Quotes about survival
page 9

Ernesto Che Guevara photo
Andrew Carnegie photo
John Moffat photo
Robert Sheckley photo
Adolf Hitler photo
Rod Serling photo
John Gray photo
Pliny the Younger photo
Dora Russell photo
Dana Gioia photo
Jack McDevitt photo

“The cultures we can look at had already grasped the essential unity of nature. No board of gods can survive that knowledge.”

Jack McDevitt (1935) American novelist, Short story writer

Source: Academy Series - Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins, The Engines of God (1994), Chapter 8 (p. 107)

Terence McKenna photo

“Somewhere around 1945 we began to loot the future as a strategy for survival, some ethical norm was shattered.”

Terence McKenna (1946–2000) American ethnobotanist

History Ends in Green (1983)

Ayn Rand photo
Werner Erhard photo
Christopher Hitchens photo

“[Even if the U. S. doesn't attack] Saddam Hussein is not going to survive. His regime is on the verge of implosion.”

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

Nov. 7, 2002 http://www.slate.com/id/2073634/: On Iraq
2000s, 2002

Gerhard Richter photo
Alfred P. Sloan photo
Lois McMaster Bujold photo

“No battle plan survives first contact with the enemy. Not when the enemy is me.”

This includes a common paraphrase of a statement which originates with military strategist Field Marshall Helmuth von Moltke: "No plan of operations extends with any certainty beyond the first contact with the main hostile force."
Vorkosigan Saga, Cetaganda (1996)

S. I. Hayakawa photo
Charles Fort photo
Max Horkheimer photo
James Hamilton photo
Herbert Marcuse photo

“Life is like this. When I started business 48 years ago as a contractor, I was only looking to survive, cari makan”

Sukanto Tanoto (1949) Indonesian businessman

looking for food
Globe Asia Interview, Sep, 2015. http://www.inside-rge.com/Sukanto-Tanoto-Resource-King-GlobeAsia
2015

Eliezer Yudkowsky photo
Warren Farrell photo
E.M. Forster photo
David Foster Wallace photo
George W. Bush photo

“What we're trying to do with this reinforcement of our troops is to provide enough space so that the Iraqi government can meet certain benchmarks or certain requirements for a unity government to survive and for the country to be strong.”

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

Meeting with Cabinet http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2007/02/20070205-2.html (February 7, 2007)
2000s, 2007

Edward Carpenter photo
Herbert Marcuse photo

“The world of their [the bourgeois’] predecessors was a backward, pre-technological world, a world with the good conscience of inequality and toil, in which labor was still a fated misfortune; but a world in which man and nature were not yet organized as things and instrumentalities. With its code of forms and manners. with the style and vocabulary of its literature and philosophy. this past culture expressed the rhythm and content of a universe in which valleys and forests, villages and inns, nobles and villains, salons and courts were a part of the experienced reality. In the verse and prose of this pre-technological culture is the rhythm of those who wander or ride in carriages. who have the time and the pleasure to think, contemplate, feel and narrate. It is an outdated and surpassed culture, and only dreams and childlike regressions can recapture it. But this culture is, in some of its decisive elements. also a post-technological one. Its most advanced images and positions seem to survive their absorption into administered comforts and stimuli; they continue to haunt the consciousness with the possibility of their rebirth in the consummation of technical progress. They are the expression of that free and conscious alienation from the established forms of life with which literature and the arts opposed these forms even where they adorned them. In contrast to the Marxian concept, which denotes man's relation to himself and to his work in capitalist society, the artistic alienation is the conscious transcendence of the alienated existence—a “higher level” or mediated alienation. The conflict with the world of progress, the negation of the order of business, the anti-bourgeois elements in bourgeois literature and art are neither due to the aesthetic lowliness of this order nor to romantic reaction—nostalgic consecration of a disappearing stage of civilization. “Romantic” is a term of condescending defamation which is easily applied to disparaging avant-garde positions, just as the term “decadent” far more often denounces the genuinely progressive traits of a dying culture than the real factors of decay. The traditional images of artistic alienation are indeed romantic in as much as they are in aesthetic incompatibility with the developing society. This incompatibility is the token of their truth. What they recall and preserve in memory pertains to the future: images of a gratification that would dissolve the society which suppresses it”

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), pp. 59-60

Tadamichi Kuribayashi photo

“You must not expect my survival…”

Tadamichi Kuribayashi (1891–1945) Japanese general

Letter to his wife http://members.tripod.com/iwo_jima_project/id6.htm.

Derek Jarman photo
Warren Farrell photo

“For the first time in human history the psychology that is a prerequisite for intimacy has become the psychology that is a prerequisite for species survival.”

Warren Farrell (1943) author, spokesperson, expert witness, political candidate

Source: Why Men Are the Way They Are (1988), p. 371.

Victor Villaseñor photo
Chetan Bhagat photo

“Girls handbags have enough to make a survival kit for Antarctica.”

Source: One Night @ the Call Center (2005), P. 82

Madison Grant photo
Willa Cather photo
Adlai Stevenson photo

“Nature is indifferent to the survival of the human species, including Americans.”

Adlai Stevenson (1900–1965) mid-20th-century Governor of Illinois and Ambassador to the UN

Radio address (29 September 1952)

Elia M. Ramollah photo
Valentina Lisitsa photo

“It’s only when you stop trying to find faults and start doing something constructive that you will survive … It’s just good for you as a human not to dwell on your disasters.”

Valentina Lisitsa (1973) Ukrainian-American classical pianist

nytimes.com http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/13/arts/music/valentina-lisitsa-jump-starts-her-career-online.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.

“Having gone through that experience of being in a Cambridge college, surviving it and building myself up, meant that coming here (Westminster) was a walk in the park, and a lot of the same people are here!”

Jo Cox (1974–2016) UK politician

‘I’ve been in some horrific situations’ - MP http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news/i-ve-been-in-some-horrific-situations-mp-1-7642788, The Yorkshire Post (26 December 2015)

Bill Downs photo

“Just think! If we survive them, these will be the good old days!”

Bill Downs (1914–1978) American journalist

Quote recalled by Walter Cronkite while ducking in the trenches to avoid heavy mortar fire, from Douglas Brinkley's Cronkite.

John F. Kennedy photo
Herbert Marcuse photo

“They [great works of literature] are invalidated not because of their literary obsolescence. Some of these images pertain to contemporary literature and survive in its most advanced creations. What has been invalidated is their subversive force, their destructive content—their truth. In this transformation, they find their home in everyday living. The alien and alienating oeuvres of intellectual culture become familiar goods and services. Is their massive reproduction and consumption only a change in quantity, namely, growing appreciation and understanding, democratization of culture? The truth of literature and art has always been granted (if it was granted at all) as one of a “higher” order, which should not and indeed did not disturb the order of business. What has changed in the contemporary period is the difference between the two orders and their truths. The absorbent power of society depletes the artistic dimension by assimilating its antagonistic contents. In the realm of culture, the new totalitarianism manifests itself precisely in a harmonizing pluralism, where the most contradictory works and truths peacefully coexist in indifference. Prior to the advent of this cultural reconciliation, literature and art were essentially alienation, sustaining and protecting the contradiction—the unhappy consciousness of the divided world, the defeated possibilities, the hopes unfulfilled, and the promises betrayed. They were a rational, cognitive force, revealing a dimension of man and nature which was repressed and repelled in reality.”

Source: One-Dimensional Man (1964), pp. 60-61

Lee Kuan Yew photo
Warren Farrell photo
James E. Lovelock photo
Alfred Korzybski photo

“Since so little is known about the early Macedonians, it is hardly strange that in both ancient and modern times there has been much disagreement on their ethnic identity. The Greeks in general and Demosthenes in particular looked upon them as barbarians, that is, not Greek. Modern scholarship, after many generations of argument, now almost unanimously recognises them as Greeks, a branch of the Dorians and ‘NorthWest Greeks’ who, after long residence in the north Pindus region, migrated eastwards. The Macedonian language has not survived in any written text, but the names of individuals, places, gods, months, and the like suggest strongly that the language was a Greek dialect. Macedonian institutions, both secular and religious, had marked Hellenic characteristics and legends identify or link the people with the Dorians. During their sojourn in the Pindus complex and the long struggle to found a kingdom, however, the Macedonians fought and mingled constantly with Illyrians, Thracians, Paeonians, and probably various Greek tribes. Their language naturally acquired many Illyrian and Thracian loanwords, and some of their customs were surely influenced by their neighbours[…] To the civilised Greek of the fifth and fourth centuries, the Macedonian way of life must have seemed crude and primitive. This backwardness in culture was mainly the result of geographical factors. The Greeks, who had proceeded south in the second millennium, were affected by the many civilising influences of the Mediterranean world, and ultimately they developed that very civilising institution, the polis. The Macedonians, on the other hand, remained in the north and living for centuries in mountainous areas, fighting with Illyrians, Thracians, and amongst themselves as tribe fought tribe, developed a society that may be termed Homeric. The amenities of city-state life were unknown until they began to take root in Lower Macedonia from the end of the fifth century onwards.”

John V.A. Fine (1903–1987) American historian

"The Ancient Greeks: A Critical History", Harvard University Press, 1983, pgs 605-608

Charles Sumner photo

“The same national authority that destroyed slavery must see that this other pretension is not permitted to survive.”

Charles Sumner (1811–1874) American abolitionist and politician

As quoted in "The Ideology of the Republican Party" https://books.google.com/books?id=5Cl2cVkEV9wC&pg=PA65&dq=%22the+party+of+emancipation%22+GOP&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjW0tfNv5_LAhUJ8CYKHUxcBv4Q6AEILjAD#v=onepage&q=man's%20government&f=false, by Eric Foner, The Birth of the Grand Old Party: The Republicans' First Generation (2002), edited by Robert F. Engs and Randall M. Miller, Pennsylvania: University of Pennsylvania Press, p. 18

W. Edwards Deming photo

“Learning is not compulsory; it's voluntary. Improvement is not compulsory; it's voluntary. But to survive, we must learn.”

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

Deming: The Way We Knew Him http://books.google.com/books?id=VKBz5RW5yFcC&pg=PA125&dq=%22learning+is+not+compulsory%22+%22+survival%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=fcqtUtH0BYbioATs44HQAw&ved=0CEwQ6AEwBjgy#v=onepage&q=%22learning%20is%20not%20compulsory%22%20%22%20survival%22&f=false (1995)
This quote is often cited as “Learning is not compulsory... neither is survival.”

Albert Einstein photo
Thomas Sowell photo
Isaac Asimov photo

“[In response to this question by Bill Moyers: What do you see happening to the idea of dignity to human species if this population growth continues at its present rate? ] "It's going to destroy it all. I use what I call my bathroom metaphor. If two people live in an apartment, and there are two bathrooms, then both have what I call freedom of the bathroom, go to the bathroom any time you want, and stay as long as you want to for whatever you need. And this to my way is ideal. And everyone believes in the freedom of the bathroom. It should be right there in the Constitution. But if you have 20 people in the apartment and two bathrooms, no matter how much every person believes in freedom of the bathroom, there is no such thing. You have to set up, you have to set up times for each person, you have to bang at the door, aren't you through yet, and so on. And in the same way, democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people onto the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. It doesn't matter if someone dies.”

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

Interview by Bill Moyers on Bill Moyers' World Of Ideas (17 October 1988); transcript http://www.pbs.org/moyers/faithandreason/print/pdfs/woi%20asimov1.pdf (page 6) - audio (20:12) http://www.pbs.org/moyers/faithandreason/media_players/asimovwoi_audio.html
General sources

Arthur C. Clarke photo
Percy Bysshe Shelley photo
Marshall McLuhan photo
William H. McNeill photo
Hugo De Vries photo

“To put it in the terms chosen lately by Mr. Arthur Harris in a friendly criticism of my views: "Natural selection may explain the survival of the fittest, but it cannot explain the arrival of the fittest."”

Hugo De Vries (1848–1935) Dutch botanist

Concluding sentence of his work Species and Varieties: Their Origin by Mutation (1904), The Open Court Publishing Company, Chicago, p. 826.

Forrest Sherman photo

“The survival of this country depends upon letting the world know we have the power and the ability to use it if the occasion demands.”

Forrest Sherman (1896–1951) Recipient of the Purple Heart medal

As quoted in "According to Plan" in TIME magazine (13 March 1950) http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,812125,00.html

Charles Darwin photo

“The expression often used by Mr. Herbert Spencer of the Survival of the Fittest is more accurate, and is sometimes equally convenient.”

Compare: "This survival of the fittest, which I have here sought to express in mechanical terms, is that which Mr Darwin has called 'natural selection, or the preservation of favoured races in the struggle for life.' ", Herbert Spencer, The Principles of Biology (1864) volume 1, part III: "The Evolution of Life", chapter XII, "Indirect Equilibration", pages 444-445.
Source: On the Origin of Species (1859), chapter III: "Struggle For Existence", page 72 http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?pageseq=101&itemID=F387&viewtype=image, in the fifth (1869) and sixth (1872) editions

Clifford D. Simak photo
Linh Nga photo
Peter Sloterdijk photo
Eugene McCarthy photo
Will Eisner photo
Charles Darwin photo

“In the struggle for survival, the fittest win out at the expense of their rivals because they succeed in adapting themselves best to their environment.”

Charles Darwin (1809–1882) British naturalist, author of "On the origin of species, by means of natural selection"

This related misquote http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/six-things-darwin-never-said appeared in The Living Clocks (1971) by Ritchie R. Ward.
Misattributed

Nicholas Sparks photo

“Our stories are funny because we lived them, and we survived them. The worse the incident was when it was happening, the funnier the story had become to us over the years.”

Nicholas Sparks (1965) American writer and novelist

Nicholas Sparks, Chapter 16, p. 303
2000s, Three Weeks with My Brother (2004)

Kent Hovind photo
Arundhati Roy photo
Charles Webster Leadbeater photo
Bernard Cornwell photo
Karel Appel photo

“As an artist you have to fight and survive the wilderness to keep your creative freedom. Creativity is very fragile. It's like a leaf in the fall; it hangs and when it drops you don't know where it's drifting.”

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

Source: Karel Appel – the complete sculptures,' (1990), p. 91 'Quotes', K. Appel (1989)

Eleftherios Venizelos photo

“Greece expects you not merely to die for her, for that is little, indeed; she expects you to conquer. That is why each one of you, even in dying, should be possessed by one thought alone – how to conserve your strength to the last so that those who survive may conquer.
And you will conquer, I am more than sure of this.”

Eleftherios Venizelos (1864–1936) Greek politician

Venizelos speaking to Greek sailors at the beginning of the First Balkan War.
Source: [Chester, S. M., Life of Venizelos, with a letter from His Excellency M. Venizelos, Constable, 1921, London, http://www.archive.org/download/lifeofvenizelosw00chesuoft/lifeofvenizelosw00chesuoft.pdf], p. 162

Warren Farrell photo
Arthur James Balfour photo
Jean Metzinger photo
Franco Modigliani photo
Alex Salmond photo

“Any house built on sand - big or small - will not survive the storm.”

Alex Salmond (1954) Scottish National Party politician and former First Minister of Scotland

Reference to Matthew 7:24-27
Scotland in the World Forum (February 4, 2008), Church of Scotland (May 25, 2009)

Huey P. Newton photo
Michael Savage photo

“Whoever is in the driver's seat determines whether we as a nation will crash and burn or survive and hand the keys to the next generation.”

Michael Savage (1942) U.S. radio talk show host, Commentator, and Author

Source: The Enemy Within: Saving America from the Liberal Assault on Our Churches, Schools, and Military (2004), p. 2

John Gray photo
Thomas Sowell photo

“The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”

Thomas Sowell (1930) American economist, social theorist, political philosopher and author

"The Survival of the Left" https://www.forbes.com/forbes/1997/0908/6005128a.html, Forbes (Sep 8, 1997)
1980s–1990s

Sri Aurobindo photo
John Gray photo
Brandon Boyd photo

“Have a heart and try me, cause without love I won't survive.”

Brandon Boyd (1976) American rock singer, writer and visual artist

Lyrics, Light Grenades (2006)

John Taylor photo

“In paper, many a poet now survives
Or else their lines had perish'd with their lives.
Old Chaucer, Gower, and Sir Thomas More,
Sir Philip Sidney, who the laurel wore,
Spenser, and Shakespeare did in art excell,
Sir Edward Dyer, Greene, Nash, Daniel.
Sylvester, Beaumont, Sir John Harrington,
Forgetfulness their works would over run
But that in paper they immortally
Do live in spite of death, and cannot die.”

John Taylor (1578–1653) English poet of the 16th and 17th centuries

From "The Praise of Hemp-seed" http://ebooks.gutenberg.us/Renascence_Editions/taylor1.html, published 1620. This is the earliest surviving printed reference to the death of William Shakespeare and Francis Beaumont, who had both died in 1616.

“If art is to survive it must describe and express people, their lives and times.”

Raphael Soyer (1899–1987) American artist

As quoted in Barry N. Schwartz, The new humanism: art in a time of change, Praeger 1974, p. 179.

Carroll Baker photo

“Life seems to be a never-ending series of survivals, doesn't it?”

Carroll Baker (1931) American actress

Quoted in Balloon, Rachel. Breathing Life Into Your Characters (2003), p. 135

John Wallis photo