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Post by Tamrin on Dec 15, 2013 6:12:20 GMT 10
The public has a distorted view of science because children are taught in school that science is a collection of firmly established truths. In fact, science is not a collection of truths. It is a continuing exploration of mysteries
Both as a scientist and as a religious person, I am accustomed to living with uncertainty
The greatest unsolved mysteries are the mysteries of our existence as conscious beings in a small corner of a vast universe
We all know that religion has been historically, and still is today, a cause of great evil as well as great good in human affairs … Religion amplifies the good and evil tendencies of individual souls
The progress of science requires the growth of understanding in both directions, downward from the whole to the parts and upward from the parts to the whole
The great question for our time is, how to make sure that the continuing scientific revolution brings benefits to everybody rather than widening the gap between rich and poor. To lift up poor countries, and poor people in rich countries, from poverty, to give them a chance of a decent life, technology is not enough. Technology must be guided and driven by ethics if it is to do more than provide new toys for the rich
It is better to be wrong than to be vagueFreeman DysonEnglish-born American physicist, mathematician and futurist ( Disturbing the Universe) (Born this day 1923) The conservative has little to fear from the man whose reason is the servant of his passions, but let him beware of him in whom reason has become the greatest and most terrible of passions. These are the wreckers of outworn empires
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 15, 2013 6:13:38 GMT 10
Oh, God, who does not exist, you hate women, otherwise you'd have made them different. And Jesus, who snubbed your mother, you hate them more
She said the reason that love is so painful is that it always amounts to two people wanting more than two people can give
We all leave one another. We die, we change — it's mostly change — we outgrow our best friends; but even if I do leave you, I will have passed on to you something of myself; you will be a different person because of knowing me; it's inescapable
Cities, in many ways, are the best repositories for a love affair. You are in a forest or a cornfield, you are walking by the seashore, footprint after footprint of trodden sand, and somehow the kiss or the spoken covenant gets lost in the vastness and indifference of nature. In a city there are places to remind us of what has been
Life, after all, was a secret with the self. The more one gave out, the less there remained for the center — that center which she coveted for herself and recognized instantly in others. Fruits had it, the very heart of, say, a cherry, where the true worth and flavor lay. Some of course were flawed or hollow in there. Many, in fact
It is increasingly clear that the fate of the universe will come to depend more and more on individuals as the bungling of bureaucracy permeates every corner of our existence
In our deepest moments we say the most inadequate thingsEdna O'BrienIrish-American novelist, short-story writer and screenwriter (Born this day 1932) The vote means nothing to women. We should be armed
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 15, 2013 6:16:58 GMT 10
This isn't right. This isn't even wrong
The layman always means, when he says "reality" that he is speaking of something self-evidently known; whereas to me it seems the most important and exceedingly difficult task of our time is to work on the construction of a new idea of reality
Well, well, our friend Dirac has a religion, and its guiding principle is: "There is no God, and Dirac is His prophet
I confess, that very different from you, I do find sometimes scientific inspiration in mysticism … but this is counterbalanced by an immediate sense for mathematics
It would be most satisfactory if physics and psyche could be seen as complementary aspects of the same reality
The best that most of us can hope to achieve in physics is simply to misunderstand at a deeper level
I have done a terrible thing, I have postulated a particle that cannot be detectedWolfgang PauliAustrian-Swiss physicist, Nobel laureate (Physics, 1945) (Died this day 1958) I don't mind your thinking slowly; I mind your publishing faster than you think
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:46:42 GMT 10
Monday’s Quotes:Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice; and yet everybody is content to hear
'Tis not the drinking that is to be blamed, but the excess
Ignorance of the law excuses no man; not that all men know the law, but because 'tis an excuse every man will plead, and no man can tell how to refute him
Idolatry is in a man's own thought, not in the opinion of another
The law against witches does not prove there be any; but it punishes the malice of those people that use such means to take away men's lives
Thou little thinkest what a little foolery governs the world
They that govern the most make the least noiseJohn SeldenEnglish jurist, legal antiquary and oriental scholar (Born this day 1584) Scrutamini scripturas (“Let us look at the scriptures”) These two words have undone the world
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:48:21 GMT 10
They are much to be pitied who have not been given a taste for nature early in life
My idea of good company is the company of clever, well-informed people who have a great deal of conversation; that is what I call good company
Vanity and pride are different things, though the words are often used synonymously. A person may be proud without being vain. Pride relates more to our opinion of ourselves; vanity, to what we would have others think of us
Seldom, very seldom, does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised, or a little mistaken
It will, I believe, be everywhere found, that as the clergy are, or are not what they ought to be, so are the rest of the nation
Men have had every advantage of us in telling their own story. Education has been theirs in so much higher a degree; the pen has been in their hands. I will not allow books to prove anything
How quick come the reasons for approving what we like!Jane AustenEnglish novelist ( Pride & Prejudice) (Born this day 1775) Nobody minds having what is too good for them
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:49:14 GMT 10
The truth is cruel, but it can be loved, and it makes free those who have loved it
Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it
History is a pack of lies about events that never happened told by people who weren't there
The philosophy of the common man is an old wife that gives him no pleasure, yet he can- not live without her, and resents any aspersions that strangers may cast on her character
By nature's kindly disposition most questions which it is beyond a man's power to answer do not occur to him at all
Skepticism, like chastity, should not be relinquished too readily
The Bible is a wonderful source of inspiration for those who don't understand itGeorge SantayanaSpanish philosopher, poet and humanist ( Last Puritan) (Born this day 1863) Almost every wise saying has an opposite one, no less wise, to balance it
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:49:58 GMT 10
It was not Cafe Society, it was Nescafe Society
My importance to the world is relatively small. On the other hand, my importance to myself is tremendous. I am all I have to work with, to play with, to suffer and to enjoy. It is not the eyes of others that I am wary of, but of my own. I do not intend to let myself down more than I can possibly help, and I find that the fewer illusions I have about myself or the world around me, the better company I am for myself
I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy me
It is discouraging how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit
My body has certainly wandered a good deal, but I have an uneasy suspicion that my mind has not wandered enough
I don't believe in astrology. The only stars I can blame for my failures are those that walk about the stage
I'll go through life either first class or third, but never in secondNoel CowardEnglish playwright ( In Which We Serve — 1942 Academy Award) (Born this day 1899) Everybody worships me, it's nauseating
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:53:53 GMT 10
Life — how curious is that habit that makes us think it is not here, but elsewhere
The present has its élan because it is always on the edge of the unknown and one mis- understands the past unless one remembers that this unknown was once part of its nature
I found people were telling stories to themselves without knowing it. It seemed to me that people were living a sort of small sermon that they believed in, but at the same time it was a fairy tale. Selfish desires, along with one or two highly suspect elevated thoughts. They secretly regard themselves as works of art, valuable in themselves
The profoundly humorous writers are humorous because they are responsive to the hopeless, uncouth, concatenations of life
It's very important to feel foreign. I was born in England, but when I'm being a writer, everyone in England is foreign to me
The peculiar foreign superstition that the English do not like love, the evidence being that they do not talk about it
There is more magic in sin if it is not committedV.S. PritchettBritish short story writer, novelist, memoirist and critic (Born this day 1900) E.M. Forster once spoke of the novelist as sending down a bucket into the uncon- scious; the author of She [H.Rider Haggard] installed a suction pump. He drained the whole reservoir of the public's secret desires. Critics speak of the reader suspending unbelief; the best-seller knows better; man is a believing animal
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:54:42 GMT 10
1 of 2:I was brought up to believe that the only thing worth doing was to add to the sum of accurate information in the world
If one cannot state a matter clearly enough so that even an intelligent twelve- year-old can understand it, one should remain within the cloistered walls of the university and laboratory until one gets a better grasp of one's subject matter
As the traveler who has once been from home is wiser than he who has never left his own doorstep, so a knowledge of one other culture should sharpen our ability to scrutinize more steadily, to appreciate more lovingly, our own
I have spent most of my life studying the lives of other peoples – faraway peoples – so that Americans might better understand themselves
What people say, what people do, and what they say they do are entirely different things
We are living beyond our means. As a people we have developed a life-style that is draining the earth of its priceless and irreplaceable resources without regard for the future of our children and people all around the world
Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever hasMargaret MeadAmerican anthropologist ( Coming of Age in Samoa) (see The Trashing of Margaret Mead How Derek Freeman Fooled Us All on an Alleged Hoax) (Born this day 1901) Be lazy, go crazy(Mead’s motto)
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Post by Tamrin on Dec 16, 2013 7:55:30 GMT 10
2 of 2:Our humanity rests upon a series of learned behaviors, woven together into patterns that are infinitely fragile and never directly inherited
Human nature is potentially aggressive and destructive and potentially orderly and constructive
I had no reason to doubt that brains were suitable for a woman. And as I had my father's kind of mind — which was also his mother's — I learned that the mind is not sex-typed
The male form of a female liberationist is a male liberationist — a man who real- izes the unfairness of having to work all his life to support a wife and children so that someday his widow may live in comfort, a man who points out that commuting to a job he doesn't like is just as oppressive as his wife's imprisonment in a suburb, a man who rejects his exclusion, by society and most women, from participation in childbirth and the most engrossing, delightful care of young children — a man, in fact, who wants to relate himself to people and the world around him as a person
Instead of being presented with stereotypes by age, sex, color, class, or religion, children must have the opportunity to learn that within each range, some people are loathsome and some are delightful
Many societies have educated their male children on the simple device of teaching them not to be women
Always remember that you are absolutely unique. Just like everyone elseMargaret Mead(Born this day 1901) To cherish the life of the world(epitaph on Mead's gravestone)
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