Tag Archives: quotes

Quote of the Day

Posted on by
4

Courtesy of papertygre‘s quotefile:

“The brain is not an organ of thinking but an organ of survival, like claws and fangs. It is made in such a way as to make us accept as truth that which is only advantage. It is an exceptional, almost pathological constitution one has, if one follows thoughts logically through, regardless of consequences. Such people make martyrs, apostles, or scientists, and mostly end on the stake, or in a chair, electric or academic.”

—Albert Szent-Gyorgi

Oh. My. God.
That. Is. The. Most. Brilliant. Observation. Ever.

It just keeps getting better every single time i see it…

Posted on by
4

“Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you do it? Why? Why get up? Why keep fighting? Do you believe you’re fighting for something? Something more than your survival? Can you tell me what it is? Do you even know? Is it freedom or truth? Perhaps peace? Could it be for love? Illusions, Mr. Anderson! Temporary constructs of a feeble human intellect trying desperately to justify an existence without meaning or purpose. And all as artificial as the Matrix itself, although only a human mind could invent something as insipid as love. You must be able to see it, Mr. Anderson. You must know it by now. You can’t win. There’s no point in fighting. Why, Mr. Anderson? Why? Why do you persist?”

Watched The Matrix Revolutions again last night. That entire series is pure brilliance, beginning to end.

Civilian Space Exploration meme

Posted on by
4

Ganked from happypete:

In honor of the launch of SpaceShipOne for all the marbles on Monday, I’ve got a meme.

Add “civilian space program” to your Interests, and post about it. Let’s see how far it goes. See if we can generate some interest in Boldly Going….

To add “civilian space program” to your interests automagically, click here.

Quote for the Day, courtesy Deke Slayton, the late NASA astronaut, from the book Moon Shot; he’s quoting Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the first human to envision rockets for space travel:

“Earth is the cradle of the mind, but one cannot live in the cradle forever.”

Amen.

A quote…

Posted on by
6

…ruthlessly ganked from skitten‘s journal:

There are two kinds of people — those who finish what they start and so on.”
                  –Robert Byrne

I have tons and tons of pics and stories about FetishCon still to post, but I’m running late and likely won’t be able to for a while, so instead I’ll just rave about a movie.

Shaun of the Dead, to be exact.

We went to see the movie last night with all the Smooshlings, and I can safely say it was by far the best zombie flick I’d seen all day. In fact, it was hands-down the best zombie romantic comedy ever filmed in London.

Seriously, it’s hysterical. Much, much funnier than I expected it to be. It’s dead-balls on target, skewering every zombie movie cliche in existance; it even gets in a little poke at Resident Evil toward the end. And it’s all brilliant deadpan stuff. Highly, highly recommended. (Pay special attention to the scene where Shaun goes to the local grocery to pick up some Coke after the zombies have started taking over London…)

9-11-2004

Posted on by
Reply

Lest we forget:

“Atrocity is recognized as such by victim and perpetrator alike, by all who learn about it at whatever remove. Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating upon itself–a barbarous form of incest. Whoever commits atrocity also commits those future atrocities thus bred.”
–Frank Herbert

The two best things I’ve read tonight

Posted on by
2

From merovingian:

“If the audience is composed of broccoli and rhinoceroses, stop giving your speech. You’re not going to get your point across, no matter how well you express yourself.”

That works so well as a metaphor for some of the things going on in my life right now, on so many levels, it’s just amazing.

And from a conversation with a dear friend:

“well – [family]’s not something everyone wants. intimacy scares a lot of people…they want to love from a distance. And it’s pretty impossible to do.”

Not said in response to anything specific, per se, but certainly germane to some of the things I’ve been observing lately.

Many major things are afoot right now. More later.

Some thoughts on happiness, life, and such

Posted on by
Reply

Lessons learned from Shrek 2:

If I marry a queen and become king of a great kingdom, but only with the help of a scheming fairy godmother who has something she can hold over me or blackmail me with, I will, upon ascention to the throne, immediately have the royal assassins put her to death. Or, I will cast her into my deepest, darkest dungeon.

And there will be royal assassins, oh yes.

The secret to happiness, in two steps:

Step 1: Decide what kind of person you want to be, and what kind of life you want to live.

Step 2: Every time you make a choice or embark on a course of action, ask yourself: “Does this take me closer to the person I want to be?”

Random wisdom from The Book of Leadership and Strategy (a translation from a Chinese Taoist book Huainanzi), which happend to be sitting on the couch at a friend’s house:

There is no harm greater than killing innocent people and supporting unjust rulers. There is no calamity worse than exhausting the world’s resources to provide for the desires of an individual.

I’ve posted this before…

Posted on by
6

…but in light of the recent murder of Nick Berg for the crime of being born in a particular country, it bears repeating:

“Atrocity is recognized as such by victim and predator alike, by all who learn about it at whatever remove. Atrocity has no excuses, no mitigating argument. Atrocity never balances or rectifies the past. Atrocity merely arms the future for more atrocity. It is self-perpetuating upon itself–a barbarous form of incest. Whoever commits atrocity also commits those future atrocities thus bred.”
–Frank Herbert

Quote of the Day

Posted on by
18

How is it that hardly any major religion has looked at science and concluded, ‘This is better than we thought! The Universe is much bigger than our prophets saiid, grander, more subtle, more elegant’? Instead they say, ‘No, no, no! My god is a little god, and I want him to stay that way.’ A religion, old or new, that stressed the magnificence of the Universe are revealed by modern science might be able to draw forth reserves of reverance and awe hardly tapped by the conventional faiths.
–Carl Sagan