main known to us.
Occurrences in this domain are beyond the reach of exact prediction because of the variety of factors in operation, not because of any lack of order in nature.”

Albert Einstein (1879–1955) German-born physicist and founder of the theory of relativity

1940s, Science and Religion (1941)

Nature, Thinking, Weather

“I don't have a method. All I do is read a lot, think a lot, and rewrite constantly. It's not a scientific thing.”

Gabriel García Márquez (1927–2014) Colombian writer

Source: Conversations with Gabriel García Márquez

Thinking, Reading

“A sufficient and sure method of civilization is in the influence of good women.”

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882) American philosopher, essayist, and poet

Women

“If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.”

Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929–1968) American clergyman, activist, and leader in the American Civil Rights Movement

1960s, Nobel Prize acceptance speech (1964)
Context: Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time — the need for mankind to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts… Sooner or later all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

Love, Revenge

“Crime is terribly revealing. Try and vary your methods as you will, your tastes, your habits, your attitude of mind, and your soul is revealed by your actions.”

Agatha Christie And Then There Were None

The ABC Murders (1936)
Source: And Then There Were None

Soul

“When an active individual of sound common sense perceives the sordid state of the world, desire to change it becomes the guiding principle by which he organizes given facts and shapes them into a theory. The methods and categories as well as the transformation of the theory can be understood only in connection with his taking of sides. This, in turn, discloses both his sound common sense and the character of the world. Right thinking depends as much on right willing as right willing on right thinking.”

Max Horkheimer (1895–1973) German philosopher and sociologist

Source: "The Latest Attack on Metaphysics" (1937), p. 162.

World, Thinking, Sense, Change

“Mathematics because of its nature and structure is peculiarly fitted for high school instruction [Gymnasiallehrfach]. Especially the higher mathematics, even if presented only in its elements, combines within itself all those qualities which are demanded of a secondary subject. It engages, it fructifies, it quickens, compels attention, is as circumspect as inventive, induces courage and self-confidence as well as modesty and submission to truth. It yields the essence and kernel of all things, is brief in form and overflows with its wealth of content. It discloses the depth and breadth of the law and spiritual element behind the surface of phenomena; it impels from point to point and carries within itself the incentive toward progress; it stimulates the artistic perception, good taste in judgment and execution, as well as the scientific comprehension of things. Mathematics, therefore, above all other subjects, makes the student lust after knowledge, fills him, as it were, with a longing to fathom the cause of things and to employ his own powers independently; it collects his mental forces and concentrates them on a single point and thus awakens the spirit of individual inquiry, self-confidence and the joy of doing; it fascinates because of the view-points which it offers and creates certainty and assurance, owing to the universal validity of its methods. Thus, both what he receives and what he himself contributes toward the proper conception and solution of a problem, combine to mature the student and to make him skillful, to lead him away from the surface of things and to exercise him in the perception of their essence. A student thus prepared thirsts after knowledge and is ready for the university and its sciences. Thus it appears, that higher mathematics is the best guide to philosophy and to the philosophic conception of the world (considered as a self-contained whole) and of one’s own being.”

Christian Heinrich von Dillmann (1829–1899) German educationist

Source: Die Mathematik die Fackelträgerin einer neuen Zeit (Stuttgart, 1889), p. 40.

Truth, World, School, Law

“It is a curious thing that relatively little attention has been directed toward working out methods for keeping the peace in a disarmed world. The technological The technological developments of the last twenty years have made disarmament a major concern of most nations, for it has become apparent that war is no longer an effective means for settling disputes between the great powers.”

John R. Platt (1918–1992) American physicist

Alexander Rich and John R. Platt (1966) "How to Keep the Peace" in: Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. April 1966. p. 14

War, World, Peace

“The regulative principles of management along scientific lines include four important elements:
(a) Planning of the processes and operations in detail by a special department organized for this purpose.
(b) Functional organization by which each man superintending the workman is responsible for a single line of effort. This is distinctly opposed to the older type of military organization, where every man in the management is given a combination of executive, legislative and judicial functions.
(c) Training the worker so as to require him to do each job in what has been found to be the best method of operation.
(d) Equable payment of the workers based on quantity and quality of output of each individual. This involves scientific analysis of each operation to determine the proper time that should be required for its accomplishment and also high payment for the worker who obtains the object sought.”

Hugo Diemer (1870–1937) American mechanical engineer

(1921, p. 10); Diemer quotes the ASCM committee
Factory organization and administration, 1910

Effort, Time, Training

“The word " economy" has latterly been used in various senses; the Germans give it a very indefinite signification.
Judging from its etymology and original signification, the Greeks seem to have understood by it the establishment and direction of the menage, or domestic arrangements.
Xenophon, in his work on economy, treats of domestic management, the reciprocal duties of the members of a family and of those who compose the household; and only incidentally mentions agriculture as having relation to domestic affairs. This word is never applied to agriculture by Xenophon, nor, indeed, by any Greek author; they distinguish it by the terms, georgic geoponic.
The Romans give a very extensive and indefinite signification to the word "economy." They understand by it, the best method of attaining the aim and end of some particular thing; or the disposition, plan, and division of some particular work. Thus, Cicero speaks of oeconomia causae, oeconomia orationis; and by this he means the direction of a law process, the arrangement of an harangue. Several German authors use it in this sense when they speak of the oekonomie eines schauspiels, or eines gedichtes, the economy of a play or poem. Authors of other nations have adopted all the significations which the Romans have attached to this word, and understand by it the relation of the various parts of any particular thing to each other and to the whole—that which we are accustomed to term the organization. The word "economy" only acquires a real sense when applied to some particular subject: thus, we hear of "the economy of nature," "the animal economy," and " the economy of the state" spoken of. It is also applied to some particular branch of science or industry; but, in the latter case, the nature of the economy ought to be pointed out, if it is not indicated by the nature of the subject.”

Albrecht Thaer (1752–1828) German agronomist and an avid supporter of the humus theory for plant nutrition

Source: The Principles of Agriculture, 1844, Section II. The Economy, Organization and Direction of an Agricultural Enterprise, p. 54-55.

Family, Law, Understanding, Nature

“In the 1950s, I proposed the survivor method of determining the efficient sizes of enterprises, and worked on delivered price systems, vertical integration, and similar topics.”

George Stigler (1911–1991) American economist

"George J. Stigler - Biographical," 1982

“So long as commerce specializes in business methods which take no account of human nature and social motives, so long may we expect strikes and sabotage to be the ordinary accompaniment of industry. Sabotage is essentially a protest of the human spirit against dull mechanism. And the emphasis which democracy places upon political methods tends to transform mere sporadic acts of sabotage into an organized conspiracy against society.”

Elton Mayo (1880–1949) Australian academic

Source: Democracy and freedom. 1919, p. 56

Democracy, Motivation, Business, Nature

“If one approaches a problem with order and method there should be no difficulty in solving it — none whatever,’ said Pirot severely.”

Agatha Christie book Death in the Clouds

Death in the Clouds (1935)

Problem

“The true method of knowledge is experiment.”

William Blake book All Religions are One

All Religions are One (1788)
1780s

Knowledge

“It is a defect in the existing histories that, while they state generally the contents of, and the main propositions proved in, the great treatises of Archimedes and Apollonius, they make little attempt to describe the procedure by which the results are obtained. I have therefore taken pains, in the most significant cases, to show the course of the argument in sufficient detail to enable a competent mathematician to grasp the method used and to apply it, if he will, to other similar investigations.”

Thomas Little Heath (1861–1940) British civil servant and academic

A History of Greek Mathematics (1921) Vol. 1. From Thales to Euclid

Pain, History

“The first question we should face is: What is the aim of a physical theory? To this question diverse answers have been made, but all of them may be reduced to two main principles:
"A physical theory," certain logicians have replied, "has for its object the explanation of a group of laws experimentally established."
"A physical theory," other thinkers have said, "is an abstract system whose aim is to summarize and classify logically a group of experimental laws without claiming to explain these laws…
Now these two questions — Does there exist a material reality distinct from sensible appearances? and What is the nature of reality? — do not have their source in experimental method, which is acquainted only with sensible appearances and can discover nothing beyond them. The resolution of these questions transcends the methods used by physics; it is the object of metaphysics.
Therefore, if the aim of physical theories is to explain experimental laws, theoretical physics is not an autonomous science; it is subordinate to metaphysics…
Now, to make physical theories depend on metaphysics is surely not the way to let them enjoy the privilege of universal consent.”

Pierre Duhem (1861–1916) French physicist, historian of science

Notice sur les Titres et Travaux scientifiques de Pierre Duhem rédigée par lui-même lors de sa candidature à l'Académie des sciences (mai 1913), The Aim and Structure of Physical Theory (1906)

Law, Way, Question, Nature

“No particular results then, so far, but only an attitude of orientation, is what the pragmatic method means. The attitude of looking away from first things, principles, 'categories,' supposed necessities; and of looking towards last things, fruits, consequences, facts.”

William James (1842–1910) American philosopher, psychologist, and pragmatist

Lecture II, What Pragmatism Means
1900s, Pragmatism: A New Name for Some Old Ways of Thinking (1907)

“To pass through different situations, different types of questioning may be useful. So many doors have been opened by asking a correct and useful question and so many issues can be solved only using this method.”

Elia M. Ramollah (1973) founder and leader of the El Yasin Community

The Great Master of Thought (Amen- Vol.3), Observing management

Question

“Only an unashamed dogmatist would dare to assert that the issue has finally been resolved now, in favor of the view that, outside logic or mathematics, the method of modern science is the only method to employ in seeking knowledge. The dogmatist who made this assertion would have to be more than ashamed. He would have to blind himself to the fact that his own assertion was not established by the experimental method, nor made as an indisputable conclusion of mathematical reasoning or of purely logical analysis.”

Robert Maynard Hutchins (1899–1977) philosopher and university president

Great Books: The Foundation of a Liberal Education (1954)

Mathematics, Knowledge, Science

“We have already various treatises on Mechanics, but the plan of this one is entirely new. I intend to reduce the theory of this Science, and the art of solving problems relating to it, to general formulae, the simple development of which provides all the equations necessary for the solution of each problem. I hope that the manner in which I have tried to attain this object will leave nothing to be desired. No diagrams will be found in this work. The methods that I explain require neither geometrical, nor mechanical, constructions or reasoning, but only algebraical operations in accordance with regular and uniform procedure. Those who love Analysis will see with pleasure that Mechanics has become a branch of it, and will be grateful to me for having thus extended its domain.”

Joseph Louis Lagrange book Mécanique analytique

Mécanique analytique (1788) as quoted by E. W. Hobson, Mathematics, from the points of view of the Mathematician and of the Physicist (1912) an address delivered to the Mathematical and Physical Society of University College London, p.13. https://books.google.com/books?id=H7Y_AQAAIAAJ&pg=PA13

Love, Pleasure, Hope, Art

“The natural sciences did not advance in virtue of the universal appeal of rationality. Their theological, classicist and metaphysical opponents were not converted but displaced. All the ancient universities had to be compelled by outside pressure to make room for science; and most nations began to appreciate it only after succumbing to the weapons produced with its aid. To cut a long story short, scientific method has triumphed throughout the world because it bestowed upon those who practised it power over those who did not. Sorcery lost not because of any waning of its intrinsic appeal to the human mind, but because it failed to match the power created by science. But, though abandoned as a tool for controlling nature, incantations remain more effective for manipulating crowds than logical arguments, so that in the conduct of human affairs sorcery continues to be stronger than science.”

Stanislav Andreski (1919–2007) Polish-British sociologist

Social Sciences as Sorcery (1972)

World, Nature, Universe, Science

“I was looking for some sort of systematic way of getting down these subjective images and I had always admired, particularly admired the early Italian painters who proceeded the Renaissance and I very much liked some of the altarpieces in which there would be, for example the story of Christ told in a series of boxes... And it seemed to me this was a very rational method of conveying something. So I decided to try it. But I was not interested in telling, in giving something its chronological sequence. What I wanted to do was give something, to present what material I was interested in simultaneously so that you would get an instantaneous impact from it. So, I made boxes..”

Adolph Gottlieb (1903–1974) American artist

Variant: I was looking for some sort of systematic way of getting down these subjective images and I had always admired, particularly admired the early Italian painters who proceeded the Renaissance and I very much liked some of the altarpieces in which there would be, for example the story of Christ told in a series of boxes... And it seemed to me this was a very rational method of conveying something. So I decided to try it. But I was not interested in telling, in giving something its chronological sequence. What I wanted to do was give something, to present what material I was interested in simultaneously so that you would get an instantaneous impact from it. So I made boxes..
Source: 1960s, Interview with Dorothy Seckler, 1967, p. 55-59.

Way, Christ, Box

“Bottom trawls—large bag-shaped nets towed over the sea floor—account for more of the world's catch of fish, shrimp, squid, and other marine animals than any other fishing method. But trawling also disturbs the sea floor more than any other human activity, with increasingly devastating consequences for the world's fish population.”

Carl Safina (1955) American biologist

[Scorched-Earth Fishing, Issues in Science and Technology, 14, 3, Spring 1998, 33–36, http://www.jstor.org/stable/43313863]

World, Fish, Animals, Sea

“Econometrics may be defined as the quantitative analysis of actual economic phenomena based on the concurrent development of theory and observation, related by appropriate methods of inference.”

Tjalling Koopmans (1910–1985) Dutch American economist

Paul Samuelson, Tjalling Koopmans, and Richard Stone. "Report of the evaluative committee for Econometrica." Econometrica- journal of the Econometric Society. (1954): 141-146.

“Vyshinsky: Were you badly treated?
Muralov: I was deprived of my liberty.
Vyshinsky: But perhaps rough methods were used against you?
Muralov: No. No such rough methods were used. I must say that in Novosibirsk and here I was treated politely and no cause for resentment was given. I was treated very decently and politely.”

Nikolay Muralov (1877–1937) Soviet revolutionary

Dialogue with state prosecutor Andrey Vyshinsky during his trial. Quote from Harpal Brar's Trotskyism or Leninism?, p. 300-1.

“In short, the greatest contribution to real security that science can make is through the extension of the scientific method to the social sciences and a solution of the problem of complete avoidance of war.”

Edward Condon (1902–1974) physicist

in Science, Vol. 107, June 25, 1948, p. 665

War, Problem, Science

“It is one of the advantages of the revelations which we acknowledge, that whilst they reject idolatry with its many pernicious accompaniments, they introduce the Deity to human apprehension, under an idea more personal, more determinate, more within its compass, than the theology of nature can do. And this they do by representing him exclusively under the relation in which he stands to ourselves; and, for the most part, under some precise character, resulting from that relation, or from the history of his providences. Which method suits the span of our intellects much better than the universality which enters into the idea of God, as deduced from the views of nature.”

William Paley (1743–1805) Christian apologist, natural theologian, utilitarian

Source: Natural Theology (1802), Ch. 24 : Of the Natural Attributes of the Deity.

God, History, Idea, Nature

“Each book of the New Testament is in its own way a methodical interpretation of the Christian experience of revelation.”

Roger Haight (1936) American theologian

Source: Dynamics Of Theology, Chapter Four, Revelation and Theology, p. 79

Books, Way

“The Weimar Constitution is for me not a noli me tangere; I did not participate in its creation, and it is in its basic principles contrary to my political thinking…I believed that a change of the constitution was approaching, and that I could help towards this by methods which were not unnecessarily to lead through civil war. So far as concerns my attitude towards the international Social Democracy, I have to confess that at the outset I believed in the possibility to winning over part of it to national co-operation; but I have revised this opinion long ago, a long time before our conversation, in so far as the Social Democratic Party is concerned, not the German working class as such…I see clearly that a collaboration with the Social Democratic Party is impossible because it repudiates the idea of military preparedness…I do not consider a Stresemann cabinet viable, not even after its transformation. This lack of confidence I have expressed to the chancellor himself as well as to the president, and I have told them that in the long run I could not guarantee the attitude of the Reichswehr to a government in which it had no confidence…A Stresemann government cannot last without the support of the Reichswehr and of the forces standing behind it.”

Hans von Seeckt (1866–1936) German general

Letter to von Kahr (2 November 1923), quoted in F. L. Carsten, The Reichswehr and Politics 1918 to 1933 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1966), p. 117.

War, Democracy, Confidence, Idea

“If any common program is impossible, if there is no such thing as an education that everybody ought to have, then we must admit that any community is impossible. All men are different; but they are also the same. As we must all become specialists, so we must all become men. … The West needs an education that draws out our common humanity rather than our individuality. Individual differences can be taken into account in the methods that are employed and in the opportunities for specialization that may come later.”

Robert Maynard Hutchins (1899–1977) philosopher and university president

Great Books: The Foundation of a Liberal Education (1954)

Men, Education, Communication, Drawing

“The essence of modernism lies in the use of the characteristic methods of a discipline to criticize the discipline itself, not in order to subvert it but in order to entrench it more firmly in its area of competence. Modernism used art to call attention to art. The limitations that constitute the medium of painting - the flat surface, the shape of the support, the properties of the pigment - came to be regarded as positive factors, and were acknowledged openly.”

Clement Greenberg (1909–1994) American writer and artist

1960s, Modernist Painting (1960)

Art, Support, Painting

“Some other Course therefore must be taken to promote the Search of Knowledge. Some other kind of Art for Inquiry than what hath been hitherto made use of, must be discovered; the Intellect is not to he suffer'd to act without its Helps, but is continually to be assisted by some Method or Engine, which shall be as a Guide to regulate its Actions, so as that it shall not be able to act amiss: Of this Engine, no Man except the incomparable Verulam hath had any Thoughts, and he indeed hath promoted it to a very good pitch; but there is yet somewhat more to be added, which he seem'd to want time to compleat. By this, as by that Art of Algebra in Geometry, 'twill be very easy to proceed in any Natural Inquiry, regularly and certainly: And indeed it may not improperly be call'd a Philosophical Algebra, or an Art of directing the Mind in the search after Philosophical Truths, for as 'tis very hard for the most acute Wit to find out any difficult Problem in Geometry. without the help of Algebra to direct and regulate the Acts of the Reason in the Process from the question to the quœsitum, and altogether as easy for the meanest Capacity acting by that Method to compleat and perfect it, so will it be in the inquiry after Natural Knowledge.”

Robert Hooke (1635–1703) English natural philosopher, architect and polymath

"The Present State of Natural Philosophy, and wherein it is deficient," The Posthumous Works of Robert Hooke https://books.google.com/books?id=6xVTAAAAcAAJ (1705) ed., Richard Waller, pp. 6-7.

Truth, Art, Search, Question

“[H]istorical science is not worse, more restricted, or less capable of achieving firm conclusions because experiment, prediction, and subsumption under invariant laws of nature do not represent its usual working methods. The sciences of history use a different mode of explanation, rooted in the comparative and observational richness in our data. We cannot see a past event directly, but science is usually based on inference, not unvarnished observation”

Stephen Jay Gould book Wonderful Life

you don't see electrons, gravity, or black holes either
Source: Wonderful Life (1989), p. 279

Law, History, Nature, Science

“Students of administration, writes J. M. Gaus, have become "more uncertain in recent years as to the ends, aims and methods which they should advocate/' It is difficult to view in their entirety and in perspective the writings on public administration that now pour from the presses. But this is hardly necessary to confirm the truth of Gaus' statement.”

Dwight Waldo (1913–2000) American political scientist

Source: The Administrative State, 1948, p. 206

Truth

“For there have been some people, otherwise good and holy, who saw that intemperance and luxury time and again drive man to throw off all restraints unless he is curbed by the utmost severity. And in their desire to correct such a pernicious evil they have adopted the only method which they saw fit, namely to permit earthly blessings only insofar as they were an absolute necessity. This advice showed the best of intentions but was far too rigid. For they committed the very dangerous error of imposing on the consequence of others stricter rules than those laid down in the Word of the Lord. By restricting people within the demands of necessity, they meant abstinence from everything possible. On the other hand, there are many nowadays who seek a pretext to excuse intemperance in the use of the external things, and who desire to indulge the lusts of the flesh. Such people take for granted that liberty should not be restricted by any limitations at all; but to this we can never agree. We must grant, indeed, that it is not right or possible to bind the consciences of others with hard and fast rules.”

John Calvin (1509–1564) French Protestant reformer

Page 85.
Golden Booklet of the True Christian Life (1551)

People, Error, Evil, Time

“Rat and behavioral psychology … mirror the actual inhumanity of reality. Rat psychology is human psychology where a total society has trained human beings to be creatures of stimulus and response, i. e. rats. “Insofar as the hardening of society has reduced men more and more to objects,” wrote Adorno, “methods which convey this are no sacrilege. … The method serves freedom in that it wordlessly testifies to the prevailing unfreedom.” Or, as Adorno and Horkheimer wrote in another context: “The usual objection that empirical social research is too mechanical, too crude, and too unspiritual [ungeistig] shifts the responsibility from that which science is investigating to science itself.” … The idealistic misconception of … behavioral methods … shifts the evil from the social conditions that coerce men and women into standardized roles onto the social science that is merely registering these conditions.”

Russell Jacoby (1945) American historian

Source: Social Amnesia: A Critique of Conformist Psychology from Adler to Laing (1975), p. 69

Women, Men, Behavior, Reality

“Notwithstanding all the differences in the aims and tasks of the Russian revolution, compared with the French revolution of 1871, the Russian proletariat had to resort to the same method of struggle as that first used by the Paris Commune — civil war. Mindful of the lessons of the Commune, it knew that the proletariat should not ignore peaceful methods of struggle — they serve its ordinary, day-to-day interests, they are necessary in periods of preparation for revolution — but it must never forget that in certain conditions the class struggle assumes the form of armed conflict and civil war; there are times when the interests of the proletariat call for ruthless extermination of its enemies in open armed clashes.”

Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution

“Lessons of the Commune”, in Zagranichnaya Gazeta, No. 2 (23 March 1908) http://www.marx.org/archive/lenin/works/1908/mar/23.htm, as translated by Bernard Isaacs, Collected Works, Vol. 13, p. 478. <br class="br">1900s <br class="br">Variant: The proletariat should not ignore peaceful methods of struggle — they serve its ordinary, day-to-day interests, they are necessary in periods of preparation for revolution — but it must never forget that in certain conditions the class struggle assumes the form of armed conflict and civil war; there are times when the interests of the proletariat call for ruthless extermination of its enemies in open armed clashes. This was first demonstrated by the French proletariat in the Commune and brilliantly confirmed by the Russian proletariat in the December uprising.

War, Peace, Communication, Time