Quotes about number
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“Numbers are not the supreme truth in the world. In freedom's battle in any country, do all the people of that country take part? When the Americans fought for their freedom, more than half the people of that country were with the British. In the Irish freedom struggle, how many were actually involved in it? Right or wrong is not decided by the counting of heads. It is decided by the intensity of tapasya or the single-minded devotion to the cause. The problem before the Hindus is not to devise ways and means of bringing about an artificial unity. The problem before them in how to organise themselves.”

H.V. Sheshadri (1926–2005) Indian writer

Source: The Tragic Story of Partition (1982), p.252

People, Truth, World, Way

“We assume that our own advances in objectivity are steps along a path that extends beyond them and beyond all our capacities. But even allowing unlimited time, or an unlimited number of generations, to take as many successive steps as we like, the process can never be completed. … What is wanted is some way of making the most objective standpoint the basis of action.”

Thomas Nagel (1937) American philosopher

Source: The View From Nowhere (1986), pp. 128-129.

Way, Time, Success

“The world operates by number, by physical laws, expressed mathematically. If you know these, you will have a better grasp of things. And some possible job skills.”

Kim Stanley Robinson book The Years of Rice and Salt

Book 9: "Nsara", § 5
The Years of Rice and Salt (2002)

World, Law, Mathematics

“The number both of pupils and school places in 1922 is… all too small. But, inadequate as they are, they represent something like an educational revolution compared with the almost complete absence of public provision which existed prior to 1902.”

R. H. Tawney (1880–1962) English philosopher

Secondary Education For All (1922)

Education, School

“Nature herself supplies us with an ascending scale or Alphabet of angles for half a degree up to 60 degrees, Specimens of which are placed in every Elementary School throughout the land. Owing to occasional retrogressions, to still more frequent moral and intellectual stagnation, and to the extraordinary fecundity of the Criminal and Vagabond Classes, there is always a vast superfluity of individuals of the half degree and single degree class, and a fair abundance of Specimens up to 10 degrees. These are absolutely destitute of civic rights; and a great number of them, not having even intelligence enough for the purposes of warfare, are devoted by the States to the service of education. Fettered immovably so as to remove all possibility of danger, they are placed in the class rooms of our Infant Schools, and there they are utilized by the Board of Education for the purpose of imparting to the offspring of the Middle Classes that tact and intelligence of which these wretched creatures themselves are utterly devoid.”

Edwin Abbott Abbott book Flatland

Source: Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (1884), PART I: THIS WORLD, Chapter 5. Of Our Methods of Recognizing One Another

Education, School, Intelligence, Nature

“Since most of the mass immigration now convulsing Europe is composed of Muslims, it is therefore hardly surprising that anti-immigrant feeling is largely anti-Muslim feeling. The sheer weight of numbers plus the refusal to assimilate to western values makes this an unprecedented crisis for western liberalism. The crisis is forcing it to confront the fundamental questions of what constitutes a country, national identity and the very nature of a liberal society.”

Melanie Phillips (1951) British journalist

"How the West was lost" http://www.melaniephillips.com/how-the-west-was-lost (May 11, 2002)

Feeling, Question, Nature, Country

“Our desire to conserve wildlife for our children and our children's children forces us to bring out into the open conservation's secret question : Does God give a prize for the maximum number of human beings? Put another way, which shall we bequeath to our grandchildren : human life with nature, or human life without nature?”

Garrett Hardin (1915–2003) American ecologist

Naked Emperors : Essays of a Taboo-Stalker (1982)

Life, God, Children, Secret

“By the letter that will accompany this, and was to have gone last night by Major Mifflin, your Excellency will see what measures I took before your favor came to hand. The passing of the ships up the river is, to be sure, a full proof of the insufficiency of the obstructions in the river to stop the ships from going up; but that garrison employs double the number of men to invest it that we have to occupy it. They must keep troops at King's Bridge, to prevent a communication with the country; and they dare not leave a very small number, for fear our people should attack them.”

Nathanael Greene (1742–1786) American general in the American Revolutionary War

Letter to George Washington (9 October 1776)

Men, People, Fear, Communication

“There are great numbers of people to whom the act of reading a book — any sort of book — is wondrous; they speak of the reader in the tone of warm approbation which they use otherwise when referring to pregnant women, or the newly dead.”

Robertson Davies book A Voice from the Attic

A Voice from the Attic (1960)

Women, People, Books, Reading

“The fundamental digital divide is no measured by the number of connections to the Internet, but by the consequences of both connection and lack of connection.”

Manuel Castells (1942) Spanish sociologist (b.1942)

Source: The Internet Galaxy - Reflections on the Internet, Business, and Society (2001), Chapter 9, The Digital Divide in a Global Perspective, p. 269

“I also remind the House that the use of confessional evidence, which is the basis of the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act, has led to the imprisonment of the Birmingham Six, who have now served almost 16 years in British prisons. I have visited them in prison several times… My experience of the Prevention of Terrorism (Temporary Provisions) Act is that it has nothing to do with the prevention of terrorism and everything to do with policing and patrolling the Irish community in this country. I have lost count of the number of occasions that I have had telephone calls late at night from Irish people who live in my constituency, who were expecting a son, a daughter, an uncle, an aunt or a father to come across to visit them from Dublin or from Belfast, but who find that they have not arrived. They ask me, "Do you know where they are?" I have no idea where they are. We then start an amazing series of telephone calls to find out whether someone is being held under the Act. A Kafka-like mystery surrounds it and it is not clear whether that person is being held until lawyers make contact and eventually application is made for a writ of habeas corpus.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1990/mar/06/prevention-of-terrorism in the House of Commons (6 March 1990). 1990s

People, Communication, Idea, Time

“Your letter became before I was up this morning – Yes nice to get. I recognize two of the drawings you speak of – Number one is the first of the dozen or more you speak of – number 2 came next The last – It didn't quite satisfy me so I tried again – the last one was so much worse than the one you like that I thought I had just about worn the idea out so quit... You ask me what I did with the rest of myself when I made number 2 -... I sat up almost all night one night this week and made the most infernally ugly little shape you ever saw – I wanted to break it when I got through – but didn't then next afternoon when I had time to look at it, it amused me so that I didn't – really its laughable – it's so ugly – and still some way it's quite beautiful – I don't know – I may break it up – or I may try to cast it just for fun – I have another idea that I'm in an awful stew to model – I am going to get a lot of patience so I can make all the little do-dangles I want to and won't have to break one up so I can make another – I want to make a big one..”

Georgia O'Keeffe (1887–1986) American artist

Canyon, Texas, (September, 1916), p. 198
1915 - 1920, Letters to Anita Pollitzer' (1916)

Beauty, Way, Idea, Time

“The descendants of those who crucified Christ… have taken ownership of the riches of the world, a minority has taken ownership of the gold of the world, the silver, the minerals, water, the good lands, petrol, well, the riches, and they have concentrated the riches in a small number of hands.”

Hugo Chávez (1954–2013) 48th President of Venezuela

Christmas Speech at a rehabilitation center on December 24th, 2005. http://www.gobiernoenlinea.gob.ve/docMgr/sharedfiles/Chavez_visita_Centro_Manantial_de_los_suenos24122005.pdf 2005

World, Water, Christ

“It has long been though that the sun is a constant star of regular and repeatable behavior. Measurements of the radiative output, or solar constant, seem to justify the first assumption, and the record of periodicity in sunspot numbers is taken as evidence of the second. Both records, however, sample only the most recent history of the sun.”

John A. Eddy (1931–2009) American astronomer

Source: Eddy, J.A., "The Maunder Minimum", Science 18 June 1976: Vol. 192. no. 4245, pp. 1189 - 1202 http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/citation/192/4245/1189, PDF Copy http://bill.srnr.arizona.edu/classes/182h/Climate/Solar/Maunder%20Minimum.pdf

Behavior, History, Star, Sun

“On the publication of this order (reimposing the Jiziyah) by Aurangzeb in 1679, the Hindus all round Delhi assembled in vast numbers under the jharokha of the Emperor… to represent their inability to pay and pray for the recall of the edict… But the Emperor would not listen to their complaints. One day, when he went to public prayer in the great mosque on the sabbath, a vast multitude of the Hindus thronged the road from the palace to the mosque, with the object of seeking relief. Money changers and drapers, all kinds of shopkeepers from the Urdu bazar mechanics, and workmen of all kinds, left off work and business and pressed into the way… Every moment the crowd increased, and the emperor’s equippage was brought to a stand-still. At length an order was given to bring out the elephants and direct them against the mob. Many fell trodden to death under the feet of elephants and horses. For some days the Hindus continued to assemble, in great numbers and complain, but at length they submitted to pay the Jiziyah.”

Aurangzeb (1618–1707) Sixth Mughal Emperor

Khafi Khan, trs. E and D, VII, p. 296. Quoted from Lal, K. S. (1992). The legacy of Muslim rule in India. New Delhi: Aditya Prakashan. Chapter 6
Quotes from late medieval histories, 1660s

Death, Money, Way, Business

“It would be ridiculous for me to say anything negative regarding blacks having an equal opportunity on TV. After all, I was number one in the ratings four times last year and twice this season. What could be more damn equal than that? If they get any more equal, I don't want it.”

Flip Wilson (1933–1998) Comedian, actor

Quoted in Comedian Flip Wilson Dies at 64 (November 26,1998) http://www.bobbydarin.net/aparticle.html

Time, Season

“You look at what's happening last night in Sweden. Sweden! Who would believe this, Sweden! They took in large numbers, they're having problems like they never thought possible.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Trump speaking at mass rally of his supporters in Melbourne, Florida https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AMLK15edOUY (18 February 2017) 2010s, 2017, February

Problem

“The story of widows and orphans now wandering amid the ravines of the rural counties of my native state seeking protection and maintenance from others who are yet unable, on account of their own poverty, to grant them aid. I could dwell upon the sorrows of poor women, with their helpless infants, cast upon the world, homeless and destitute, deprived of their natural protectors by the red hand of the midnight assassin. I could appeal to you, members upon this floor, as husbands and fathers, to picture to yourselves the desolation of your own happy firesides should you be suddenly snatched away from your loved ones. Think of gray-haired men, whose fourscore years are almost numbered, the venerated heads of peaceful households, without warning murdered for political opinion's sake.”

Joseph Hayne Rainey (1832–1887) politician

1871, Speech on the the Ku Klux Klan Bill of 1871 (1 April 1871)

Love, Women, Men, Happiness

“Unfortunately a large number of people in many countries are strongly opposed to green technology, for reasons having little to do with the real dangers. It is important to treat the opponents with respect, to pay attention to their fears, to go gently into the new world of green technology so that neither human dignity nor religious conviction is violated. If we can go gently, we have a good chance of achieving within a hundred years the goals of ecological sustainability and social justice that green technology brings within our reach.”

Freeman Dyson (1923) theoretical physicist and mathematician

Progress In Religion (2000)

People, World, Fear, Justice

“In the past three years we have burned our identity cards, torn up our ration books, halved the number of snoopers, decimated the number of forms and said good riddance to nearly two-thirds of the remaining wartime regulations. This is the march to freedom on which we are bound. And the pace must quicken as we go forward…Within the limits of law and social justice, our aim is freedom for every man and woman to live their own lives in their own way and not have their lives lived for them by an overweening State.”

Rab Butler (1902–1982) British politician

Speech in Gloucester (10 July 1954), quoted in R. A. Butler, The Art of the Possible (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1971), p. 173.

Books, Justice, Law, Way

“Every picture shop is filled with pictures of the Emperor; every photographer's with photos--all sizes and in all kinds of positions, in and out of uniform, in different uniforms, looking condescending, looking dignified, on horseback in uniform, on horseback in plain clothes, on donkeyback, head and shoulders without legs, legs without head and shoulders, helmet in hand, helmet on head, helmet on tail, flying in mid air etc. etc. All the statuary too turns on the Emperor. There are busts chiselled in all sizes and the number of different varieties to be seen in halls, houses, shop windows etc. is something quite unbearable. The toy shops are filled with toy Emperors; when he was young the boy Emperor; then the man Emperor; in fact Berlin is saturated with the blessed Emperor as man, woman, boy, girl, soldier, tinker, tailor. The end of it all will be that the people will go stark staring mad and the Emperor himself will go off with a bang the verdict being: "Death from explosion owing to his receiving more hero-worship than the human frame can bear!"”

Edward German (1862–1936) English musician and composer

In a letter to his sister, describing his observations from a trip to Germany of the cult-like status given the Kaiser.

Death, People, Photo, Girl

“I do not believe in the doctrine of the greatest number. It means in its nakedness that in order to achieve the supposed good of 51 per cent the interests of 49 per cent may be, or rather, should be sacrificed. It is a heartless doctrine and has done harm to humanity.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

The Dairy of Mahadev Desai, (June 4, 1932) p. 149
1930s

“Like the other immigrant groups, the day will come when we win the economic and political rewards which are in keeping with our numbers in society. The day will come when the politicians do the right thing by our people out of political necessity and not out of charity or idealism.
That day may not come this year. That day may not come during this decade. But it will come, someday!
And when that day comes, we shall see the fulfillment of that passage from the Book of Matthew in the New Testament, "That the last shall be first and the first shall be last."”

Cesar Chavez (1927–1993) American farm worker, labor leader, and civil rights activist

And on that day, our nation shall fulfill its creed — and that fulfillment shall enrich us all.
What the Future Holds (1984)

People, Books

“On the whole, Divergant series are the work of the Devil and it's a Shame that one dares base any Demonstration on them. You can get whatever result you want when you use them, and they have given rise to so many Disasters and so many Paradoxes. Can anything more horrible be conceived than to have the following oozing out of you:
0 = 1 - 2n + 3n - 4n + etc.
where n is a whole Number? Risum teneatis amici.”

Niels Henrik Abel (1802–1829) Norwegian mathematician

Laughter retains friends
Letter to Bernt Michael Holmboe (Jan. 1826) as quoted by Arild Stubhaug, Niels Henrik Abel and his Times: Called Too Soon by Flames Afar (2013)

Laughter

“But you will never catch Sir Oswald [Mosley] admitting to anti-Semitism. All he does is embody it. He talked of 'the use of Jewish money power to promote a world war.' Taxed on this point, he disclaimed anti-Semitism, by saying that he meant 'not all Jews, but some Jews.' That's as far as he will ever reduce his estimate. The truth, of course, is that the real number of Jews responsible for World War II was zero.”

Clive James (1939–2019) Australian author, critic, broadcaster, poet, translator and memoirist

'The Truly Strong Man'
Essays and reviews, The Crystal Bucket (1982)

Money, War, Truth, World

“Let’s move on to the next major lie in my opening statement, the idea of Putin’s popularity in Russia. I could not begin to count the number of times I’ve been forced to address this myth, the persistence of which I again attribute to our lack of language to describe modern dictatorships. Terms like “polls” and “popularity” as applied to politicians in the free world have very different meanings in authoritarian regimes. I’m fond of asking in response to questions about Putin’s “popularity” if a restaurant is popular if it’s the only one in town and every other restaurant was burned to the ground.”

Garry Kasparov (1963) former chess world champion

2010s, The Truth About Putin (2018)

Lie, World, Idea, Question

“That reform of the land laws, that abolition of the present system of entail, together with just facilities for the transfer of land, is absolutely necessary in order to do anything like common justice to those who inhabit the rural parts of this country, and whom, instead of seeing them, as we now see them, dwindle from one census to another, I, for my part, and I believe you, along with me, would heartily desire to see maintained, not in their present number only, but in increasing numbers over the whole surface of the land.”

William Ewart Gladstone (1809–1898) British Liberal politician and prime minister of the United Kingdom

Speech in Newcastle (2 October 1891), quoted in A. W. Hutton and H. J. Cohen (eds.), The Speeches of The Right Hon. W. E. Gladstone on Home Rule, Criminal Law, Welsh and Irish Nationality, National Debt and the Queen's Reign. 1888–1891 (London: Methuen, 1902), p. 386.
1890s

Justice, Law, Parting, Country

“Since the 1950s, the key equation of quantum gravity has been called the Wheeler-DeWitt equation. Bryce DeWitt and John Wheeler wrote it down, but in all the time since then, no one had been able to solve it. We found we could solve it exactly, and in fact we found an infinite number of exact solutions.”

Lee Smolin (1955) American cosmologist

Describing work with Ted Jacobson
"Loop Quantum Gravity," The New Humanists: Science at the Edge (2003)

Time

“What has taken place is a shift of business from one manufacturer to another, and the announcements in the press as well as the general publicity of those manufacturers who have succeeded in increasing their business give, I think, the impression that this is true of the whole industry. If we could assume, for the sake of argument, that we will reach the point at which twenty-five million cars and trucks will be registered in the United States an assumption that from what we have accomplished so far is certainly perfectly reasonable then I think we could safely say that the replacement demand, plus the export demand which will increase for many years yet, plus the normal growth, would amount to something like four to four and one half million vehicles a year and would require the manufacture of a number of cars equal to or greater than has yet been produced in any year in the history of the industry…
I am sure that I do not need to elaborate what the automotive industry consists of, its influence on the prosperity of the United States, the influence that it has had in many other industries which contribute to its production necessities. General Motors is an important part of this great industry of ours and as my contribution to your visit with us I would like to tell you in a brief way something about General Motors; how we are thinking, what we are doing, and our ambitions for the future.”

Alfred P. Sloan (1875–1966) American businessman

Source: Alfred P. Sloan in The Turning Wheel, 1934, p. 332-3: Speech by President Alfred P. Sloan, Jr., 1927 (II)

Cars, Way, History, Business

“Not only have material wealth and the possibilities for freeing mankind definitively from the burden of meaningless, repetitive and mechanical work increased, but so too has the polarization of society between fewer and fewer owners of capital and more and more workers of hand and brain, forced to sell their labour-power to these owners. The concentration of wealth and power in a small number of giant industrial and financial corporations has brought with it an increasingly universal struggle between Capital and Labour.”

Ernest Mandel (1923–1995) Belgian economist and Marxist philosopher

Introduction to Capital. Introduction to volume 1 (1976)

Universe, Wealth

“Back in September, my friend Donald said he had his lawyers look at this from every which way and there was no issue there. There was nothing to this birther issue. Now since September, the Constitution hasn't changed. But the poll numbers have. And I recognize, I recognize that Donald is dismayed that his poll numbers are falling in Iowa. But the facts and law here are really quite clear. Under longstanding U. S. law, the child of a U. S. Citizen born abroad is a natural-born citizen.”

Ted Cruz (1970) American politician

Republican Presidential Debate http://www.vox.com/2016/1/15/10774204/winners-losers-republican-debate-charleston-fox-business (January 14, 2016) 2010s

Law, Way, Nature, Change

“Yet for many of us, anti-Semitic feeling had little to do with our dedication [to Zionism]. I personally never suffered anti-Semitic persecution. Plonsk was remarkably free of it, or at least the Jews felt well protected in the cocoon of their community life. Nevertheless, and I think this very significant, it was Plonsk that sent the highest proportion of Jews to Eretz Israel from any town in Poland of comparable size. We emigrated not for negative reasons of escape but for the positive purpose of rebuilding a homeland, a place where we wouldn't be perpetual strangers and that through our toil would become irrevocably our own. Life in Plonsk was peaceful enough. There were three main communities: Russians, Jews and Poles. Each lived apart from the others. The Russians as the occupiers kept a firm hand on the civil administration. There were no Polish or Jewish officials. Officials or the police almost never interfered in dealings between Jewish and Polish communities. They disliked both equally and took an aloof attitude to the town's day-to-day life. The number of Jews and Poles in the city were roughly equal, about five thousand each. The Jews, however, formed a compact, centralized group occupying the innermost districts whilst the Poles were more scattered, living in outlying areas and shading off into the peasantry. Consequently, when a gang of Jewish boys met a Polish gang the latter would almost inevitably represent a single suburb and thus be poorer in fighting potential than the Jews who even if their numbers were initially fewer could quickly call on reinforcements from the entire quarter. Far from being afraid of them, they were rather afraid of us. In general, however, relations were amicable, though distant.”

David Ben-Gurion (1886–1973) Israeli politician, Zionist leader, prime minister of Israel

Memoirs : David Ben-Gurion (1970), p. 36

Life, Peace, Feeling, Boy

“There's two approved methods for getting a pedicure for a guy. Number one, you use your own grinder or…You have an eighteen year-old Vietnamese girl rub your feet and call you "Joe" and that's it!”

Christopher Titus (1964) actor, writer, podcaster

Neverlution (2011)

Guy, Girl

“Her finely touched spirit had still its fine issues, though they were not widely visible. Her full nature, like that river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on the earth. But the effect of her being on those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”

George Eliot book Middlemarch

Last lines
Middlemarch (1871)

Life, World, Nature, Dependency

“"Well, maybe I'm a latent homosexual." He considered that for a moment. "Or maybe I'm a latent heterosexual. Anyway, I'm pretty latent. I don't know why. Of course, I've taken a number of stabs at it, but then I start thinking about the futility of it all and I give up. Maybe it's because you're expected to do something and after a certain point all I want to do is lie there and stare at the ceiling."”

Margaret Atwood book The Edible Woman

The Edible Woman (1969)

Lie, Thinking

“The history of the Democratic Party can be concisely captured by referring to its steadfast allegiance to the four Ss. Slavery, Secession, Segregation, and Socialism. During the Obama presidency we have seen how hard old habits die, even for a black man whose race was the long-time victim of Democratic Party's bone-deep authoritarianism. Under this Democratic president we have seen a war waged on several fronts against America's young. Indeed, the Democrats' historic taste for and belief in slavery have resurfaced with a vengeance and indiscriminately under the Obama administration, whether white, black, yellow, red, male, or female America's young are dying and being forced to work for Obama and his lieutenants as they seek to maintain their party's hold on political power. How so? Well, America has never had a president and administration so eager to kill unborn Americans. Even with post-1973 science having proved irrefutably that the unborn are human beings, and even though American law always has defined them as U. S. citizens, Obama and his colleagues have strengthened at every point they could the absurd notion that unborn humans are the chattel property of the woman who bears them, and so can be disposed of, that is, murdered, at her whim. And, in what must be considered a masterpiece of Orwellian language, Obama and his team, and most Democrats since 1973, describe this federal government-issued license to kill as a woman's 'right', a means by which she manifests her equality with men. They then damn any one who questions the logic, sanity, or justice of this argument as an 'extremist'. Only in an America in which a political entity as devoted to the four 'Ss' as the Democratic Party could opposition to the cold-blooded murder of fellow citizens unable defend themselves be identified by the country’s best-educated as 'extremism'. If this is indeed a right, it is a right gives each woman the right to be a slave-owner and a Nazi. Such a 'right' really is no different than the rights sanctioned by the Dred Scott decision and the Nuremberg laws, each of which legally defined certain categories of people out of the human race in order to enslave or kill them. Since 1973, the application of this 'right' has produced precisely the same results as Dred Scott and the Nuremberg laws, though in numbers so immense, 55 million and climbing, that they make those acts seem rather tame and minimally destructive of humans.”

Michael Scheuer (1952) American counterterrorism analyst

As quoted in "Obama and his party offer America's young … death, misery, and slavery" http://non-intervention.com/1143/obama-and-his-party-offer-america%E2%80%99s-young-%E2%80%A6-death-misery-and-slavery/ (21 November 2013), by M. Scheuer, Michael Scheuer's Non-Intervention. 2010s

Men, War, People, Education

“He [Arjun Nair] started as a batsman and the bowling took over, now he's picking up the batting again, which is good because it is important he offers something [more] than his bowling. Finger spin in Australia is challenging at the best of times and you just have to give yourself more opportunities to be selected. In this professional age it is important he offers as much as possible to maximise the number of opportunities he gets. Fielding is another aspect, like all young cricketers. Arjun needs to make sure he nails that because you can't afford any deficiencies if you want to break through.”

Greg Chappell (1948) Australian cricketer

Chappel on cricketer Arjun Nair, The Sydney Morning Herald (January 30, 2016), "Arjun Nair is a name to remember, says Cricket Australia's Greg Chappell" http://www.smh.com.au/sport/cricket/arjun-nair-is-a-name-to-remember-says-cricket-australias-greg-chappell-20160129-gmhk9z.html

Age, Time

“To investigate the essence of a natural phenomenon, three conditions are necessary: We must first study and know the phenomenon itself, from all sides; we must then determine in what relation it stands to other natural phenomena; and lastly, when we have ascertained all these relations, we have to solve the problem of measuring these relations and the laws of mutual dependence—that is, of expressing them in numbers. In the first period of chemistry, all the powers of men's minds were devoted to acquiring a knowledge of the properties of bodies; it was necessary to discover, observe, and ascertain their peculiarities. This is the alchemistical period. The second period embraces the determination of the mutual relations or connections of these properties; this is the period of phlogistic chemistry. In the third period, in which we now are, we ascertain by weight and measure and express in numbers the degree in which the properties of bodies are mutually dependent. The inductive sciences begin with the substance itself, then come just ideas, and lastly, mathematics are called in, and with the aid of numbers, complete the work.”

Justus von Liebig (1803–1873) German chemist

Familiar Letters on Chemistry, Tr. Blythe, 4th ed., London, 1859, p. 60 as quoted by John Theodore Merz, A History of European Thought in the Nineteenth Century Vol.1 http://books.google.com/books?id=xqwQAAAAYAAJ (1903).

Men, Law, Mathematics, Idea

“The fifth and most important principle of our foreign policy is support of national independence—the right of each people to govern themselves—and to shape their own institutions. For a peaceful world order will be possible only when each country walks the way that it has chosen to walk for itself. We follow this principle by encouraging the end of colonial rule. We follow this principle, abroad as well as at home, by continued hostility to the rule of the many by the few—or the oppression of one race by another. We follow this principle by building bridges to Eastern Europe. And I will ask the Congress for authority to remove the special tariff restrictions which are a barrier to increasing trade between the East and the West. The insistent urge toward national independence is the strongest force of today's world in which we live. In Africa and Asia and Latin America it is shattering the designs of those who would subdue others to their ideas or their will. It is eroding the unity of what was once a Stalinist empire. In recent months a number of nations have east out those who would subject them to the ambitions of mainland China. History is on the side of freedom and is on the side of societies shaped from the genius of each people. History does not favor a single system or belief—unless force is used to make it so. That is why it has been necessary for us to defend this basic principle of our policy, to defend it in Berlin, in Korea, in Cuba—and tonight in Vietnam.”

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)

Hostility, People, World, Peace

“After drinking alcohol on Thursday night, I did a number of things that were very wrong and for which I am ashamed. I drove a car when I should not have, and was stopped by the L. A. County sheriffs. The arresting officer was just doing his job and I feel fortunate that I was apprehended before I caused injury to any other person. I acted like a person completely out of control when I was arrested, and said things that I do not believe to be true and which are despicable. I am deeply ashamed of everything I said and I apologize to anyone who I have offended. Also, I take this opportunity to apologize to the deputies involved for my belligerent behavior. They have always been there for me in my community and indeed probably saved me from myself. I disgraced myself and my family with my behavior and for that I am truly sorry. I have battled the disease of alcoholism for all of my adult life and profoundly regret my horrific relapse. I apologize for any behavior unbecoming of me in my inebriated state and have already taken necessary steps to ensure my return to health.”

Mel Gibson (1956) American actor, film director, producer and screenwriter

Apology issued July 29, 2006 for his behavior and comments during the incident with his drunk driving and speeding. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/5230480.stm

Life, Health, Alcohol, Disease

“I am not addressing my own people, nor my fellow citizens of the holy Romans, but those who are now become citizens of demons by reason of their evil works. They have chosen, by their hostile deeds, to live in death; comrades of the Scotti and Picts and of all who behave like apostates, bloody men who have steeped themselves in the blood of innocent Christians. The very same people I have begotten for God; their number beyond count, I myself confirmed them in Christ.”

Saint Patrick (385–461) 5th-century Romano-British Christian missionary and bishop in Ireland

Letter to the Soldiers of Coroticus (c.450?)

Death, Men, God, Hostility

“This country and this people seem to have been made for each other, and it appears as if it was the design of Providence, that an inheritance so proper and convenient for a band of brethren, united to each other by the strongest ties, should never be split into a number of unsocial, jealous, and alien sovereignties.”

John Jay Federalist Papers

1780s, The Federalist Papers, Federalist No. 2 (1787)

People, Appearance, Country

“From that place the Sultan proceeded to a certain city, which was accounted holy by the people of the country. In that city the men of Ghaznin saw so many strange and wonderful things, that to tell them or to write a description of them is not easy' In short, the Sultan Mahmud having possessed himself of the booty, burned their idol temples and proceeded towards Kanauj….. The Ghaznivids found in these forts and their dependencies 10,000 idol temples, and they ascertained the vicious belief of the Hindus to be, that since the erection of these buildings no less than three or four hundred thousand years had elapsed. Sultan Mahmud during this expedition achieved many other conquests after he left Kanauj, and sent to hell many of the infidels with blows of the well tempered sword. Such a number of slaves were assembled in that great camp, that the price of a single one did not exceed ten dirhams.”

Mahmud of Ghazni (971–1030) Sultan of Ghazni

Mathura (Uttar Pradesh), Kanauj (Uttar Pradesh). Habibu’s-Siyar in Elliot and Dowson, Vol. IV : Elliot and Dowson, History of India as told by its own Historians, 8 Volumes, Allahabad Reprint, 1964. p. 178-80
Quotes from The History of India as told by its own Historians

Men, People, Hell, Dependency

“Number was born in superstition and reared in mystery,… numbers were once made the foundation of religion and philosophy, and the tricks of figures have had a marvellous effect on a credulous people.”

Francis Wayland Parker (1837–1902) Union Army officer

Source: Talks on Pedagogics, (1894), p. 64. Reported in Moritz (1914, 269)

People, Religion

“Visionaries are the first people in their industry segment to see the potential of the High Tech Marketing Enlightenment new technology. Fundamentally, they see themselves as smarter than their opposite numbers in competitive companies—and, quite often, they are. Indeed, it is their ability to see things first that they want to leverage into a competitive advantage. That advantage can only come about if no one else has discovered it. They do not expect, therefore, to be buying a well—tested product with an extensive list of industry references. Indeed, if such a reference base exists, it may actually turn them off, indicating that for this technology, at any rate, they are already too late.”

Geoffrey Moore book Crossing the Chasm

Source: Crossing the Chasm, 1991, p. 41-42

People

“I’m kind of at the point where I’m doing the second of those things and surprised by what I have done. And it is not necessarily a big master plan, but I look at the number of recordings I’ve made and I’m kind of shocked.”

Hilary Hahn (1979) American violinist

Why Violinist Hilary Hahn Will Never Just Stick to the Classical Repertoire (2012)

“By Numbers here from Shame or Censure free,
All Crimes are safe, but hated Poverty.
This, only this, the rigid Law persues,
This, only this, provokes the snarling Muse.”

Samuel Johnson (1709–1784) English writer

London: A Poem (1738) http://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Texts/london2.html, lines 158–161

Hate, Law

“While I am sure there are a number of women who secretly wonder whether they are lesbian, most simply have, somewhere, a fantasy about having sex, in a non-defining, non-exclusive way, with other women.”

Nigella Lawson (1960) British food writer, journalist and broadcaster

As written in "Sapphism is more than designer-dykery" by Nigella Lawson in The Guardian http://observer.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,6903,416467,00.html (31 December 2000)

Women, Sex, Way

“In a free Government, the security for civil rights must be the same as that for religious rights. It consists in the one case in the multiplicity of interests, and in the other in the multiplicity of sects. The degree of security in both cases, will depend on the number of interests and sects; and this may be presumed to depend on the extent of country and number of People comprehended under the same Government.”

James Madison (1751–1836) 4th president of the United States (1809 to 1817)

Federalist No. 51 (6 February 1788)
1780s, Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

People, Dependency, Country

“An instance of callous and cold-blooded brutality is furnished by the incident that took place on December 20, 1949 in Kalshira under P. S. Mollarhat in the District of Khulna. … The police constable entered into the house and assaulted the wife of Joydev Brahma whose cry attracted her husband and a few companions who escaped from the house. They became desperate, re-entered the house, found 4 constables with one gun only. That perhaps might have encouraged the young men who struck a blow on an armed constable who died on the spot. … the assailants fled and the intelligent neighbours also fled away. But the bulk of the villagers remained in their houses as they were absolutely innocent and failed to realise the consequence of the happening. Subsequently, the S. P., the military and armed police began to beat mercilessly the innocents of the entire village, encouraged the neighbouring Muslims to take away their properties. A number of persons were killed and men and women were forcibly converted. House-hold deities were broken and places of worship desecrated and destroyed. Several women were raped by the police, military and local Muslims. Thus a veritable hell was let loose not only in the village of Kalshira which is 1-1/2 miles in length with a large population, but also in a number of neighbouring Namahsudra villages.”

Jogendra Nath Mandal (1904–1968) Pakistani politician

Excerpted from the resignation letter of J. N. Mandal, Minister for Law and Labour, Government of Pakistan, October 8, 1950. https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Resignation_letter_of_Jogendra_Nath_Mandal https://biblio.wiki/wiki/Resignation_letter_of_Jogendra_Nath_Mandal

Women, Men, Intelligence, Hell

“As the misfortune befell in November [1918], I threw myself into the woodcut... It is a technique that provokes one to confession, to the unmistakable statement of what one finally means. It, or far more she, enforces a certain general validity of expression... I have finished a number of large woodcuts that deal with all of the distress of the times.”

Ernst Barlach (1870–1938) German expressionist sculptor, printmaker and writer

Barlach in a letter to his cousin, 1919; in Erhard Gopel, Deutsche Holzschnitte des zwanzigsten Jahr- hunderts, Wiesbaden: Insel Verlag, 1955, p. 44; as quoted in 'The Revival of Printmaking in Germany', I. K. Rigby; in German Expressionist Prints and Drawings - Essays Vol 1.; published by Museum Associates, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, California & Prestel-Verlag, Germany, 1986, p. 46
Barlach explained why the woodcut spoke so poignantly to the current times

Time

“We are now approaching a social revolution, in which the old economic foundations of monogamy will disappear just as surely as those of its complement, prostitution. Monogamy arose through the concentration of considerable wealth in one hand — a man's hand — and from the endeavor to bequeath this wealth to the children of this man to the exclusion of all others. This necessitated monogamy on the woman's, but not on the man's part. Hence this monogamy of women in no way hindered open or secret polygamy of men. Now, the impending social revolution will reduce this whole care of inheritance to a minimum by changing at least the overwhelming part of permanent and inheritable wealth—the means of production—into social property. Since monogamy was caused by economic conditions, will it disappear when these causes are abolished?
One might reply, not without reason: not only will it not disappear, but it will rather be perfectly realized. For with the transformation of the means of production into collective property, wagelabor will also disappear, and with it the proletariat and the necessity for a certain, statistically ascertainable number of women to surrender for money. Prostitution disappears and monogamy, instead of going out of existence, at last becomes a reality—for men also.
At all events, the situation will be very much changed for men. But also that of women, and of all women, will be considerably altered. With the transformation of the means of production into collective property the monogamous family ceases to be the economic unit of society. The private household changes to a social industry. The care and education of children become? a public matter. Society cares equally well for all children, legal or illegal. This removes the care about the "consequences" which now forms the essential social factor—moral and economic—hindering a girl to surrender unconditionally to the beloved man. Will not this be sufficient cause for a gradual rise of a more unconventional intercourse of the sexes and a more lenient public opinion regarding virgin honor and female shame? And finally, did we not see that in the modern world monogamy and prostitution, though antitheses, are inseparable and poles of the same social condition? Can prostitution disappear without engulfing at the same time monogamy?”

Friedrich Engels (1820–1895) German social scientist, author, political theorist, and philosopher

The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State (1804) as translated by Ernest Untermann (1902); Full English text of The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1884/origin-family/index.htm - Full original-language German text of The Origin of the Family, Private Property and the State http://www.mlwerke.de/me/me21/me21_025.htm

Women, Men, Money, Children

“…we see a number of sophisticated, yet uneducated, theoreticians who are conversant in the LSZ formalism of the Heisenberg field operators, but do not know why an excited atom radiates, or are ignorant of the quantum theoretic deerivation of Rayleigh's law that accounts for the blueness of the sky.”

J. J. Sakurai (1933–1982) American physicist

Modern Quantum Mechanics, Second Edition, Addison-Wesley, 2011.

Law

“The Greek writers who have treated incidentally of agriculture are more than fifty in number. Those whom you may consult with profit are Hieron of Sicily and Attalus Philometor, among the philosophers; Democritus the physicist; Xenophon the disciple of Socrates; Aristotle and Theophrastus, the peripatetics; Archytas the pythagorean; likewise the Athenian Amphilochus, Anaxipolis of Thasos, Apollodorus of Lemnos, Aristophanes of Mallos, Antigonus of Cyme, Agathocles of Chios, Apollonius of Pergamum, Aristandrus of Athens, Bacchius of Miletus, Bion of Soli, Chaeresteus and Chaereas of Athens, Diodorus of Priene, Dion of Colophon, Diophanes of Nicaea, Epigenes of Rhodes, Evagon of Thasos, Euphronius of Athens, and his name sake of Amphipolis, Hegesias of Maronea, the two Menanders, one of Priene, the other of Heraclaea, Nicesius of Maronea, Pythion of Rhodes. Among the rest whose countries I do not know, are Andiotion, Aeschrion, Aristomenes, Athenagoras, Crates, Dadis, Dionysius, Euphiton, Euphorion, Eubulus, Lysimachus, Mnaseas, Menestratus, Plentiphanes, Persis, and Theophilus.”

Marcus Terentius Varro (-116–-27 BC) ancient latin scholar

Bk. 1, ch. 1 ( online https://archive.org/stream/cu31924062805209#page/n75/mode/2up); De Re Rustica

Country

“If I were five-and-twenty or thirty, instead of, unhappily, twice that number of years, I would take Adam Smith in hand—I would not go beyond him, I would have no politics in it—I would take Adam Smith in hand, and I would have a League for free trade in Land just as we had a League for free trade in Corn. You will find just the same authority in Adam Smith for the one as for the other; and if it were only taken up as it must be taken up to succeed, not as a political, revolutionary, Radical, Chartist notion, but taken up on politico-economic grounds, the agitation would be certain to succeed; and if you apply free trade in land and to labour too—that is, by getting rid of those abominable restrictions in your parish settlements, and the like—then, I say, the men who do that will have done for England probably more than we have been able to do by making free trade in corn.”

Richard Cobden (1804–1865) English manufacturer and Radical and Liberal statesman

Speech at Rochdale (23 November 1864), quoted in John Bright and J. E. Thorold Rogers (eds.), Speeches on Questions of Public Policy by Richard Cobden, M.P. Volume II (London: T. Fisher Unwin, 1908), p. 493.
1860s

Men

“I come from Illinois, corn country. There are so many kinds of corn up there they have to number them. You'd be driving down the highway, you'll see BX65, don't mix it up with XL29, you know, something, blah-blah-blah. But I'll tell you what, folks, you can crossbreed your corn from now till the cows come home, and you'll always get corn. You'll never get a hamster, or a tomato or a whale to grow on that corn stalk, okay?”

Kent Hovind (1953) American young Earth creationist

100 Reasons Evolution is So Stupid! (2001)

Home, Country

“Black Death sits upon an eminence, and numbers the silent peoples for their lord; yet the greater part of the troop remains. The Gortynian judge shakes them in his inexorable urn, demanding the truth with threats, and constrains them to speak out their whole lives' story.”
In speculis Mors atra sedet dominoque silentes adnumerat populos; maior superinminet ordo. arbiter hos dura versat Gortynius urna vera minis poscens adigitque expromere vitas usque retro.

Statius book Thebaid

Source: Thebaid, Book IV, Line 528 (tr. J. H. Mozley)

Death, People, Truth, Parting

“I'm very aware that this programme may be regarded as bleak or depressing - an increasing population with an ever decreasing supply of resources – but humans have capabilities that animals don't: to think rationally; to study; to plan ahead. The number of people on the planet depends on the personal decisions we each make regarding the number of children we have even setting aside the moral responsibility we have to protect other species, if we continue to damage our ecosystem, we damage ourselves. Its clear that we'll have to change the way that we live and use our resources. We're at a crossroads where we can chose to cooperate or carry on regardless. Can our intelligence save us? I hope so. m46s24-m47s15”

David Attenborough (1926) British broadcaster and naturalist

How Many People Can Live on Planet Earth? (BBC Horizon, 2009)

Children, People, Hope, Way

“Opposers of compassion urge: ‘If we should live on vegetable food, what shall we do with our cattle? What would become of them? They would grow so numerous they would be prejudicial to us—they would eat us up if we did not kill and eat them.’ But there is abundance of animals in the world whom men do not kill and eat; and yet we hear not of their injuring mankind, and sufficient room is found for their abode. Horses are not usually killed to be eaten, and yet we have not heard of any country overstocked with them. … Cattle are at present an article of trade, and their numbers are industriously promoted. … Self-preservation justifies a man in putting noxious animals to death, yet cannot warrant the least act of cruelty to any being. … Some animals are savage and unfeeling; but let not their ferocity and brutality be the standard pattern of the conduct of man.”

George Nicholson (printer)

Because some of them have no compassion, feeling, or reason, are we to possess no compassion, feeling, or reason? Remarks on Defences of Flesh-eating; quoted in The Ethics of Diet: A Catena of Authorities Deprecatory of the Practice of Flesh-eating https://archive.org/stream/ethicsofdietcate00will/ethicsofdietcate00will#page/n3/mode/2up by Howard Williams (London: F. Pitman, 1883), p. 193.

Death, Men, World, Food

“When I was young, I learned a quote in Sunday school that has stayed with me throughout my life. It said, 'teach us to number our days that we gain a heart of wisdom.' * Most of us will wake up 28,762 days- and then one day - we won’t. That means you have about 21,000 days left - and about 14,000 of them for your career. So herein lies the urgency.”

Steve Blank (1953) American businessman

NYU Commencement Speech, Blank to Millennials: 'Make the Days of Your Life Matter'" https://www.inc.com/zoe-henry/steve-blank-2016-commencement-speech-steve-jobs.html,"Steve, May 23, 2016.

Life, Wisdom, School, Quotes

“We live today in a world which only faintly resembles that of a half century ago. The standard of living, the level of education, and the political complexion of the United States today profoundly affect both the possibilities and limitations of organizational behavior. In addition, technological changes are bringing about changes in all types of organization. In the military, for example, it is becoming increasingly difficult to manage a weapons team in the field as a typical infantry unit was managed a couple of decades ago. Such a team requires a high degree of autonomy. Instead of following explicit orders from superiors, it must be able to adjust its behavior to fit local circumstances within the context of relatively broad objectives. (It is interesting to note the attempts that are made — by "programming" for example — to retain central control over the operations of such units. Established theories of control are not abandoned easily, even in the face of clear evidence of their inappropriateness.) Underlying the principles of classical organization theory are a number of assumptions about human behavior which are at best only partially true.”

Douglas McGregor (1906–1964) American professor

Source: The Human Side of Enterprise (1960), p. 16 (2006; 23)

World, Education, Behavior, Change

“Success, in life, is most easily measured by the number of days you are truly happy.”

Eric Edmeades (1970) Canadian businessman

Article=Success Express Journal: Volume 3, Issue 1 – November 1995 http://sejarchives.wordpress.com/1995/11/01/sej-volume-3-issue-1/

Life, Happiness, Success

““Pure Mohammadan Islam”: This is what ISIS, Daesh in Arabic, promises to deliver once the caliphate has defeated “Infidel” enemies and secured its position. The promise is at the core of its propaganda, including in cyberspace. Its recent blitzkrieg victories and high-profile beheadings are not the only reason ISIS has attracted universal attention. Perhaps more interesting is Daesh’s ability to seduce large numbers of Muslims across the globe, including in Europe and the United States. It does so with an ideological “product” designed to replace other brands of Islamism marketed by the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, the Taliban in Afghanistan and the Khomeinists in Iran. Daeshism, to coin a phrase, also aimed to transcend the ideological hodgepodge marketed by al Qaeda franchises.”

Amir Taheri (1942) Iranian journalist

"The ugly attractions of ISIS’ ideology" http://nypost.com/2014/11/02/the-ugly-attractions-of-isis-ideology/, New York Post (November 2, 2014). New York Post

Universe, Victory

“This increase in the life span and in the number of our senior citizens presents this Nation with increased opportunities: the opportunity to draw upon their skill and sagacity — and the opportunity to provide the respect and recognition they have earned. It is not enough for a great nation merely to have added new years to life — our objective must also be to add new life to those years.”

John F. Kennedy (1917–1963) 35th president of the United States of America

Special message to the Congress on the needs of the nation’s senior citizens (21 February 1963); in Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: John F. Kennedy, 1963, p. 189
1963

Life, Drawing

“We have all the essential elements of a high national career. The idea has been given out at the North, and even in the border States, that we are too small and too weak to maintain a separate nationality. This is a great mistake. In extent of territory we embrace five hundred and sixty-four thousand square miles and upward. This is upward of two hundred thousand square miles more than was included within the limits of the original thirteen States. It is an area of country more than double the territory of France or the Austrian empire. France, in round numbers, has but two hundred and twelve thousand square miles. Austria, in round numbers, has two hundred and forty-eight thousand square miles. Ours is greater than both combined. It is greater than all France, Spain, Portugal, and Great Britain, including England, Ireland, and Scotland, together. In population we have upward of five millions, according to the census of 1860; this includes white and black. The entire population, including white and black, of the original thirteen States, was less than four millions in 1790, and still less in 76, when the independence of our fathers was achieved. If they, with a less population, dared maintain their independence against the greatest power on earth, shall we have any apprehension of maintaining ours now?”

Alexander H. Stephens (1812–1883) Vice President of the Confederate States (in office from 1861 to 1865)

The Cornerstone Speech (1861)

Idea, Country

“Being a mom is my number one job. My son [Nayib, 27] lives in Los Angeles and he has his own company where he works on music and film projects, but he calls me every day. Emily [who is 12] is very athletic; she plays tennis and basketball. I love going to her games. If she needs help with her home work, I'll sit with her. She also is very musical -- she writes poetry and plays the guitar. I always tell both my kids, "Find what makes you happy. The money will come regardless of what you do, and more or less of it is not going to be what makes you happy. Spending hours at something you enjoy will."”

Gloria Estefan (1957) Cuban-American singer-songwriter, actress and divorciada

Latina Magazine (September, 2007)
2007, 2008

Love, Money, Happiness, Music

“The wide distribution of the Satem or Iranian group to the south and west of Asia shows that the Nordics in great numbers conquered the aboriginal inhabitants of these countries and imposed on them the Aryan speech. They invented the caste system to maintain the purity of their blood. In fact, the Hindu word "varna" means both color and caste. In spite of all their efforts, however, the conquering invaders died out almost completely in India and Persia — leaving behind them only their language, and, in some cases, their religion.”

Madison Grant (1865–1937) American lawyer, eugenicist, and conservationist

The Conquest of a Continent (1933)

Religion, Color, Effort, Country

“I will take leave to read to the house a few figures which show the amazing, the unprecedented growth which has not perhaps a parallel in the annals of the past, of the military power of our neighbours within the past three or four years… From January 1861 to January 1863 the army of 10,000 was increased to 800,000… In January 1861 the ships of war belonging to the United States were 83; in December 1864 they numbered 671…
These are frightful figures for the capacity of destruction they represent, for the heaps of carnage that they represent, for the quantity of human blood spilt that they represent, for the lust of conquest that they represent, for the evil passions that they represent, and for the the arrest of onward progress that they represent.”

Thomas D'Arcy McGee (1825–1868) Canadian politician

Legislative Assembly, February 9, 1865

War, Passion, Evil, Reading

“But what, after all, are the integers? Everyone thinks that he or she knows, for example, what the number three is — until he or she tries to define or explain it.”

Carl B. Boyer (1906–1976) American mathematician

As quoted in Everything and More: A Compact History of Infinity (2013) by David Foster Wallace, p. 8

Thinking

“This faulty intuition as well as many modern applications of probability theory are under the strong influence of traditional misconceptions concerning the meaning of the law of large numbers and of a popular mystique concerning a so-called law of averages.”

William Feller (1906–1970) Croatian-American mathematician

Source: An Introduction To Probability Theory And Its Applications (Third Edition), Chapter X, Law Of large Numbers, p. 250.

Law, Strong

“[T]he sciences that are expressed by numbers or by other small signs, are easily learned; and… this facility rather than its demonstrability is what has made the fortune of algebra.”

Julien Offray de La Mettrie book Man a Machine

p, 125
Man a Machine (1747)

Learning, Science

“An increase in the number of paupers does not broaden the market.”

Michał Kalecki (1899–1970) Polish economist

Source: Theory of Economic Dynamics (1965), Chapter 15, Development Factors, p. 161

“Bit of Toto as Hoffmann makes his way to the middle - "I bless the rains down in Africa!" - smashing. My favourite Toto number is Rosanna. I used to go out with someone called Rosanna. Her mum looked like Cher.”

Ben Dirs journalist

Way

“Clinton has changed all that. By endowing bin Laden with his new title (i. e. America's Public Enemy Number One), he has given the Saudi dissident what he sought: recognition as the greatest enemy of Western "corruption," the leader of all resistance against US policy in the Middle East. It would be funny if it weren't so tragic, the way America now treats its opponents as if they were Hollywood bandits.”

Robert Fisk (1946) English writer and journalist

Robert Fisk talks about Usama bin Ladin http://www.robert-fisk.com/fisk_talks_with_usama_bin_ladin.htm, September 21, 1998 1990s

Way, Change

“President Obama keeps insisting that ISIS is not Islamic. Well, maybe they don't practice the Muslim faith the same way he does, but if vast numbers of Muslims across the world believe, and they do, that humans deserve to die for merely holding a different idea, or drawing a cartoon, or writing a book, or eloping with the wrong person, not only does the Muslim world have something in common with ISIS, it has too much in common with ISIS. There's so much talk … about wiping out ISIS. You can't, not with bombs. You can only expose that something is a bad idea … Cultures are different. It's okay to judge that rule of law isn't just different than theocracy, it's better. If you don't see that, you're either a religious fanatic or a masochist, but one thing you certainly are not is a liberal. To count yourself as a liberal, you have to stand up for liberal principles. Free speech, separation of church and state, freedom to practice any religion or no religion without the threat of violence. Respect for minorities including homosexuals, equality for women.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/09/27/maher_rips_liberals_over_islam_if_were_giving_no_quarter_to_intolerance_shouldnt_we_start_with_honor_killers.html September 26, 2014. Real Time with Bill Maher

Women, Books, World, Faith

“A pure Democracy, by which I mean a Society consisting of a small number of citizens, who assemble and administer the Government in person, can admit of no cure for the mischiefs of faction. A common passion or interest will, in almost every case, be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert result from the form of Government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party, or an obnoxious individual. Hence it is, that such Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulence and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property; and have in general been as short in their lives, as they have been violent in their deaths. Theoretic politicians, who have patronized this species of Government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions.”

James Madison (1751–1836) 4th president of the United States (1809 to 1817)

Federalist No. 10
1780s, Federalist Papers (1787–1788)

Death, Democracy, Communication, Passion

“Mental illness, of course, is not literally a "thing" — or physical object — and hence it can "exist" only in the same sort of way in which other theoretical concepts exist. Yet, familiar theories are in the habit of posing, sooner or later — at least to those who come to believe in them — as "objective truths" (or "facts"). During certain historical periods, explanatory conceptions such as deities, witches, and microorganisms appeared not only as theories but as self-evident causes of a vast number of events. I submit that today mental illness is widely regarded in a somewhat similar fashion, that is, as the cause of innumerable diverse happenings. As an antidote to the complacent use of the notion of mental illness — whether as a self-evident phenomenon, theory, or cause — let us ask this question: What is meant when it is asserted that someone is mentally ill?
In what follows I shall describe briefly the main uses to which the concept of mental illness has been put. I shall argue that this notion has outlived whatever usefulness it might have had and that it now functions merely as a convenient myth.”

Thomas Szasz book The Myth of Mental Illness

"The Myth of Mental Illness" in American Psycholigist, Vol. 15 (1960), p. 113 http://psychclassics.yorku.ca/Szasz/myth.htm

Truth, Way, Fashion, Question

“The third group [of society] are those irresponsible and reckless ones having little regard for the consequences of their acts, or whose religious scruples prevent their exercising control over their numbers. Many of this group are diseased, feeble-minded, and are of the pauper element dependent upon the normal and fit members of society for their support. There is no doubt in the minds of all thinking people that the procreation of this group should be stopped.”

Margaret Sanger (1879–1966) American birth control activist, educator and nurse

Speech quoted in "Birth Control: What It Is, How It Works, What It Will Do." The Proceedings of the First American Birth Control Conference. Held at the Hotel Plaza, New York City, November 11-12, 1921. Published by the Birth Control Review, Gothic Press, pages 172 and 174.

People, Disease, Exercises, Support

“First, the eight rules of tolerance: 1. Stay out of the way. 2. Don't pick a fight. 3. If challenged, walk away. 4. Avoid eye contact. 5. If your enemy is diurnal, learn to be nocturnal. 6. Vice versa. 7. Possess nothing the other wants. 8. Draw the line at hurting kids: I will fight to the death.
After tolerance is achieved comes play. Here are the nine rules of play: 1. Know when to quit. 2. Learn how to handicap. 3. Learn what frightens the other (cat claws). 4. Don't let it get to you. It's just a game; you mustn't take it seriously (cats have trouble with this one—escalation is always a risk in cat games). 5. Don't eat your playmate. 6. Pay attention to the signals on the other side—for instance, “enough” and “quit.” 7. Don't suddenly change the rules. 8. Don't be a sore loser. 9. Remember: It's only a game.
And if play succeeds, we can move on to the eight rules of friendship: 1. Learn the rules of your opposite number. 2. Recognize that danger is no longer relevant. 3. Take your time. 4. One step at a time. 5. Apologize often by learning the other's words, gestures, sounds, or postures for “I'm sorry.””

Jeffrey Moussaieff Masson (1941) American writer and activist

6. Acknowledge mistakes. 7. Make the offer of friendship more than once. 8. Express curiosity about what the other is like.
Source: Raising the Peaceable Kingdom (2005), Ch. 5

Death, Friendship, Way, Game

“In this day and age if you've got the technology then it's vital to use that technology to track people down. The number on the database should be the maximum number you can get.”

Tony Blair (1953) former Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

BBC News online http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6075930.stm Remarks while touring the Forensic Science Service, concerning the police DNA database, 23 October 2006. 2000s

People, Age

“The Greeks encountered the confusion of tongues when numbers invaded Euclidean space.”

Marshall McLuhan (1911–1980) Canadian educator, philosopher, and scholar-- a professor of English literature, a literary critic, and a …

Source: 1960s, The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962), p. 203

“The shattering of modern culture is the result, on the plane of ideological struggle, of the chaotic crisis of these antagonisms. The new desires that are taking shape are presented in distorted form: present-day resources could enable them to be fulfilled, but the anachronistic economic structure is incapable of developing these resources to such ends. Ruling-class ideology has meanwhile lost all coherence because of the depreciation of its successive conceptions of the world (a depreciation which leads the ruling class to historical indecision and uncertainty); because of the coexistence of a range of mutually contradictory reactionary ideologies (such as Christianity and social-democracy); and because of the mixing into contemporary Western culture of a number of only recently appreciated features of several foreign civilizations. The main goal of ruling-class ideology is therefore to maintain this confusion.”

Guy Debord (1931–1994) French Marxist theorist, writer, filmmaker and founding member of the Situationist International (SI)

Report on the Construction of Situations (1957)

World, Democracy, Success, Indecision

“Look, having nuclear—my uncle was a great professor and scientist and engineer, Dr. John Trump at MIT; good genes, very good genes, OK, very smart, the Wharton School of Finance, very good, very smart—you know, if you're a conservative Republican, if I were a liberal, if, like, OK, if I ran as a liberal Democrat, they would say I'm one of the smartest people anywhere in the world—it's true!—but when you're a conservative Republican they try—oh, do they do a number—that's why I always start off: Went to Wharton, was a good student, went there, went there, did this, built a fortune—you know I have to give my like credentials all the time, because we're a little disadvantaged—but you look at the nuclear deal, the thing that really bothers me — it would have been so easy, and it's not as important as these lives are—nuclear is powerful; my uncle explained that to me many, many years ago, the power and that was 35 years ago; he would explain the power of what's going to happen and he was right, who would have thought?—but when you look at what's going on with the four prisoners—now it used to be three, now it's four—but when it was three and even now, I would have said it's all in the messenger; fellas, and it is fellas because, you know, they don't, they haven't figured that the women are smarter right now than the men, so, you know, it's gonna take them about another 150 years—but the Persians are great negotiators, the Iranians are great negotiators, so, and they, they just killed, they just killed us.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Speech in South Carolina (19 July 2016)
2010s, 2016, July

Women, Men, People, World

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

"Cornel West interviewed by bell hooks" in Breaking Bread: Insurgent Black Intellectual Life (1991)

People, World, Religion, Art

“LISP has been jokingly described as "the most intelligent way to misuse a computer". I think that description a great compliment because it transmits the full flavor of liberation: it has assisted a number of our most gifted fellow humans in thinking previously impossible thoughts.”

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

1970s, The Humble Programmer (1972)

Way, Intelligence, Thinking

“The monetary history of the last four hundred years has been replete with financial crises. The pattern was that investor optimism increased as economies expanded, the rate of growth of credit increased and economic growth accelerated, and an increasing number of individuals began to invest for short-term capital gains rather than for the returns associated with the productivity of the assets they were acquiring. The increase in the supply of credit and more buoyant economic outlook often led to economic booms as investment spending increased in response to the more optimistic outlook and the greater availability of credit, and as household spending increased as personal wealth surged.”

Charles P. Kindleberger (1910–2003) American economic historian

Manias, Panics, and Crashes: A History of Financial Crises (1978), Ch. 13 : The Lessons of History and the Most Tumultuous Decades Ever

History, Optimism, Personality, Wealth

“Those of us concerned with developing new technology should consider ourselves to have a major undertaking to try to meet the expanding needs of the increasing number of people in the world with its finite resources and environments constraints.”

Harold Chestnut (1917–2001) American engineer

Chestnut (1981) attributed in: Dr. Harold Chestnut: 1981 Honda Prize Laureate http://www.hondafoundation.jp/library/pdfs/ourdream_e.pdf in: Honda Prize Ecotechnology Quote

People, World

“I'm totally against the trade bill for a number of reasons. Number one, the people negotiating don't have a clue. Our president doesn't have a clue. He's a bad negotiator. He's the one that did Bergdahl. We get Bergdahl, they get five killer terrorists that everybody wanted over there. We get Bergdahl. We get a traitor. We get a no-good traitor, and they get the five people that they wanted for years, and those people are now back on the battlefield trying to kill us. That's the negotiator we have.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2015, Presidential Bid Announcement (June 16, 2015)

People

“If the Negroes, numbering one-eighth of the population of these United States, would only cast their votes in the interest of the Democratic Party, all open measures against them would be immediately suspended and their rights as American citizens recognized. But as to the real results of such a state of affairs, and speaking in behalf of those with whom I am conversant, I can only say that we love freedom more, vastly more, than slavery. Consequently, we hope to keep clear of the Democrats! I say to the entire membership of the Democratic Party, that upon your hands rests the blood of the loyal men of the south. Disclaim it as you will; the stain is there to prove your criminality before God and the world in the day of retribution.”

Joseph Hayne Rainey (1832–1887) politician

1871, Speech on the the Ku Klux Klan Bill of 1871 (1 April 1871)

Love, Men, God, World

“I see Professionalism as a spreading disease of the present-day world, a sort of poly-oligarchy by which various groups (subway conductors, social workers, bricklayers) can bring things to a halt if their particular demands are not met. (Meanwhile, the irrelevance of each profession increases, in proportion to its increasing rigidity.) Such lucky groups demand more in each go-round - but meantime, the number who are permanently unemployed grows and grows.”

Ted Nelson (1937) American information technologist, philosopher, and sociologist; coined the terms "hypertext" and "hypermedia"

Computer Lib
Computer Lib/Dream Machines (1974, rev. 1987)

World, Disease

“Sociology is the science whose object is to interpret the meaning of social action and thereby give a causal explanation of the way in which the action proceeds and the effects which it produces. By "action" in this definition is meant the human behaviour when and to the extent that the agent or agents see it as subjectively meaningful […] the meaning to which we refer may be either (a) the meaning actually intended either by an individual agent on a particular historical occasion or by a number of agents on an approximate average in a given set of cases, or (b) the meaning attributed to the agent or agents, as types, in a pure type constructed in the abstract. In neither case is the "meaning" to be thought of as somehow objectively "correct" or "true" by some metaphysical criterion. This is the difference between the empirical sciences of action, such as sociology and history and any kind of a priori discipline, such as jurisprudence, logic, ethics, or aesthetics whose aim is to extract from their subject-matter "correct" or "valid" meaning.”

Max Weber (1864–1920) German sociologist, philosopher, and political economist

Max Weber, The Nature of Social Action, 1922

Way, History, Science

“Music is made up of a large number of individual sounds, and is either a single melody or a part-song.”

Johannes Tinctoris (1435–1511) Flemish composer

Dictionary of Musical Terms (1475)

Music, Parting

“I have not written a book since the campaign. I did not write this book at all. It is the result of the editorial literary skill of Mr. William Bayard Hale, who has put together here in their right sequences the more suggestive portions of my campaign speeches.
And yet it is not a book of campaign speeches. It is a discussion of a number of very vital subjects in the free form of extemporaneously spoken words. I have left the sentences in the form in which they were stenographically reported. I have not tried to alter the easy-going and often colloquial phraseology in which they were uttered from the platform, in the hope that they would seem the more fresh and spontaneous because of their very lack of pruning and recasting.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

Preface, p. vii http://books.google.com/books?id=MW8SAAAAIAAJ&pg=PP11&dq=%22I+have+not+written%22 1910s, The New Freedom (1913)

Books, Hope

“As mathematical and absolute certainty is seldom to be attained in human affairs, reason and public utility require that judges and all mankind in forming their opinions of the truth of facts should be regulated by the superior number of the probabilities on the one side or the other whether the amount of these probabilities be expressed in words and arguments or by figures and numbers.”

William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield (1705–1793) British judge

Reported in Andrew Stuart, Letters to the Right Honorable Lord Mansfield (1773), p. 29.

Truth, Mathematics

“The speeches by the Minister and the former Minister were an absolute disgrace in complacency, especially the assumption that market forces will solve the housing problem. If that is so, why is it that there are record numbers of homeless people? Why is it that tonight, as on every night of the year, people will be sleeping under the national theatre, in Covent Garden, around the tube stations in London and alongside the main roads? The Government, in their obsession with market forces and the triumph of the rich over the poor, are creating a hobo society. That is all they are trying to do with their housing policies…They are proposing a return to Rachmanism. They are proposing all the horrors of the Rent Act 1957: nothing but homelessness and exploitation for the unemployed, the poor and the homeless.”

Jeremy Corbyn (1949) British Labour Party politician

Speech http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1987/apr/28/housing in the House of Commons (28 April 1987). 1980s

People, Problem, Sleep, Housing

“The cities of Italy are now deluged with droves of these creatures [tour groups], for they never separate, and you see them, forty in number, pouring along a street with their director — now in front, now at the rear, circling them like a sheep dog — and really the process is as like herding as may be.”

Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian

Charles James Lever, Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men and Women and Other Things in General (Blackwood's Magazine, 1864-1865): "Continental Excursionists" [Adamant Media Corporation, 2001, ISBN 0-543-90729-5], p. 243. Quoted by Boorstin in The Image: A Guide to Pseudo-Events in America (1961) [Vintage edition, 1992, ISBN 0-679-74180-1], Ch. 3: From Traveler to Tourist: The Lost Art of Travel, p. 88.
Misattributed

Dogs

“There were long stretches where each of us was engaged in a private world of rapidly shifting vignettes. Always I was overwhelmed by the sheer number of human beings ebbing and flowing like the tides of the sea.”

Howard Thurman (1899–1981) American writer

Of a trip to India, in With Head and Heart: The Autobiography of Howard Thurman (1979), p. 135 http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=Aos1iJ9YfRwC&pg=PA135&dq=%22howard+thurman%22+india&hl=en&sa=X&ei=bmNeT47pDIqZ8QPJt9XvDg&ved=0CDwQ6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=%22howard%20thurman%22%20india&f=false

World, Sea

“It seems reasonable to envision, for a time 10 or 15 years hence, a 'thinking center' that will incorporate the functions of present-day libraries together with anticipated advances in information storage and retrieval.
The picture readily enlarges itself into a network of such centers, connected to one another by wide-band communication lines and to individual users by leased-wire services. In such a system, the speed of the computers would be balanced, and the cost of the gigantic memories and the sophisticated programs would be divided by the number of users.”

J. C. R. Licklider Man-Computer Symbiosis

Cited in: Jacques Berleur, Markku I. Nurminen, John Impagliazzo (2006) Social Informatics: An Information Society for All? p. 436.
Man-Computer Symbiosis, 1960

Communication, Thinking, Memory, Time

“Since it is only in the context of a proposition that words have any meaning, our problem becomes this: To define the sense of a proposition in which a number-word occurs.”

Gottlob Frege (1848–1925) mathematician, logician, philosopher

Nur im Zusammenhange eines Satzes bedeuten die Wörter etwas. Es wird also darauf ankommen, den Sinn eines Satzes zu erklären, in dem ein Zahlwort vorkommt.
Gottlob Frege (1950 [1884]). p. 73

Problem, Sense

“The progress of the nation in wealth and refinement, however, naturally brought with it an increase in the number of crimes, as the old definition of offences became inadequate.”

Edward Jenks (1861–1939) British legal scholar

Source: A Short History Of The English Law (First Edition) (1912), Chapter XI, Criminal Law And Procedure, p. 149

Nature, Wealth

Quotes about number page 23

Quotes about number
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