-- John C. Dvorak
%
"There are things that are so serious that you can only joke about them"
-- Heisenberg
+ -- Heisenberg
%
"It takes all sorts of in & out-door schooling to get adapted
to my kind of fooling"
-- R. Frost
%
"Confound these ancestors.... They've stolen our best ideas!"
-- Ben Jonson
+ -- Ben Jonson
%
And thou shalt eat it as barley cakes, and thou shalt bake it with dung that
cometh out of man, in their sight...Then he [the Lord!] said unto me, Lo, I
%
That's the thing about people who think they hate computers. What they
really hate is lousy programmers.
-- Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle in "Oath of Fealty"
+ -- Larry Niven and Jerry Pournelle in "Oath of Fealty"
%
Wherever you go...There you are.
-- Buckaroo Banzai
+ -- Buckaroo Banzai
%
Life in the state of nature is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.
-- Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
+ -- Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
%
Lack of skill dictates economy of style.
-- Joey Ramone
+ -- Joey Ramone
%
No one is fit to be trusted with power. ... No one. ... Any man who has lived
-at all knows the follies and wickedness he's capabe of. ... And if he does
+at all knows the follies and wickedness he's capable of. ... And if he does
know it, he knows also that neither he nor any man ought to be allowed to
decide a single human fate.
-- C. P. Snow, The Light and the Dark
+ -- C. P. Snow, The Light and the Dark
%
Successful and fortunate crime is called virtue.
-- Seneca
+ -- Seneca
%
When we jumped into Sicily, the units became separated, and I couldn't find
anyone. Eventually I stumbled across two colonels, a major, three captains,
two lieutenants, and one rifleman, and we secured the bridge. Never in the
history of war have so few been led by so many.
-- General James Gavin
+ -- General James Gavin
%
The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do
nothing.
-- Edmund Burke
+ -- Edmund Burke
%
You may call me by my name, Wirth, or by my value, Worth.
-- Nicklaus Wirth
+ -- Nicklaus Wirth
%
Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish, and he'll invite himself over for dinner.
-- Calvin Keegan
+ -- Calvin Keegan
%
Prediction is very difficult, especially of the future.
-- Niels Bohr
+ -- Niels Bohr
%
The computer can't tell you the emotional story. It can give you the exact
mathematical design, but what's missing is the eyebrows.
-- Frank Zappa
+ -- Frank Zappa
%
Things are not as simple as they seems at first.
-- Edward Thorp
+ -- Edward Thorp
%
The main thing is the play itself. I swear that greed for money has nothing
to do with it, although heaven knows I am sorely in need of money.
-- Feodor Dostoyevsky
+ -- Feodor Dostoyevsky
%
It is surely a great calamity for a human being to have no obsessions.
-- Robert Bly
+ -- Robert Bly
%
Machines take me by surprise with great frequency.
-- Alan Turing
+ -- Alan Turing
%
Uncertain fortune is thoroughly mastered by the equity of the calculation.
-- Blaise Pascal
+ -- Blaise Pascal
%
After Goliath's defeat, giants ceased to command respect.
-- Freeman Dyson
+ -- Freema Dyson
%
There are two ways of constructing a software design. One way is to make
it so simple that there are obviously no deficiencies and the other is to
make it so complicated that there are no obvious deficiencies.
-- Charles Anthony Richard Hoare
+ -- Charles Anthony Richard Hoare
%
Do not allow this language (Ada) in its present state to be used in
applications where reliability is critical, i.e., nuclear power stations,
programming language generating unreliable programs constitutes a far
greater risk to our environment and to our society than unsafe cars, toxic
pesticides, or accidents at nuclear power stations.
-- C. A. R. Hoare
+ -- C. A. R. Hoare
%
Without coffee he could not work, or at least he could not have worked in the
way he did. In addition to paper and pens, he took with him everywhere as an
indispensable article of equipment the coffee machine, which was no less
important to him than his table or his white robe.
-- Stefan Zweigs, Biography of Balzac
+ -- Stefan Zweigs, Biography of Balzac
%
"It was the Law of the Sea, they said. Civilization ends at the waterline.
Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top."
-- Hunter S. Thompson
+ -- Hunter S. Thompson
%
In the pitiful, multipage, connection-boxed form to which the flowchart has
today been elaborated, it has proved to be useless as a design tool --
programmers draw flowcharts after, not before, writing the programs they
describe.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
The so-called "desktop metaphor" of today's workstations is instead an
"airplane-seat" metaphor. Anyone who has shuffled a lap full of papers while
seated between two portly passengers will recognize the difference -- one can
see only a very few things at once.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
...when fits of creativity run strong, more than one programmer or writer has
been known to abandon the desktop for the more spacious floor.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
A little retrospection shows that although many fine, useful software systems
have been designed by committees and built as part of multipart projects,
the products of one or a few designing minds, great designers. Consider Unix,
APL, Pascal, Modula, the Smalltalk interface, even Fortran; and contrast them
with Cobol, PL/I, Algol, MVS/370, and MS-DOS.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
...computer hardware progress is so fast. No other technology since
civilization began has seen six orders of magnitude in performance-price
gain in 30 years.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
Software entities are more complex for their size than perhaps any other human
construct because no two parts are alike. If they are, we make the two
similar parts into a subroutine -- open or closed. In this respect, software
systems differ profoundly from computers, buildings, or automobiles, where
repeated elements abound.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
Digital computers are themselves more complex than most things people build:
They have very large numbers of states. This makes conceiving, describing,
and testing them hard. Software systems have orders-of-magnitude more states
than computers do.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
The complexity of software is an essential property, not an accidental one.
Hence, descriptions of a software entity that abstract away its complexity
often abstract away its essence.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
Einstein argued that there must be simplified explanations of nature, because
God is not capricious or arbitrary. No such faith comforts the software
engineer.
-- Fred Brooks, Jr.
+ -- Fred Brooks, Jr.
%
Except for 75% of the women, everyone in the whole world wants to have sex.
-- Ellyn Mustard
+ -- Ellyn Mustard
%
The connection between the language in which we think/program and the problems
and solutions we can imagine is very close. For this reason restricting
language features with the intent of eliminating programmer errors is at best
dangerous.
-- Bjarne Stroustrup in "The C++ Programming Language"
+ -- Bjarne Stroustrup in "The C++ Programming Language"
%
The only way to learn a new programming language is by writing programs in it.
-- Brian Kernighan
+ -- Brian Kernighan
%
Perfection is achieved only on the point of collapse.
-- C. N. Parkinson
+ -- C. N. Parkinson
%
There you go man,
Keep as cool as you can.
Hoping to goodness is not theologically sound. - Peanuts
%
Police up your spare rounds and frags. Don't leave nothin' for the dinks.
-- Willem Dafoe in "Platoon"
+ -- Willem Dafoe in "Platoon"
%
"All my life I wanted to be someone; I guess I should have been more
specific."
--- Jane Wagner
+ -- Jane Wagner
%
"Any medium powerful enough to extend man's reach is powerful enough to topple
his world. To get the medium's magic to work for one's aims rather than
against them is to attain literacy."
--- Alan Kay, "Computer Software", Scientific American, September 1984
+ -- Alan Kay, "Computer Software", Scientific American, September 1984
%
"Computer literacy is a contact with the activity of computing deep enough to
make the computational equivalent of reading and writing fluent and enjoyable.
we value the lifelong learning of arts and letters as a springboard for
personal and societal growth, should any less effort be spent to make
computing a part of our lives?"
--- Alan Kay, "Computer Software", Scientific American, September 1984
+ -- Alan Kay, "Computer Software", Scientific American, September 1984
%
"The greatest warriors are the ones who fight for peace."
--- Holly Near
+ -- Holly Near
%
"No matter where you go, there you are..."
--- Buckaroo Banzai
+ -- Buckaroo Banzai
%
Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be prosecuted.
%
Trespassers will be shot. Survivors will be SHOT AGAIN!
%
"I'm growing older, but not up."
--- Jimmy Buffett
+ -- Jimmy Buffett
%
Scientists will study your brain to learn more about your distant cousin, Man.
%
contradictory evidence rather than modify or reject a flawed theory. Because
of their strong biases, they seem to lack the self-correcting mechanisms
scientists must employ in their work.
--- Thomas L. Creed, "The Skeptical Inquirer," Summer 1987
+ -- Thomas L. Creed, "The Skeptical Inquirer," Summer 1987
%
Finding the occasional straw of truth awash in a great ocean of confusion and
bamboozle requires intelligence, vigilance, dedication and courage. But if we
don't practice these tough habits of thought, we cannot hope to solve the
truly serious problems that face us -- and we risk becoming a nation of
suckers, up for grabs by the next charlatan who comes along.
--- Carl Sagan, "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection," Parade, February 1, 1987
+ -- Carl Sagan, "The Fine Art of Baloney Detection," Parade,
+ February 1, 1987
%
Do not underestimate the value of print statements for debugging.
%
version requires the same systematic testing procedure that adding a new
component does, although it should require less time, for more complete and
efficient test cases will usually be available.
-- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
+ -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
%
Each team building another component has been using the most recent tested
version of the integrated system as a test bed for debugging its piece. Their
must. But the changes need to be quantized. Then each user has periods of
productive stability, interrupted by bursts of test-bed change. This seems
to be much less disruptive than a constant rippling and trembling.
-- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
+ -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
%
Conceptual integrity in turn dictates that the design must proceed from one
mind, or from a very small number of agreeing resonant minds.
-- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
+ -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
%
It is a very humbling experience to make a multimillion-dollar mistake, but it
is also very memorable. I vividly recall the night we decided how to organize
was right on both counts. Moreover, the lack of conceptual integrity made
the system far more costly to build and change, and I would estimate that it
added a year to debugging time.
-- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
+ -- Frederick Brooks Jr., "The Mythical Man Month"
%
The reason ESP, for example, is not considered a viable topic in contemoprary
psychology is simply that its investigation has not proven fruitful...After
conducted over many decades...It is for this reason alone that the topic is
now of little interest to psychology...In short, there is no demonstrated
phenomenon that needs explanation.
--- Keith E. Stanovich, "How to Think Straight About Psychology", pp. 160-161
+ -- Keith E. Stanovich, "How to Think Straight About Psychology", pp. 160-161
%
The evolution of the human race will not be accomplished in the ten thousand
years of tame animals, but in the million years of wild animals, because man
is and will always be a wild animal.
--- Charles Galton Darwin
+ -- Charles Galton Darwin
%
Natural selection won't matter soon, not anywhere as much as conscious
selection. We will civilize and alter ourselves to suit our ideas of what we
can be. Within one more human lifespan, we will have changed ourselves
unrecognizably.
--- Greg Bear
+ -- Greg Bear
%
"Jesus may love you, but I think you're garbage wrapped in skin."
--- Michael O'Donohugh
+ -- Michael O'Donohugh
%
...though his invention worked superbly -- his theory was a crock of sewage
from beginning to end. -- Vernor Vinge, "The Peace War"
"It's like deja vu all over again." -- Yogi Berra
%
The last thing one knows in constructing a work is what to put first.
--- Blaise Pascal
+ -- Blaise Pascal
%
"Where shall I begin, please your Majesty?" he asked. "Begin at the
beginning," the King said, gravely, "and go on till you come to the end: then
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Lewis Carroll
%
A morsel of genuine history is a thing so rare as to be always valuable.
--- Thomas Jefferson
+ -- Thomas Jefferson
%
To be awake is to be alive. -- Henry David Thoreau, in "Walden"
%
of space and time. -- Samuel Taylor Coleridge
%
What we anticipate seldom occurs; what we least expect generally happens.
--- Benjamin Disraeli
+ -- Benjamin Disraeli
%
Nothing in progression can rest on its original plan. We may as well think of
rocking a grown man in the cradle of an infant. -- Edmund Burke
%
For every problem there is one solution which is simple, neat, and wrong.
--- H. L. Mencken
+ -- H. L. Mencken
%
Don't tell me how hard you work. Tell me how much you get done.
--- James J. Ling
+ -- James J. Ling
%
One friend in a lifetime is much; two are many; three are hardly possible.
Friendship needs a certain parallelism of life, a community of thought,
distorted and incomplete data, with ignorant, sloppy or biased reporting, with
propaganda and deliberate falsehoods, and you destroy his whole reasoning
processes, and make him something less than a man.
--- Arthur Hays Sulzberger
+ -- Arthur Hays Sulzberger
%
Each honest calling, each walk of life, has its own elite, its own aristocracy
based on excellence of performance. -- James Bryant Conant
It is important to note that probably no large operating system using current
design technology can withstand a determined and well-coordinated attack,
and that most such documented penetrations have been remarkably easy.
--- B. Hebbard, "A Penetration Analysis of the Michigan Terminal System",
-Operating Systems Review, Vol. 14, No. 1, June 1980, pp. 7-20
+ -- B. Hebbard, "A Penetration Analysis of the Michigan Terminal
+ System", Operating Systems Review, Vol. 14, No. 1, June 1980,
+ pp. 7-20
%
A right is not what someone gives you; it's what no one can take from you.
-- Ramsey Clark
would deliver enough power to drive the Queen Elizabeth II. And if you were
interested in miniaturization, you could place half a dozen of them on a
pinhead.
--- Christopher Evans
+ -- Christopher Evans
%
In the future, you're going to get computers as prizes in breakfast cereals.
You'll throw them out because your house will be littered with them.
--- Robert Lucky
+ -- Robert Lucky
%
Get hold of portable property. -- Charles Dickens, "Great Expectations"
%
calculations can no longer be deemed unworthy of the attention of the country.
In fact, there is no reason why mental as well as bodily labor should not
be economized by the aid of machinery.
-- Charles Babbage, Passage from the Life of a Philosopher
+ -- Charles Babbage, Passage from the Life of a Philosopher
%
How many hardware guys does it take to change a light bulb?
%
Children begin by loving their parents. After a time they judge them. Rarely,
if ever, do they forgive them.
-- Oscar Wilde
+ -- Oscar Wilde
%
Single tasking: Just Say No.
%
"Catch a wave and you're sitting on top of the world."
-- The Beach Boys
+ -- The Beach Boys
%
"Bond reflected that good Americans were fine people and that most of them
seemed to come from Texas."
-- Ian Fleming, "Casino Royale"
+ -- Ian Fleming, "Casino Royale"
%
"I think trash is the most important manifestation of culture we have in my
lifetime."
-- Johnny Legend
+ -- Johnny Legend
%
By one count there are some 700 scientists with respectable academic credentials
(out of a total of 480,000 U.S. earth and life scientists) who give credence
to creation-science, the general theory that complex life forms did not evolve
but appeared "abruptly."
-- Newsweek, June 29, 1987, pg. 23
+ -- Newsweek, June 29, 1987, pg. 23
%
Even if you can deceive people about a product through misleading statements,
sooner or later the product will speak for itself.
-- Hajime Karatsu
+ -- Hajime Karatsu
%
In order to succeed in any enterprise, one must be persistent and patient.
Even if one has to run some risks, one must be brave and strong enough to
meet and overcome vexing challenges to maintain a successful business in
the long run. I cannot help saying that Americans lack this necessary
challenging spirit today.
-- Hajime Karatsu
+ -- Hajime Karatsu
%
Memories of you remind me of you.
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
Life. Don't talk to me about life.
-- Marvin the Paranoid Android
+ -- Marvin the Paranoid Android
%
On a clear disk you can seek forever.
%
indivisible,
with liberty
and justice for all.
-- Francis Bellamy, 1892
+ - Francis Bellamy, 1892
%
People think my friend George is weird because he wears sideburns...behind his
ears. I think he's weird because he wears false teeth...with braces on them.
--- Steven Wright
+ -- Steven Wright
%
My brother sent me a postcard the other day with this big satellite photo of
the entire earth on it. On the back it said: "Wish you were here".
-- Steven Wright
%
You can't have everything... where would you put it?
--- Steven Wright
+ -- Steven Wright
%
I was playing poker the other night... with Tarot cards. I got a full house and
4 people died.
--- Steven Wright
+ -- Steven Wright
%
You know that feeling when you're leaning back on a stool and it starts to tip
over? Well, that's how I feel all the time.
--- Steven Wright
+ -- Steven Wright
%
I came home the other night and tried to open the door with my car keys...and
the building started up. So I took it out for a drive. A cop pulled me over
for speeding. He asked me where I live... "Right here".
--- Steven Wright
+ -- Steven Wright
%
"Live or die, I'll make a million."
--- Reebus Kneebus, before his jump to the center of the earth, Firesign Theater
+ -- Reebus Kneebus, before his jump to the center of the earth,
+ Firesign Theater
%
The typical page layout program is nothing more than an electronic
light table for cutting and pasting documents.
%
There are bugs and then there are bugs. And then there are bugs.
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
My computer can beat up your computer.
-- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
Kill Ugly Processor Architectures
-- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
Kill Ugly Radio
-- Frank Zappa
+ -- Frank Zappa
%
"Just Say No." - Nancy Reagan
system. We do not teach how to think. This is a very serious failure that
may even, in a world rigged with 60,000 nuclear weapons, compromise the human
future.
-- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87
+ -- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer,
+ Vol. 12, Fall 87
%
"I maintain there is much more wonder in science than in pseudoscience. And
in addition, to whatever measure this term has any meaning, science has the
additional virtue, and it is not an inconsiderable one, of being true.
-- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87
+ -- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer,
+ Vol. 12, Fall 87
%
I'm often asked the question, "Do you think there is extraterrestrial intelli-
gence?" I give the standard arguments -- there are a lot of places out there,
really think?" I say, "I just told you what I really think." "Yeah, but
what's your gut feeling?" But I try not to think with my gut. Really, it's
okay to reserve judgment until the evidence is in.
-- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. 12, Fall 87
+ -- Carl Sagan, The Burden Of Skepticism, The Skeptical Inquirer,
+ Vol. 12, Fall 87
%
Repel them. Repel them. Induce them to relinquish the spheroid.
-- Indiana University fans' chant for their perennially bad football team
+ -- Indiana University fans' chant for their perennially bad
+ football team
%
If it's working, the diagnostics say it's fine.
If it's not working, the diagnostics say it's fine.
-- A proposed addition to rules for realtime programming
+ -- A proposed addition to rules for realtime programming
%
It is either through the influence of narcotic potions, of which all
primitive peoples and races speak in hymns, or through the powerful approach
once again by the magic of the Dionysian rite, but alienated, hostile, or
subjugated nature again celebrates her reconciliation with her prodigal son,
man.
-- Fred Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
+ -- Fred Nietzsche, The Birth of Tragedy
%
The characteristic property of hallucinogens, to suspend the boundaries between
the experiencing self and the outer world in an ecstatic, emotional experience,
to meditation aimed at the mystical experience of a deeper, comprehensive
reality. Such a use accords entirely with the essence and working character
of LSD as a sacred drug.
-- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
+ -- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
%
I share the belief of many of my contemporaries that the spiritual crisis
pervading all spheres of Western industrial society can be remedied only
new consciousness of an all-encompassing reality, which embraces the
experiencing ego, a reality in which people feel their oneness with animate
nature and all of creation.
-- Dr. Albert Hoffman
+ -- Dr. Albert Hoffman
%
Deliberate provocation of mystical experience, particularly by LSD and related
hallucinogens, in contrast to spontaneous visionary experiences, entails
for a pleasure drug. Special internal and external advance preparations
are required; with them, an LSD experiment can become a meaningful
experience.
-- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
+ -- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
%
I believe that if people would learn to use LSD's vision-inducing capability
more wisely, under suitable conditions, in medical practice and in conjution
with meditation, then in the future this problem child could become a wonder
child.
-- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
+ -- Dr. Albert Hoffman, the discoverer of LSD
%
In the realm of scientific observation, luck is granted only to those who are
prepared.
-- Louis Pasteur
+ -- Louis Pasteur
%
core error - bus dumped
%
use.
%
"Come on over here, baby, I want to do a thing with you."
-- A Cop, arresting a non-groovy person after the revolution, Firesign Theater
+ -- A Cop, arresting a non-groovy person after the revolution,
+ Firesign Theater
%
"Ahead warp factor 1"
-- Captain Kirk
+ -- Captain Kirk
%
Fiery energy lanced out, but the beams struck an intangible wall between
the Gubru and the rapidly turning Earth ship.
mistakes. Postjudice is not terrible. You can't be perfect of course; you
may make mistakes also. But it is permissible to make a judgment after you
have examined the evidence. In some circles it is even encouraged.
-- Carl Sagan, The Burden of Skepticism, Skeptical Enquirer, Vol. 12, pg. 46
+ -- Carl Sagan, The Burden of Skepticism, Skeptical Enquirer,
+ Vol. 12, pg. 46
%
If a person (a) is poorly, (b) receives treatment intended to make him better,
and (c) gets better, then no power of reasoning known to medical science can
convince him that it may not have been the treatment that restored his health.
-- Sir Peter Medawar, The Art of the Soluble
+ -- Sir Peter Medawar, The Art of the Soluble
%
America has been discovered before, but it has always been hushed up.
-- Oscar Wilde
+ -- Oscar Wilde
%
Unix: Some say the learning curve is steep, but you only have to climb it once.
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
Sometimes, too long is too long.
-- Joe Crowe
+ -- Joe Crowe
%
When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one,
an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.
-- Edmund Burke
+ -- Edmund Burke
%
Behind all the political rhetoric being hurled at us from abroad, we are
bringing home one unassailable fact -- [terrorism is] a crime by any civilized
endeavour of the human mind - activities which could not be carried out
except in a mental climate of ambition and confidence which such a spearhead
can give.
-- Dr. Martin Schwarzschild, 1962, in "The History of Manned Space Flight"
+ -- Dr. Martin Schwarzschild, 1962, in "The History of Manned Space
+ Flight"
%
Human society - man in a group - rises out of its lethargy to new levels of
productivity only under the stimulus of deeply inspiring and commonly
working diligently toward earnestly desired goals provides the means and
the strength toward which many ends can be satisfied...to unparalleled
social accomplishment.
-- Dr. Lloyd V. Berkner, in "The History of Manned Space Flight"
+ -- Dr. Lloyd V. Berkner, in "The History of Manned Space Flight"
%
The vigor of civilized societies is preserved by the widespread sense that high
aims are worth-while. Vigorous societies harbor a certain extravagance of
present-day scientific knowledge; and
3. there has been no evidence indicating that sightings categorized
as UNIDENTIFIED are extraterrestrial vehicles.
-- the summary of Project Blue Book, an Air Force study of UFOs from 1950
- to 1965, as quoted by James Randi in Flim-Flam!
+ -- the summary of Project Blue Book, an Air Force study of UFOs from
+ 1950 to 1965, as quoted by James Randi in Flim-Flam!
%
Those who believe that they believe in God, but without passion in their
hearts, without anguish in mind, without uncertainty, without doubt,
without an element of despair even in their consolation, believe only
in the God idea, not God Himself.
-- Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish philosopher and writer
+ -- Miguel de Unamuno, Spanish philosopher and writer
%
Doubt is a pain too lonely to know that faith is his twin brother.
-- Kahlil Gibran
+ -- Kahlil Gibran
%
Doubt isn't the opposite of faith; it is an element of faith.
-- Paul Tillich, German theologian and historian
+ -- Paul Tillich, German theologian and historian
%
Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.
-- Voltaire
+ -- Voltaire
%
If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit
in my name at a Swiss Bank.
-- Woody Allen
+ -- Woody Allen
%
I cannot affirm God if I fail to affirm man. Therefore, I affirm both.
Without a belief in human unity I am hungry and incomplete. Human unity
is the fulfillment of diversity. It is the harmony of opposites. It is
a many-stranded texture, with color and depth.
-- Norman Cousins
+ -- Norman Cousins
%
To downgrade the human mind is bad theology.
-- C. K. Chesterton
+ -- C. K. Chesterton
%
...difference of opinion is advantageious in religion. The several sects
perform the office of a common censor morum over each other. Is uniformity
attainable? Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the
introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned;
yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity.
-- Thomas Jefferson, "Notes on Virginia"
+ -- Thomas Jefferson, "Notes on Virginia"
%
Life is a process, not a principle, a mystery to be lived, not a problem to
be solved.
-- Gerard Straub, television producer and author (stolen from Frank Herbert??)
+ -- Gerard Straub, television producer and author (stolen from Frank
+ Herbert??)
%
So we follow our wandering paths, and the very darkness acts as our guide and
our doubts serve to reassure us.
-- Jean-Pierre de Caussade, eighteenth-century Jesuit priest
+ -- Jean-Pierre de Caussade, eighteenth-century Jesuit priest
%
Faith may be defined briefly as an illogical belief in the occurrence of the
improbable.
-- H. L. Mencken
+ -- H. L. Mencken
%
And do you not think that each of you women is an Eve? The judgement of God
upon your sex endures today; and with it invariably endures your position of
criminal at the bar of justice.
-- Tertullian, second-century Christian writer, misogynist
+ -- Tertullian, second-century Christian writer, misogynist
%
I judge a religion as being good or bad based on whether its adherents
become better people as a result of practicing it.
-- Joe Mullally, computer salesman
+ -- Joe Mullally, computer salesman
%
Imitation is the sincerest form of plagiarism.
%
"Unibus timeout fatal trap program lost sorry"
-- An error message printed by DEC's RSTS operating system for the PDP-11
+ -- An error message printed by DEC's RSTS operating system for the
+ PDP-11
%
How many surrealists does it take to screw in a light bulb?
political preference--and where no man is denied public office merely
because his religion differs from the president who might appoint him or the
people who might elect him.
-- from John F. Kennedy's address to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association
- September 12, 1960.
+ -- from John F. Kennedy's address to the Greater Houston Ministerial
+ Association September 12, 1960.
%
The truth is that Christian theology, like every other theology, is not only
opposed to the scientific spirit; it is also opposed to all other attempts
everywhere, the habitual and incorrigible defender of bad governments, bad
laws, bad social theories, bad institutions. It was, for centuries, an
apologist for slavery, as it was the apologist for the divine right of kings.
-- H. L. Mencken
+ -- H. L. Mencken
%
The notion that science does not concern itself with first causes -- that it
leaves the field to theology or metaphysics, and confines itself to mere
To argue that gaps in knowledge which will confront the seeker must be filled,
not by patient inquiry, but by intuition or revelation, is simply to give
ignorance a gratuitous and preposterous dignity....
-- H. L. Mencken, 1930
+ -- H. L. Mencken, 1930
%
The evidence of the emotions, save in cases where it has strong objective
support, is really no evidence at all, for every recognizable emotion has
beyond the grave. Such childish "proofs" are typically theological, and
they remain theological even when they are adduced by men who like to
flatter themselves by believing that they are scientific gents....
-- H. L. Mencken
+ -- H. L. Mencken
%
There is, in fact, no reason to believe that any given natural phenomenon,
however marvelous it may seem today, will remain forever inexplicable.
discovered in the laboratory, and man may set up business as a creator
on his own account. The thing, indeed, is not only conceivable; it is
even highly probable.
-- H. L. Mencken, 1930
+ -- H. L. Mencken, 1930
%
The best that we can do is to be kindly and helpful toward our friends and
fellow passengers who are clinging to the same speck of dirt while we are
drifting side by side to our common doom.
-- Clarence Darrow
+ -- Clarence Darrow
%
We're here to give you a computer, not a religion.
-- attributed to Bob Pariseau, at the introduction of the Amiga
+ -- attributed to Bob Pariseau, at the introduction of the Amiga
%
...there can be no public or private virtue unless the foundation of action is
the practice of truth.
-- George Jacob Holyoake
+ -- George Jacob Holyoake
%
"If you'll excuse me a minute, I'm going to have a cup of coffee."
-- broadcast from Apollo 11's LEM, "Eagle", to Johnson Space Center, Houston
- July 20, 1969, 7:27 P.M.
+ -- broadcast from Apollo 11's LEM, "Eagle", to Johnson Space Center,
+ Houston July 20, 1969, 7:27 P.M.
%
The meek are contesting the will.
%
the artistry of it. These men are better than I'd thought. Their insults
are wordy and overblown, but they have talent. They deserve honorable, slow
deaths.
-- David Brin, Startide Rising
+ -- David Brin, Startide Rising
%
"I'm a mean green mother from outer space"
- -- Audrey II, The Little Shop of Horrors
+ -- Audrey II, The Little Shop of Horrors
%
Like my parents, I have never been a regular church member or churchgoer.
It doesn't seem plausible to me that there is the kind of God who
people to follow His precepts -- there is just too much misery and
cruelty for that. On the other hand, I respect and envy the people
who get inspiration from their religions.
-- Benjamin Spock
+ -- Benjamin Spock
%
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
-- Andy Finkel, computer guy
+ -- Andy Finkel, computer guy
%
Being schizophrenic is better than living alone.
%
NOWPRINT. NOWPRINT. Clemclone, back to the shadows again.
-- The Firesign Theater
+ -- The Firesign Theater
%
Yes, many primitive people still believe this myth...But in today's technical
vastness of the future, we can guess that surely things were much different.
-- The Firesign Theater
+ -- The Firesign Theater
%
...this is an awesome sight. The entire rebel resistance buried under six
million hardbound copies of "The Naked Lunch."
-- The Firesign Theater
+ -- The Firesign Theater
%
We want to create puppets that pull their own strings.
-- Ann Marion
+ -- Ann Marion
%
I know engineers. They love to change things.
-- Dr. McCoy
+ -- Dr. McCoy
%
On our campus the UNIX system has proved to be not only an effective software
tool, but an agent of technical and social change within the University.
-- John Lions (University of New South Wales)
+ -- John Lions (University of New South Wales)
%
Those who do not understand Unix are condemned to reinvent it, poorly.
-- Henry Spencer, University of Toronto Unix hack
+ -- Henry Spencer, University of Toronto Unix hack
%
"You know why there are so few sophisticated computer terrorists in the United
States? Because your hackers have so much mobility into the establishment.
Here, there is no such mobility. If you have the slightest bit of intellectual
integrity you cannot support the government.... That's why the best computer
minds belong to the opposition."
-- an anonymous member of the outlawed Polish trade union, Solidarity
+ -- an anonymous member of the outlawed Polish trade union, Solidarity
%
"Every Solidarity center had piles and piles of paper .... everyone was
eating paper and a policeman was at the door. Now all you have to do is
bend a disk."
-- an anonymous member of the outlawed Polish trade union, Solidarity,
+ -- an anonymous member of the outlawed Polish trade union, Solidarity,
commenting on the benefits of using computers in support of their movement
%
Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.
-- Mark Twain
+ -- Mark Twain
%
The sooner all the animals are extinct, the sooner we'll find their money.
-- Ed Bluestone
+ -- Ed Bluestone
%
He's dead, Jim.
%
New York... when civilization falls apart, remember, we were way ahead of you.
-- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
You can do more with a kind word and a gun than with just a kind word.
-- Al Capone
+ -- Al Capone
%
The fountain code has been tightened slightly so you can no longer dip objects
into a fountain or drink from one while you are floating in mid-air due to
Teleporting to hell via a teleportation trap will no longer occur if the
character does not have fire resistance.
-- README file from the NetHack game
+ -- README file from the NetHack game
%
Remember, there's a big difference between kneeling down and bending over.
-- Frank Zappa
+ -- Frank Zappa
%
I think that all right-thinking people in this country are sick and
tired of being told that ordinary decent people are fed up in this
country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not. But I'm
sick and tired of being told that I am.
-- Monty Python
+ -- Monty Python
%
"There is no statute of limitations on stupidity."
--- Randomly produced by a computer program called Markov3.
+ -- Randomly produced by a computer program called Markov3.
%
There is a time in the tides of men,
Which, taken at its flood, leads on to success.
On the other hand, don't count on it.
-- T. K. Lawson
+ -- T. K. Lawson
%
To follow foolish precedents, and wink
With both our eyes, is easier than to think.
-- William Cowper
+ -- William Cowper
%
It is the quality rather than the quantity that matters.
-- Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C. - A.D. 65)
+ -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 B.C. - A.D. 65)
%
One may be able to quibble about the quality of a single experiment, or
about the veracity of a given experimenter, but, taking all the supportive
experiments together, the weight of evidence is so strong as readily to
merit a wise man's reflection.
-- Professor William Tiller, parapsychologist, Standford University,
- commenting on psi research
+ -- Professor William Tiller, parapsychologist, Standford University,
+ commenting on psi research
%
Nothing ever becomes real until it is experienced.
-- John Keats
In 1969, only 66 years after Orville Wright flew two feet off the ground
for 12 seconds, Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and I rocketed to the moon
in Apollo 11."
--- Michael Collins
- Former astronaut and past Director of the National Air and Space Museum
+ -- Michael Collins
+ Former astronaut and past Director of the National Air and Space
+ Museum
%
Most people exhibit what political scientists call "the conservatism of the
peasantry." Don't lose what you've got. Don't change. Don't take a chance,
something untried, only the brave reach deep into their pockets and play
the game as it must be played.
-- David Lammers, "Yakitori", Electronic Engineering Times, January 18, 1988
+ -- David Lammers, "Yakitori", Electronic Engineering Times,
+ January 18, 1988
%
"We can't schedule an orgy, it might be construed as fighting"
--Stanley Sutton
%
Weekends were made for programming.
-- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
"Once he had one leg in the White House and the nation trembled under his
roars. Now he is a tinpot pope in the Coca-Cola belt and a brother to the
forlorn pastors who belabor halfwits in galvanized iron tabernacles behind
the railroad yards."
-- H. L. Mencken, writing of William Jennings Bryan, counsel for the supporters
- of Tennessee's anti-evolution law at the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in 1925.
+ -- H. L. Mencken, writing of William Jennings Bryan, counsel for the
+ supporters of Tennessee's anti-evolution law at the Scopes "Monkey
+ Trial" in 1925.
%
This was the ultimate form of ostentation among technology freaks -- to have
a system so complete and sophisticated that nothing showed; no machines,
from a "universal mind" (the repository of all past wisdom and creativity)
not only are implausible but also unfairly demean the stunning achievements
of individual human brains.
-- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for Psi
- Phenomena", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 163-171
+ -- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for
+ Psi Phenomena", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 163-171
%
... Fortunately, the responsibility for providing evidence is on the part of
the person making the claim, not the critic. It is not the responsibility
claims that are not adequately supported by acceptable evidence and to
provide plausible alternative explanations that are more in keeping with
the accepted body of scientific evidence. ...
-- Thomas L. Creed, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, pg. 215
+ -- Thomas L. Creed, The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, pg. 215
%
"Ada is the work of an architect, not a computer scientist."
-- Jean Icbiah, inventor of Ada, weenie
+ -- Jean Icbiah, inventor of Ada, weenie
%
Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary proof. There are many examples of
outsiders who eventually overthrew entrenched scientific orthodoxies, but
handsome dividends, we should insist on better evidence for psi phenomena
than presently exists, especially when neurology and psychology themselves
offer more plausible alternatives.
-- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for Psi
- Phenomena", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 163-171
+ -- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for
+ Psi Phenomena", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 163-171
%
Evolution is a bankrupt speculative philosophy, not a scientific fact.
Only a spiritually bankrupt society could ever believe it. ... Only
atheists could accept this Satanic theory.
-- Rev. Jimmy Swaggart, "The Pre-Adamic Creation and Evolution"
+ -- Rev. Jimmy Swaggart, "The Pre-Adamic Creation and Evolution"
%
Evolution is as much a fact as the earth turning on its axis and going around
the sun. At one time this was called the Copernican theory; but, when
present life descended from earlier forms, over vast stretches of geologic
time, is as firmly established as Copernican cosmology. Biologists differ
only with respect to theories about how the process operates.
-- Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life",
+ -- Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life",
The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131
%
...It is sad to find him belaboring the science community for its united
opposition to ignorant creationists who want teachers and textbooks to
give equal time to crank arguments that have advanced not a step beyond
the flyblown rhetoric of Bishop Wilberforce and William Jennings Bryan.
-- Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life",
- The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131
+ -- Martin Gardner, "Irving Kristol and the Facts of Life",
+ The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 128-131
%
... The book is worth attention for only two reasons: (1) it attacks
attempts to expose sham paranormal studies; and (2) it is very well and
plausibly written and so rather harder to dismiss or refute by simple
jeering.
-- Harry Eagar, reviewing "Beyond the Quantum" by Michael Talbot,
- The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 200-201
+ -- Harry Eagar, reviewing "Beyond the Quantum" by Michael Talbot,
+ The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII No. 2, ppg. 200-201
%
Now I lay me down to sleep
I hear the sirens in the street
marginal product of labor for any number of additional workers
equals zero until the acquisition of another cut-off saw.
Let's not even consider a chainsaw.
-- Mike Dennison
+ -- Mike Dennison
[You could always schedule the saw, though - ed.]
%
As long as we're going to reinvent the wheel again, we might as well try making
it round this time.
-- Mike Dennison
+ -- Mike Dennison
%
This conjunction of an immense military establishment and a large arms
industry is now in the American experience... We must not fail to
acquisition of unwarranted influence...by the military-industrial
complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power
exists and will persist.
-- Dwight D. Eisenhower, from his farewell address in 1961
+ -- Dwight D. Eisenhower, from his farewell address in 1961
%
This restaurant was advertising breakfast any time. So I ordered
french toast in the renaissance.
-- Steven Wright, comedian
+ -- Steven Wright, comedian
%
Everyone has a purpose in life. Perhaps yours is watching television.
-- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
A lot of the stuff I do is so minimal, and it's designed to be minimal.
The smallness of it is what's attractive. It's weird, 'cause it's so
intellectually lame. It's hard to see me doing that for the rest of
my life. But at the same time, it's what I do best.
-- Chris Elliot, writer and performer on "Late Night with David Letterman"
+ -- Chris Elliot, writer and performer on "Late Night with David
+ Letterman"
%
e-credibility: the non-guaranteeable likelihood that the electronic data
you're seeing is genuine rather than somebody's made-up crap.
-- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
Whenever people agree with me, I always think I must be wrong.
-- Oscar Wilde
+ -- Oscar Wilde
%
My mother is a fish.
-- William Faulkner
+ -- William Faulkner
%
The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it
seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the
fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving
after rational knowledge.
-- Albert Einstein
+ -- Albert Einstein
%
The more a man is imbued with the ordered regularity of all events, the firmer
becomes his conviction that there is no room left by the side of this ordered
themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the
True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. This is, to be sure, a more
difficult but an incomparably more worthy task.
-- Albert Einstein
+ -- Albert Einstein
%
Anyone who knows history, particularly the history of Europe, will, I think,
recognize that the domination of education or of government by any one
particular religious faith is never a happy arrangement for the people.
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
+ -- Eleanor Roosevelt
%
Most non-Catholics know that the Catholic schools are rendering a greater
service to our nation than the public schools in which subversive textbooks
have been used, in which Communist-minded teachers have taught, and from
whose classrooms Christ and even God Himself are barred.
-- from "Our Sunday Visitor", an American-Catholic newspaper, 1949
+ -- from "Our Sunday Visitor", an American-Catholic newspaper, 1949
%
Those of us who believe in the right of any human being to belong to whatever
church he sees fit, and to worship God in his own way, cannot be accused
of prejudice when we do not want to see public education connected with
religious control of the schools, which are paid for by taxpayers' money.
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
+ -- Eleanor Roosevelt
%
Spiritual leadership should remain spiritual leadership and the temporal
power should not become too important in any church.
-- Eleanor Roosevelt
+ -- Eleanor Roosevelt
%
Truth has always been found to promote the best interests of mankind...
-- Percy Bysshe Shelley
+ -- Percy Bysshe Shelley
%
If atheism is to be used to express the state of mind in which God is
identified with the unknowable, and theology is pronounced to be a
collection of meaningless words about unintelligible chimeras, then
I have no doubt, and I think few people doubt, that atheists are as
plentiful as blackberries...
-- Leslie Stephen (1832-1904), literary essayist, author
+ -- Leslie Stephen (1832-1904), literary essayist, author
%
It is wrong always, everywhere and for everyone to believe anything upon
insufficient evidence.
-- W. K. Clifford, British philosopher, circa 1876
+ -- W. K. Clifford, British philosopher, circa 1876
%
Why, when no honest man will deny in private that every ultimate problem is
wrapped in the profoundest mystery, do honest men proclaim in pulpits
to declare that we don't know the map of the universe as well as the map
of our infintesimal parish, he is hooted, reviled, and perhaps told that
he will be damned to all eternity for his faithlessness...
-- Leslie Stephen, "An agnostic's Apology", Fortnightly Review, 1876
+ -- Leslie Stephen, "An agnostic's Apology", Fortnightly Review, 1876
%
Till then we shall be content to admit openly, what you (religionists)
whisper under your breath or hide in technical jargon, that the ancient
possible, and whilst you trumpet forth officially your contempt for our
skepticism, we will at least try to believe that you are imposed upon
by your own bluster.
-- Leslie Stephen, "An agnostic's Apology", Fortnightly Review, 1876
+ -- Leslie Stephen, "An agnostic's Apology", Fortnightly Review, 1876
%
Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly.
-- Voltaire
+ -- Voltaire
%
What is tolerance? -- it is the consequence of humanity. We are all formed
of frailty and error; let us pardon reciprocally each other's folly --
that is the first law of nature.
-- Voltaire
+ -- Voltaire
%
It is clear that the individual who persecutes a man, his brother, because
he is not of the same opinion, is a monster.
-- Voltaire
+ -- Voltaire
%
I simply try to aid in letting the light of historical truth into that
decaying mass of outworn thought which attaches the modern world to
medieval conceptions of Christianity, and which still lingers among us --
a most serious barrier to religion and morals, and a menace to the whole
normal evolution of society.
-- Andrew D. White, author, first president of Cornell University, 1896
+ -- Andrew D. White, author, first president of Cornell University, 1896
%
The man scarce lives who is not more credulous than he ought to be.... The
natural disposition is always to believe. It is acquired wisdom and experience
only that teach incredulity, and they very seldom teach it enough.
-- Adam Smith
+ -- Adam Smith
%
I put the shotgun in an Adidas bag and padded it out with four pairs of tennis
socks, not my style at all, but that was what I was aiming for: If they think
very technical boy. So I decided to get as crude as possible. These days,
though, you have to be pretty technical before you can even aspire to
crudeness.
-- Johnny Mnemonic, by William Gibson
+ -- Johnny Mnemonic, by William Gibson
%
However, on religious issues there can be little or no compromise.
There is no position on which people are so immovable as their religious
call in the Senate. I am warning them today: I will fight them every
step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all
Americans in the name of "conservatism."
-- Senator Barry Goldwater, from the Congressional Record, September 16, 1981
+ -- Senator Barry Goldwater, from the Congressional Record,
+ September 16, 1981
%
"I think every good Christian ought to kick Falwell's ass."
-- Senator Barry Goldwater, when asked what he thought of Jerry Falwell's
-suggestion that all good Christians should be against Sandra Day O'Connor's
-nomination to the Supreme Court
+ -- Senator Barry Goldwater, when asked what he thought of Jerry
+ Falwell's suggestion that all good Christians should be against Sandra
+ Day O'Connor's nomination to the Supreme Court
%
...And no philosophy, sadly, has all the answers. No matter how assured
we may be about certain aspects of our belief, there are always painful
Such ambiguity is not apparent to children or fanatics, but every
recognized Bible scholar is perfectly aware of it. Some Christians, alas,
resort to formal lying to obscure such reality.
-- Steve Allen, comdeian, from an essay in the book "The Courage of
- Conviction", edited by Philip Berman
+ -- Steve Allen, comdeian, from an essay in the book "The Courage of
+ Conviction", edited by Philip Berman
%
...it still remains true that as a set of cognitive beliefs about the
existence of God in any recognizable sense continuous with the great
systems of the past, religious doctrines constitute a speculative
hypothesis of an extremely low order of probability.
-- Sidney Hook
+ -- Sidney Hook
%
A fanatic is a person who can't change his mind and won't change the subject.
-- Winston Churchill
+ -- Winston Churchill
%
We're fighting against humanism, we're fighting against liberalism...
we are fighting against all the systems of Satan that are destroying
our nation today...our battle is with Satan himself.
-- Jerry Falwell
+ -- Jerry Falwell
%
They [preachers] dread the advance of science as witches do the approach
of daylight and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subversions
of the duperies on which they live.
-- Thomas Jefferson
+ -- Thomas Jefferson
%
Saints should always be judged guilty until they are proven innocent.
-- George Orwell
+ -- George Orwell
%
As I argued in "Beloved Son", a book about my son Brian and the subject
of religious communes and cults, one result of proper early instruction
is generally reasonable and high-minded or utterly bizarre and
irrational -- the powers of reason are surprisingly ineffective in
changing the believer's mind.
-- Steve Allen, comdeian, from an essay in the book "The Courage of
- Conviction", edited by Philip Berman
+ -- Steve Allen, comdeian, from an essay in the book "The Courage of
+ Conviction", edited by Philip Berman
%
Nothing is easier than to denounce the evildoer; nothing is more difficult
than to understand him.
-- Fyodor Dostoevski
+ -- Fyodor Dostoevski
%
We may not be able to persuade Hindus that Jesus and not Vishnu should
govern their spiritual horizon, nor Moslems that Lord Buddha is at the
it could make its own way; and each animated by a jealous fear that,
if any connection of State and Church were permitted, some rival
denomination would get an unfair advantage.
-- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
- from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
+ -- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
+ from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
%
Already the spirit of our schooling is permeated with the feeling that
every subject, every topic, every fact, every professed truth must be
to whom the scientific standpoint is not merely a technical device,
but is the embodiment of the integrity of mind, must protest against
its being taught in any other spirit.
-- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
- from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
+ -- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher,
+ from "Democracy in the Schools", 1908
%
In the broad and final sense all institutions are educational in the
sense that they operate to form the attitudes, dispositions, abilities
not only for education itself but for its final effect upon all the
interests and activities of a society that is committed to the democratic
way of life.
-- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher
+ -- John Dewey (1859-1953), American philosopher
%
History shows that the human mind, fed by constant accessions of knowledge,
periodically grows too large for its theoretical coverings, and bursts
grub, at intervals, casts its too narrow skin and assumes another...
Truly the imago state of Man seems to be terribly distant, but every
moult is a step gained.
-- Charles Darwin, from "Origin of the Species"
+ -- Charles Darwin, from "Origin of the Species"
%
...I would go so far as to suggest that, were it not for our ego and
concern to be different, the African apes would be included in our
family, the Hominidae.
-- Richard Leakey
+ -- Richard Leakey
%
It is inconceivable that a judicious observer from another solar system
would see in our species -- which has tended to be cruel, destructive,
wasteful, and irrational -- the crown and apex of cosmic evolution.
Viewing us as the culmination of *anything* is grotesque; viewing us
as a transitional species makes more sense -- and gives us more hope.
-- Betty McCollister, "Our Transitional Species",
- Free Inquiry magazine, Vol. 8, No. 1
+ -- Betty McCollister, "Our Transitional Species",
+ Free Inquiry magazine, Vol. 8, No. 1
%
"Well, you see, it's such a transitional creature. It's a piss-poor
reptile and not very much of a bird."
-- Melvin Konner, from "The Tangled Wing", quoting a zoologist who has
-studied the archeopteryz and found it "very much like people"
+ -- Melvin Konner, from "The Tangled Wing", quoting a zoologist who has
+ studied the archeopteryz and found it "very much like people"
%
"You need tender loving care once a week - so that I can slap you into shape."
-- Ellyn Mustard
+ -- Ellyn Mustard
%
"It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God but to
create him."
-Ambrose Bierce
%
"Plan to throw one away. You will anyway."
-- Fred Brooks, "The Mythical Man Month"
+ -- Fred Brooks, "The Mythical Man Month"
%
You need tender loving care once a week - so that I can slap you into shape.
-- Ellyn Mustard
+ -- Ellyn Mustard
%
"It may be that our role on this planet is not to worship God but to
create him."
confronting militant Islam -- particularly fallout from the Iranian
revolution -- and religion will once more, as it has in our own more
distant past -- play a role at least as standard-bearer in death and mayhem.
-- Bobby R. Inman, Admiral, USN, Retired, former director of Naval Intelligence,
- vice director of the DIA, former director of the NSA, deputy director of
- Central Intelligence, former chairman and CEO of MCC.
+ -- Bobby R. Inman, Admiral, USN, Retired, former director of Naval
+ Intelligence, vice director of the DIA, former director of the NSA,
+ deputy director of Central Intelligence, former chairman and CEO of
+ MCC.
%
...One thing is that, unlike any other Western democracy that I know of,
this country has operated since its beginnings with a basic distrust of
look to at least another decade during which many of the big problems
around this country will have to be addressed by institutions other than
federal government.
-- Bobby R. Inman, Admiral, USN, Retired, former director of Naval Intelligence,
- vice director of the DIA, former director of the NSA, deputy directory of
- Central Intelligence, former chairman and CEO of MCC.
+ -- Bobby R. Inman, Admiral, USN, Retired, former director of Naval
+ Intelligence, vice director of the DIA, former director of the NSA,
+ deputy director of Central Intelligence, former chairman and CEO of
+ MCC.
[the statist opinions expressed herein are not those of the cookie editor -ed.]
%
"I have just one word for you, my boy...plastics."
-- from "The Graduate"
+ -- from "The Graduate"
%
"There is such a fine line between genius and stupidity."
-- David St. Hubbins, "Spinal Tap"
+ -- David St. Hubbins, "Spinal Tap"
%
"If Diet Coke did not exist it would have been necessary to invent it."
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
I am approached with the most opposite opinions and advice, and by men who
are equally certain that they represent the divine will. I am sure that
a metaphor for the fact that few of us fully exploit our talents, who could
deny it? As a refuge for occultists seeking a neural basis of the miraculous,
it leaves much to be desired.
--- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for
- Psi Phenomena", The Skeptical Enquirer, Vol. XII, No. 2, pg. 171
+ -- Barry L. Beyerstein, "The Brain and Consciousness: Implications for
+ Psi Phenomena", The Skeptical Enquirer, Vol. XII, No. 2, pg. 171
%
Thufir's a Harkonnen now.
%
"Our journeys to the stars will be made on spaceships created by determined,
hardworking scientists and engineers applying the principles of science, not
aboard flying saucers piloted by little gray aliens from some other dimension."
--- Robert A. Baker, "The Aliens Among Us: Hypnotic Regression Revisited",
- The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII, No. 2
+ -- Robert A. Baker, "The Aliens Among Us: Hypnotic Regression
+ Revisited", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII, No. 2
%
"...all the good computer designs are bootlegged; the formally planned products,
if they are built at all, are dogs!"
--- David E. Lundstrom, "A Few Good Men From Univac", MIT Press, 1987
+ -- David E. Lundstrom, "A Few Good Men From Univac", MIT Press, 1987
%
"To take a significant step forward, you must make a series of finite
improvements."
--- Donald J. Atwood, General Motors
+ -- Donald J. Atwood, General Motors
%
"We will bury you."
--- Nikita Kruschev
+ -- Nikita Kruschev
%
"Now here's something you're really going to like!"
--- Rocket J. Squirrel
+ -- Rocket J. Squirrel
%
"How to make a million dollars: First, get a million dollars."
--- Steve Martin
+ -- Steve Martin
%
"Language shapes the way we think, and determines what we can think about."
--- B. L. Whorf
+ -- B. L. Whorf
%
The language provides a programmer with a set of conceptual tools; if these are
inadequate for the task, they will simply be ignored. For example, seriously
"The triumph of libertarian anarchy is nearly (in historical terms) at
hand... *if* we can keep the Left from selling us into slavery and the
Right from blowing us up for, say, the next twenty years."
--- Eric Rayman, usenet guy, about nanotechnology
+ -- Eric Rayman, usenet guy, about nanotechnology
%
"Gravitation cannot be held responsible for people falling in love."
--- Albert Einstein
+ -- Albert Einstein
%
"I think Michael is like litmus paper - he's always trying to learn."
--- Elizabeth Taylor, absurd non-sequitur about Michael Jackson
+ -- Elizabeth Taylor, absurd non-sequitur about Michael Jackson
%
While it cannot be proved retrospectively that any experience of possession,
conversion, revelation, or divine ecstasy was merely an epileptic discharge,
the religious tradition, the parallels are striking. The same is true of the
recent spate of alleged UFO abductees. Parsimony alone argues against invoking
spirits, demons, or extraterrestrials when natural causes will suffice.
--- Barry L. Beyerstein, "Neuropathology and the Legacy of Spiritual
- Possession", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII, No. 3, pg. 255
+ -- Barry L. Beyerstein, "Neuropathology and the Legacy of Spiritual
+ Possession", The Skeptical Inquirer, Vol. XII, No. 3, pg. 255
%
"A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's printed on."
-- Samuel Goldwyn
+ -- Samuel Goldwyn
%
"We shall reach greater and greater platitudes of achievement."
--- Richard J. Daley
+ -- Richard J. Daley
%
"With molasses you catch flies, with vinegar you catch nobody."
--- Baltimore City Councilman Dominic DiPietro
+ -- Baltimore City Councilman Dominic DiPietro
%
"Lead us in a few words of silent prayer."
--- Bill Peterson, former Houston Oiler football coach
+ -- Bill Peterson, former Houston Oiler football coach
%
"I couldn't remember things until I took that Sam Carnegie course."
--- Bill Peterson, former Houston Oiler football coach
+ -- Bill Peterson, former Houston Oiler football coach
%
"Right now I feel that I've got my feet on the ground as far as my head
is concerned."
--- Baseball pitcher Bo Belinsky
+ -- Baseball pitcher Bo Belinsky
%
"Ninety percent of baseball is half mental."
--- Yogi Berra
+ -- Yogi Berra
%
Two things are certain about science. It does not stand still for long,
and it is never boring. Oh, among some poor souls, including even
that every day, in some way, change our view (if not theirs) of the
natural world.
--- Kendrick Frazier, "The Year in Science: An Overview," in
- 1988 Yearbook of Science and the Future, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
+ -- Kendrick Frazier, "The Year in Science: An Overview," in
+ 1988 Yearbook of Science and the Future, Encyclopaedia Britannica, Inc.
%
"jackpot: you may have an unnecessary change record"
--- message from "diff"
+ -- message from "diff"
%
"One lawyer can steal more than a hundred men with guns."
--- The Godfather
+ -- The Godfather
%
What's the difference between a computer salesman and a used car salesman?
the performance; they then said over the radio that i had insisted on their
cancelling the performance because they were "insufficiently Zen."
Can you believe it?
--- composer John Cage, "Electronic Musician" magazine, March 88, pg. 89
+ -- composer John Cage, "Electronic Musician" magazine, March 88, pg. 89
%
"One day I woke up and discovered that I was in love with tripe."
--- Tom Anderson
+ -- Tom Anderson
%
"Most people would like to be delivered from
temptation but would like it to keep in touch."
--- Robert Orben
+ -- Robert Orben
%
The rule on staying alive as a program manager is to give 'em a number or
give 'em a date, but never give 'em both at once.
%
"If John Madden steps outside on February 2, looks down, and doesn't see his
feet, we'll have 6 more weeks of Pro football."
--- Chuck Newcombe
+ -- Chuck Newcombe
%
Dead? No excuse for laying off work.
%
Lead me not into temptation... I can find it myself.
%
"When people are least sure, they are often most dogmatic."
--- John Kenneth Galbraith
+ -- John Kenneth Galbraith
%
"Nature is very un-American. Nature never hurries."
--- William George Jordan
+ -- William George Jordan
%
"We learn from history that we learn nothing from history."
--- George Bernard Shaw
+ -- George Bernard Shaw
%
"Flattery is all right -- if you don't inhale."
--- Adlai Stevenson
+ -- Adlai Stevenson
%
"Consistency requires you to be as ignorant today as you were a year ago."
--- Bernard Berenson
+ -- Bernard Berenson
%
"Summit meetings tend to be like panda matings. The expectations are always
high, and the results usually disappointing."
--- Robert Orben
+ -- Robert Orben
%
"A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging
their prejudices."
--- William James
+ -- William James
%
"Tell the truth and run."
--- Yugoslav proverb
+ -- Yugoslav proverb
%
"The best index to a person's character is a) how he treats people who can't
do him any good and b) how he treats people who can't fight back."
--- Abigail Van Buren
+ -- Abigail Van Buren
%
"Never face facts; if you do, you'll never get up in the morning."
--- Marlo Thomas
+ -- Marlo Thomas
%
"Life is a garment we continuously alter, but which never seems to fit."
--- David McCord
+ -- David McCord
%
"The value of marriage is not that adults produce children, but that children
produce adults."
--- Peter De Vries
+ -- Peter De Vries
%
"It is easier to fight for principles than to live up to them."
--- Alfred Adler
+ -- Alfred Adler
%
"Security is mostly a superstition. It does not exist in nature... Life is
either a daring adventure or nothing."
--- Helen Keller
+ -- Helen Keller
%
"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is
shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."
--- Albert Einstein
+ -- Albert Einstein
%
"Success covers a multitude of blunders."
--- George Bernard Shaw
+ -- George Bernard Shaw
%
"The mark of an immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while
the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one."
--- William Stekel
+ -- William Stekel
%
"Yes, and I feel bad about rendering their useless carci into dogfood..."
--- Badger comics
+ -- Badger comics
%
"Is it really you, Fuzz, or is it Memorex, or is it radiation sickness?"
--- Sonic Disruptors comics
+ -- Sonic Disruptors comics
%
"Most of us, when all is said and done, like what we like and make up reasons
for it afterwards."
--- Soren F. Petersen
+ -- Soren F. Petersen
%
"You're a creature of the night, Michael. Wait'll Mom hears about this."
--- from the movie "The Lost Boys"
+ -- from the movie "The Lost Boys"
%
"Plastic gun. Ingenious. More coffee, please."
--- The Phantom comics
+ -- The Phantom comics
%
The game of life is a game of boomerangs. Our thoughts, deeds and words
return to us sooner or later with astounding accuracy.
%
"A child is a person who can't understand why someone would give away a
perfectly good kitten."
--- Doug Larson
+ -- Doug Larson
%
"The trouble with doing something right the first time is that nobody
appreciates how difficult it was."
--- Walt West
+ -- Walt West
%
"Silent gratitude isn't very much use to anyone."
--- G. B. Stearn
+ -- G. B. Stearn
%
"In matters of principle, stand like a rock; in matters of taste, swim with
the current."
--- Thomas Jefferson
+ -- Thomas Jefferson
%
The first sign of maturity is the discovery that the volume knob also turns to
the left.
%
"But this one goes to eleven."
--- Nigel Tufnel
+ -- Nigel Tufnel
%
"Been through Hell? Whaddya bring back for me?"
--- A. Brilliant
+ -- A. Brilliant
%
"I don't know what their
gripe is. A critic is
render opinions glibly."
"Critics are grinks and
groinks."
--- Baron and Badger, from Badger comics
+ -- Baron and Badger, from Badger comics
%
"I've got some amyls. We could either party later or, like, start his heart."
--- "Cheech and Chong's Next Movie"
+ -- "Cheech and Chong's Next Movie"
%
"Israel today announced that it is giving up. The Zionist state will dissolve
in two weeks time, and its citizens will disperse to various resort communities
around the world. Said Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir, 'Who needs the
aggravation?'"
--- Dennis Miller, "Satuday Night Live" News
+ -- Dennis Miller, "Satuday Night Live" News
%
"And, of course, you have the commercials where savvy businesspeople Get Ahead
by using their MacIntosh computers to create the ultimate American business
product: a really sharp-looking report."
--- Dave Barry
+ -- Dave Barry
%
SHOP OR DIE, people of Earth!
[offer void where prohibited]
--- Capitalists from outer space, from Justice League Int'l comics
+ -- Capitalists from outer space, from Justice League Int'l comics
%
"Roman Polanski makes his own blood. He's smart -- that's why his movies work."
--- A brilliant director at "Frank's Place"
+ -- A brilliant director at "Frank's Place"
%
"The following is not for the weak of heart or Fundamentalists."
--- Dave Barry
+ -- Dave Barry
%
"I take Him shopping with me. I say, 'OK, Jesus, help me find a bargain'"
--Tammy Faye Bakker
%
"I don't believe in sweeping social change being manifested by one person,
unless he has an atomic weapon."
--- Howard Chaykin
+ -- Howard Chaykin
%
"Ever free-climbed a thousand foot vertical cliff with 60 pounds of gear
strapped to your butt?"
"No."
"'Course you haven't, you fruit-loop little geek."
--- The Mountain Man, one of Dana Carvey's SNL characters
+ -- The Mountain Man, one of Dana Carvey's SNL characters
[ditto]
%
"I mean, like, I just read your article in the Yale law recipe, on search and
underwear.
3) Warn the neighbors and call the police.
But whatever else you do... DON'T GO DOWN IN THE DAMN BASEMENT!"
--- Saturday Night Live meets Friday the 13th
+ -- Saturday Night Live meets Friday the 13th
%
Victory or defeat!
%
"Everyone is entitled to an *informed* opinion."
--- Harlan Ellison
+ -- Harlan Ellison
%
"It's curtains for you, Mighty Mouse! This gun is so futuristic that even
*I* don't know how it works!"
--- from Ralph Bakshi's Mighty Mouse
+ -- from Ralph Bakshi's Mighty Mouse
%
"May the forces of evil become confused on the way to your house."
--- George Carlin
+ -- George Carlin
%
A university faculty is 500 egotists with a common parking problem.
%
he's grown too
powerful."
"HO HO HO!"
--- Duck's Breath Mystery Theatre
+ -- Duck's Breath Mystery Theatre
%
"If it's not loud, it doesn't work!"
--- Blank Reg, from "Max Headroom"
+ -- Blank Reg, from "Max Headroom"
%
"Remember kids, if there's a loaded gun in the room, be sure that you're the
one holding it"
--- Captain Combat
+ -- Captain Combat
%
Delta: We never make the same mistake three times. -- David Letterman
%
-- John Kenneth Galbraith
%
"Hello again, Peabody here..."
--- Mister Peabody
+ -- Mister Peabody
%
"It's the best thing since professional golfers on 'ludes."
--- Rick Obidiah
+ -- Rick Obidiah
%
"To your left is the marina where several senior cabinet officials keep luxury
yachts for weekend cruises on the Potomac. Some of these ships are up to 100
feet in length; the Presidential yacht is over 200 feet in length, and can
remain submerged for up to 3 weeks."
--- Garrison Keillor
+ -- Garrison Keillor
%
"Well, social relevance is a schtick, like mysteries, social relevance,
science fiction..."
--- Art Spiegelman
+ -- Art Spiegelman
%
"One of the problems I've always had with propaganda pamphlets is that they're
real boring to look at. They're just badly designed. People from the left
often are very well-intended, but they never had time to take basic design
classes, you know?"
--- Art Spiegelman
+ -- Art Spiegelman
%
"If you took everyone who's ever been to a Dead
show, and lined them up, they'd stretch halfway to
the moon and back... and none of them would be
complaining."
--- a local Deadhead in the Seattle Times
+ -- a local Deadhead in the Seattle Times
%
"And remember: Evil will always prevail, because Good is dumb."
--- Spaceballs
+ -- Spaceballs
%
Why are many scientists using lawyers for medical
experiments instead of rats?
Pig: An animal (Porcus omnivorous) closely allied to the human race by the
splendor and vivacity of its appetite, which, however, is inferior in scope,
for it balks at pig.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
"We don't have to protect the environment -- the Second Coming is at hand."
--- James Watt
+ -- James Watt
%
"I believe that Ronald Reagan will someday make this
country what it once was... an arctic wilderness."
--- Steve Martin
+ -- Steve Martin
%
"To YOU I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition."
--- Woody Allen
+ -- Woody Allen
%
Noncombatant: A dead Quaker.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
"There's only one way to have a happy marriage and as soon as I learn what it
is I'll get married again."
--- Clint Eastwood
+ -- Clint Eastwood
%
A lot of people I know believe in positive thinking, and so do I.
I believe everything positively stinks.
--- Lew Col
+ -- Lew Col
%
Q: How many IBM CPU's does it take to execute a job?
A: Four; three to hold it down, and one to rip its head off.
%
"Because he's a character who's looking for his own identity, [He-Man is]
an interesting role for an actor."
--- Dolph Lundgren, "actor"
+ -- Dolph Lundgren, "actor"
%
"If Jesus came back today, and saw what was going on in his name, he'd never
stop throwing up."
--- Max Von Sydow's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters"
+ -- Max Von Sydow's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters"
%
"Nietzsche says that we will live the same life, over and over again.
God -- I'll have to sit through the Ice Capades again."
--- Woody Allen's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters"
+ -- Woody Allen's character in "Hannah and Her Sisters"
%
"In regards to Oral Roberts' claim that God told him that he would die unless he
received $20 million by March, God's lawyers have stated that their client has
not spoken with Roberts for several years. Off the record, God has stated that
"If I had wanted to ice the little toad, I would have done it a long time ago."
--- Dennis Miller, SNL News
+ -- Dennis Miller, SNL News
%
"Only the hypocrite is really rotten to the core."
--- Hannah Arendt.
+ -- Hannah Arendt.
%
Quod licet Iovi non licet bovi.
(What Jove may do, is not permitted to a cow.)
%
"I distrust a man who says 'when.' If he's got to be careful not to drink too
much, it's because he's not to be trusted when he does."
--- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_
+ -- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_
%
"I distrust a close-mouthed man. He generally picks the wrong time to talk
and says the wrong things. Talking's something you can't do judiciously,
unless you keep in practice. Now, sir, we'll talk if you like. I'll tell
you right out, I'm a man who likes talking to a man who likes to talk."
--- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_
+ -- Sidney Greenstreet, _The Maltese Falcon_
%
All extremists should be taken out and shot.
%
"The sixties were good to you, weren't they?"
--- George Carlin
+ -- George Carlin
%
"You stay here, Audrey -- this is between me and the vegetable!"
--- Seymour, from _Little Shop Of Horrors_
+ -- Seymour, from _Little Shop Of Horrors_
%
From Sharp minds come... pointed heads.
--- Bryan Sparrowhawk
+ -- Bryan Sparrowhawk
%
There are two kinds of egotists: 1) Those who admit it 2) The rest of us
%
"The picture's pretty bleak, gentlemen... The world's climates are changing,
the mammals are taking over, and we all have a brain about the size of a
walnut."
--- some dinosaurs from The Far Side, by Gary Larson
+ -- some dinosaurs from The Far Side, by Gary Larson
%
"We Americans, we're a simple people... but piss us off, and we'll bomb
your cities."
--- Robin Williams, _Good Morning Vietnam_
+ -- Robin Williams, _Good Morning Vietnam_
%
Why won't sharks eat lawyers? Professional courtesy.
%
"You know, we've won awards for this crap."
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
It was pity stayed his hand.
"Pity I don't have any more bullets," thought Frito.
--- _Bored_of_the_Rings_, a Harvard Lampoon parody of Tolkein
+ -- _Bored_of_the_Rings_, a Harvard Lampoon parody of Tolkein
%
A good USENET motto would be:
a. "Together, a strong community."
b. "Computers R Us."
c. "I'm sick of programming, I think I'll just screw around for a while on
company time."
--- A Sane Man
+ -- A Sane Man
%
"He didn't run for reelection. `Politics brings you into contact with all the
people you'd give anything to avoid,' he said. `I'm staying home.'"
--- Garrison Keillor, _Lake_Wobegone_Days_
+ -- Garrison Keillor, _Lake_Wobegone_Days_
%
"If you lived today as if it were your last, you'd buy up a box of rockets and
fire them all off, wouldn't you?"
--- Garrison Keillor
+ -- Garrison Keillor
%
"Mr. Spock succumbs to a powerful mating urge and nearly kills Captain Kirk."
--- TV Guide, describing the Star Trek episode _Amok_Time_
+ -- TV Guide, describing the Star Trek episode _Amok_Time_
%
"Poor man... he was like an employee to me."
--- The police commissioner on "Sledge Hammer" laments the death of his
-bodyguard
+ -- The police commissioner on "Sledge Hammer" laments the death of his
+ bodyguard
%
"Trust me. I know what I'm doing."
--- Sledge Hammer
+ -- Sledge Hammer
%
"Hi. This is Dan Cassidy's answering machine. Please leave your name and
number... and after I've doctored the tape, your message will implicate you
%
"All God's children are not beautiful. Most of God's children are, in fact,
barely presentable."
--- Fran Lebowitz
+ -- Fran Lebowitz
%
"If truth is beauty, how come no one has their hair done in the library?"
--- Lily Tomlin
+ -- Lily Tomlin
%
Whom the gods would destroy, they first teach BASIC.
%
"Look! There! Evil!.. pure and simple, total evil from the Eighth Dimension!"
--- Buckaroo Banzai
+ -- Buckaroo Banzai
%
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid"
--- the artificial person, from _Aliens_
+ -- the artificial person, from _Aliens_
%
"The only way I can lose this election is if I'm caught in bed with a dead
girl or a live boy."
--- Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards
+ -- Louisiana governor Edwin Edwards
%
David Letterman's "Things we can be proud of as Americans":
* Greatest number of citizens who have actually boarded a UFO
%
"Danger, you haven't seen the last of me!"
"No, but the first of you turns my stomach!"
--- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger
+ -- The Firesign Theatre's Nick Danger
%
Pray to God, but keep rowing to shore.
-- Russian Proverb
-- Nathaniel Howe
%
"It's a dog-eat-dog world out there, and I'm wearing Milkbone underwear."
--- Norm, from _Cheers_
+ -- Norm, from _Cheers_
%
Once at a social gathering, Gladstone said to Disraeli, "I predict, Sir, that
you will die either by hanging or of some vile disease". Disraeli replied,
%
"I'll rob that rich person and give it to some poor deserving slob.
That will *prove* I'm Robin Hood."
--- Daffy Duck, Looney Tunes, _Robin Hood Daffy_
+ -- Daffy Duck, Looney Tunes, _Robin Hood Daffy_
%
"Would I turn on the gas if my pal Mugsy were in there?"
"You might, rabbit, you might!"
--- Looney Tunes, Bugs and Thugs (1954, Friz Freleng)
+ -- Looney Tunes, Bugs and Thugs (1954, Friz Freleng)
%
"Consequences, Schmonsequences, as long as I'm rich."
--- Looney Tunes, Ali Baba Bunny (1957, Chuck Jones)
+ -- Looney Tunes, Ali Baba Bunny (1957, Chuck Jones)
%
"And do you think (fop that I am) that I could be the Scarlet Pumpernickel?"
--- Looney Tunes, The Scarlet Pumpernickel (1950, Chuck Jones)
+ -- Looney Tunes, The Scarlet Pumpernickel (1950, Chuck Jones)
%
"Now I've got the bead on you with MY disintegrating gun. And when it
disintegrates, it disintegrates. (pulls trigger) Well, what you do know,
it disintegrated."
--- Duck Dodgers in the 24th and a half century
+ -- Duck Dodgers in the 24th and a half century
%
"Kill the Wabbit, Kill the Wabbit, Kill the Wabbit!"
--- Looney Tunes, "What's Opera Doc?" (1957, Chuck Jones)
+ -- Looney Tunes, "What's Opera Doc?" (1957, Chuck Jones)
%
"I DO want your money, because god wants your money!"
--- The Reverend Jimmy, from _Repo_Man_
+ -- The Reverend Jimmy, from _Repo_Man_
%
"The majority of the stupid is invincible and guaranteed for all time. The
terror of their tyranny, however, is alleviated by their lack of consistency."
--- Albert Einstein
+ -- Albert Einstein
%
"You show me an American who can keep his mouth shut and I'll eat him."
--- Newspaperman from Frank Capra's _Meet_John_Doe_
+ -- Newspaperman from Frank Capra's _Meet_John_Doe_
%
"And we heard him exclaim
As he started to roam:
`I'm a hologram, kids,
please don't try this at home!'"
-- Bob Violence
--- Howie Chaykin's little animated 3-dimensional darling, Bob Violence
+ -- Howie Chaykin's little animated 3-dimensional darling, Bob Violence
%
"The Soviet Union, which has complained recently about alleged anti-Soviet
themes in American advertising, lodged an official protest this week against
the Ford Motor Company's new campaign: `Hey you stinking fat Russian, get
off my Ford Escort.'"
--- Dennis Miller, Saturday Night Live
+ -- Dennis Miller, Saturday Night Live
%
"There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags do not wave in a vacuum."
--Arthur C. Clarke
'cause if they couldn't, they'd have to wake up to the fact that life's one big,
scary, glorious, complex and ultimately unfathomable crapshoot -- and the only
reason THEY can't seem to keep up is they're a bunch of misfits and losers."
--- an analysis of neo-Nazis and such, Badger comics
+ -- an analysis of neo-Nazis and such, Badger comics
%
"Interesting survey in the current Journal of Abnormal Psychology: New York
City has a higher percentage of people you shouldn't make any sudden moves
around than any other city in the world."
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
"Tourists -- have some fun with New york's hard-boiled cabbies. When you get
to your destination, say to your driver, "Pay? I was hitchhiking."
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
"An anthropologist at Tulane has just come back from a field trip to New
Guinea with reports of a tribe so primitive that they have Tide but not
new Tide with lemon-fresh Borax."
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
"Based on what you know about him in history books, what do you think Abraham
Lincoln would be doing if he were alive today?
2) Advising the President.
3) Desperately clawing at the inside of his
coffin."
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
"If Ricky Schroder and Gary Coleman had a fight on
television with pool cues, who would win?
1) Ricky Schroder
2) Gary Coleman
3) The television viewing public"
--- David Letterman
+ -- David Letterman
%
"If you are beginning to doubt what I am saying, you are
probably hallucinating."
--- The Firesign Theatre, _Everything you know is Wrong_
+ -- The Firesign Theatre, _Everything you know is Wrong_
%
What to do in case of an alien attack:
2) Avoid eye contact.
3) If there are no eyes, avoid all contact.
--- The Firesign Theatre, _Everything you know is Wrong_
+ -- The Firesign Theatre, _Everything you know is Wrong_
%
"Nuclear war would really set back cable."
-- Ted Turner
+ -- Ted Turner
%
"You tweachewous miscweant!"
--- Elmer Fudd
+ -- Elmer Fudd
%
"I saw _Lassie_. It took me four shows to figure out why the hairy kid never
spoke. I mean, he could roll over and all that, but did that deserve a series?"
--- the alien guy, in _Explorers_
+ -- the alien guy, in _Explorers_
%
"Open Channel D..."
--- Napoleon Solo, The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
+ -- Napoleon Solo, The Man From U.N.C.L.E.
%
Save the whales. Collect the whole set.
%
"The pyramid is opening!"
"Which one?"
"The one with the ever-widening hole in it!"
--- The Firesign Theatre
+ -- The Firesign Theatre
%
"Calling J-Man Kink. Calling J-Man Kink. Hash missile sighted, target
Los Angeles. Disregard personal feelings about city and intercept."
--- The Firesign Theatre movie, _J-Men Forever_
+ -- The Firesign Theatre movie, _J-Men Forever_
%
"My sense of purpose is gone! I have no idea who I AM!"
"Oh, my God... You've.. You've turned him into a DEMOCRAT!"
--- Doonesbury
+ -- Doonesbury
%
"You are WRONG, you ol' brass-breasted fascist poop!"
--- Bloom County
+ -- Bloom County
%
"Well, if you can't believe what you read in a comic book, what *can*
you believe?!"
--- Bullwinkle J. Moose
+ -- Bullwinkle J. Moose
%
"Your mother was a hamster, and your father smelt of elderberrys!"
--- Monty Python and the Holy Grail
+ -- Monty Python and the Holy Grail
%
"Take that, you hostile sons-of-bitches!"
--- James Coburn, in the finale of _The_President's_Analyst_
+ -- James Coburn, in the finale of _The_President's_Analyst_
%
"The voters have spoken, the bastards..."
--- unknown
+ -- unknown
%
"I prefer to think that God is not dead, just drunk"
--- John Huston
+ -- John Huston
%
"Be there. Aloha."
--- Steve McGarret, _Hawaii Five-Oh_
+ -- Steve McGarret, _Hawaii Five-Oh_
%
"When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro..."
--- Hunter S. Thompson
+ -- Hunter S. Thompson
%
"Say yur prayers, yuh flea-pickin' varmint!"
--- Yosemite Sam
+ -- Yosemite Sam
%
"There... I've run rings 'round you logically"
--- Monty Python's Flying Circus
+ -- Monty Python's Flying Circus
%
"Let's show this prehistoric bitch how we do things downtown!"
--- The Ghostbusters
+ -- The Ghostbusters
%
...Veloz is indistinguishable from hundreds of other electronics businesses
in the Valley, run by eager young engineers poring over memory dumps late
into the night. The difference is that a bunch of self-confessed "car nuts"
are making money doing what they love: writing code and driving fast.
--- "Electronics puts its foot on the gas", IEEE Spectrum, May 88
+ -- "Electronics puts its foot on the gas", IEEE Spectrum, May 88
%
"Just the facts, Ma'am"
--- Joe Friday
+ -- Joe Friday
%
"I have five dollars for each of you."
--- Bernhard Goetz
+ -- Bernhard Goetz
%
Mausoleum: The final and funniest folly of the rich.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Riches: A gift from Heaven signifying, "This is my beloved son, in whom I
am well pleased."
--- John D. Rockefeller, (slander by Ambrose Bierce)
+ -- John D. Rockefeller, (slander by Ambrose Bierce)
%
All things are either sacred or profane.
The former to ecclesiasts bring gain;
The latter to the devil appertain.
--- Dumbo Omohundro
+ -- Dumbo Omohundro
%
Saint: A dead sinner revised and edited.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Forty two.
%
Meekness: Uncommon patience in planning a revenge that is worth while.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Absolute: Independent, irresponsible. An absolute monarchy is one in which
the sovereign does as he pleases so long as he pleases the assassins. Not
many absolute monarchies are left, most of them having been replaced by
limited monarchies, where the sovereign's power for evil (and for good) is
greatly curtailed, and by republics, which are governed by chance.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Abstainer: A weak person who yields to the temptation of denying himself a
pleasure. A total abstainer is one who abstains from everything but
abstention, and especially from inactivity in the affairs of others.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Alliance: In international politics, the union of two thieves who have their
hands so deeply inserted in each other's pocket that they cannot separately
plunder a third.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Disobedience: The silver lining to the cloud of servitude.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Egotist: A person of low taste, more interested in himself than in me.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Administration: An ingenious abstraction in politics, designed to receive
the kicks and cuffs due to the premier or president.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
A penny saved is a penny to squander.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Ocean: A body of water occupying about two-thirds of a world made for man --
who has no gills.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Physician: One upon whom we set our hopes when ill and our dogs when well.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Philosophy: A route of many roads leading from nowhere to nothing.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Politics: A strife of interests masquerading as a contest of principles.
The conduct of public affairs for private advantage.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Politician: An eel in the fundamental mud upon which the superstructure of
organized society is reared. When he wriggles he mistakes the agitation of
his tail for the trembling of the edifice. As compared with the statesman,
he suffers the disadvantage of being alive.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Pray: To ask that the laws of the universe be annulled in behalf of a single
petitioner confessedly unworthy.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Presidency: The greased pig in the field game of American politics.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Proboscis: The rudimentary organ of an elephant which serves him in place
of the knife-and-fork that Evolution has as yet denied him. For purposes
of humor it is popularly called a trunk.
--- Ambrose Bierce
+ -- Ambrose Bierce
%
Inadmissible: Not competent to be considered. Said of certain kinds of
testimony which juries are supposed to be unfit to be entrusted with,
%
"Today's robots are very primitive, capable of understanding only a few
simple instructions such as 'go left', 'go right', and 'build car'."
- --John Sladek
+ -- John Sladek
%
"In the fight between you and the world, back the world."
- --Frank Zappa
+ -- Frank Zappa
%
Here is an Appalachian version of management's answer to those who are
concerned with the fate of the project:
"Don't worry about the mule. Just load the wagon."
--- Mike Dennison's hillbilly uncle
+ -- Mike Dennison's hillbilly uncle
%
Ill-chosen abstraction is particularly evident in the design of the ADA
runtime system. The interface to the ADA runtime system is so opaque that
useless for real-time systems. -- Marc D. Donner and David H. Jameson.
%
"Being against torture ought to be sort of a bipartisan thing."
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
"Here comes Mr. Bill's dog."
--- Narrator, Saturday Night Live
+ -- Narrator, Saturday Night Live
%
Sex is like air. It's only a big deal if you can't get any.
%
"Maintain an awareness for contribution -- to your schedule, your project,
our company."
--- A Group of Employees
+ -- A Group of Employees
%
"Ask not what A Group of Employees can do for you. But ask what can
All Employees do for A Group of Employees."
--- Mike Dennison
+ -- Mike Dennison
%
One evening Mr. Rudolph Block, of New York, found himself seated at dinner
alongside Mr. Percival Pollard, the distinguished critic.
This is now. Later is later.
%
"I will make no bargains with terrorist hardware."
--- Peter da Silva
+ -- Peter da Silva
%
"If I do not return to the pulpit this weekend, millions of people will go
to hell."
--- Jimmy Swaggart, 5/20/88
+ -- Jimmy Swaggart, 5/20/88
%
"Dump the condiments. If we are to be eaten, we don't need to taste good."
--- "Visionaries" cartoon
+ -- "Visionaries" cartoon
%
"Aww, if you make me cry anymore, you'll fog up my helmet."
--- "Visionaries" cartoon
+ -- "Visionaries" cartoon
%
I don't want to be young again, I just don't want to get any older.
%
Marriage Ceremony: An incredible metaphysical sham of watching God and the
law being dragged into the affairs of your family.
--- O. C. Ogilvie
+ -- O. C. Ogilvie
%
"Emergency!" Sgiggs screamed, ejecting himself from the tub like it was
a burning car. "Dial 'one'! Get room service! Code red!" Stiggs was on
concentrations of rose odor up my nostrils until I'm wasted with pleasure."
It wasn't long before we got so dissatisfied with this incompetence that we
bolted.
--- The Utterly Monstrous, Mind-Roasting Summer of O.C. and Stiggs,
+ -- The Utterly Monstrous, Mind-Roasting Summer of O.C. and Stiggs,
National Lampoon, October 1982
%
When it is incorrect, it is, at least *authoritatively* incorrect.
--- Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy
+ -- Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy
%
We decided it was night again, so we camped for twenty minutes and drank
another six beers at a Young Life campsite. O.C. got into the supervisory
adult's sleeping bag and ran around in it. "This is the judgment day and I'm
a terrifying apparition," he screamed. Then the heat made O.C. ralph in the
bag.
--- The Utterly Monstrous, Mind-Roasting Summer of O.C. and Stiggs,
+ -- The Utterly Monstrous, Mind-Roasting Summer of O.C. and Stiggs,
National Lampoon, October 1982
%
Voodoo Programming: Things programmers do that they know shouldn't work but
they try anyway, and which sometimes actually work, such as recompiling
everything.
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
This is, of course, totally uninformed specualation that I engage in to help
support my bias against such meddling... but there you have it.
--- Peter da Silva, speculating about why a computer program that had been
+ -- Peter da Silva, speculating about why a computer program that had been
changed to do something he didn't approve of, didn't work
%
"This knowledge I pursure is the finest pleasure I have ever known. I could
no sooner give it up that I could the very air that I breath."
--- Paolo Uccello, Renaissance artist, discoverer of the laws of perspective
+ -- Paolo Uccello, Renaissance artist, discoverer of the laws of perspective
%
"I got everybody to pay up front...then I blew up their planet."
"Now why didn't I think of that?"
--- Post Bros. Comics
+ -- Post Bros. Comics
%
"Atomic batteries to power, turbines to speed."
--- Robin, The Boy Wonder
+ -- Robin, The Boy Wonder
%
The F-15 Eagle:
If it's up, we'll shoot it down. If it's down, we'll blow it up.
--- A McDonnel-Douglas ad from a few years ago
+ -- A McDonnel-Douglas ad from a few years ago
%
"The Amiga is the only personal computer where you can run a multitasking
operating system and get realtime performance, out of the box."
--- Peter da Silva
+ -- Peter da Silva
%
"It's my cookie file and if I come up with something that's lame and I like it,
it goes in."
--- karl (Karl Lehenbauer)
+ -- karl (Karl Lehenbauer)
%
In recognizing AT&T Bell Laboratories for corporate innovation, for its
invention of cellular mobile communications, IEEE President Russell C. Drew
referred to the cellular telephone as a "basic necessity." How times have
changed, one observer remarked: many in the room recalled the advent of
direct dialing.
--- The Institute, July 1988, pg. 11
+ -- The Institute, July 1988, pg. 11
%
...the Soviets have the capability to try big projects. If there is a goal,
such as when Gorbachev states that they are going to have nuclear-powered
aircraft carriers, the case is closed -- that is it. They will concentrate
on the problem, do a bad job, and later pay the price. They really don't
care what the price is.
--- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
+ -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
"Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100
%
There is something you must understand about the Soviet system. They have the
the time, that aircraft was two months ahead of the Concorde. Four Tu-144s
were built; two have crashed, and two are in museums. The Concorde has been
flying safely for over 10 years.
--- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
+ -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
"Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100
%
DE: The Soviets seem to have difficulty implementing modern technology.
DE: That is absurdly low by free world standards.
Belenko: I know.
--- an interview with Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
- "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 102
+ -- an interview with Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected
+ in 1976 "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 102
%
"I have a friend who just got back from the Soviet Union, and told me the people
there are hungry for information about the West. He was asked about many
problems with them too. The other question he was asked often was why the
CIA had killed Samantha Smith, the little girl who visited the Soviet Union a
few years ago; their propaganda is very effective.
--- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
- "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100
+ -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
+ "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 100
%
"...I could accept this openness, glasnost, perestroika, or whatever you want
to call it if they did these things: abolish the one party system; open the
appease it. He will say: "Yes, we can do business!" This while his
military machine in Afghanistan has killed over a million people out of a
population of 17 million. Can you imagine that?
--- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
- "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110
+ -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
+ "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110
%
"Remember Kruschev: he tried to do too many things too fast, and he was
removed in disgrace. If Gorbachev tries to destroy the system or make too
I believe he will have a "heart attack" or retire or be removed. He is
up against a brick wall. If you think they will change everything and
become a free, open society, forget it!"
--- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
- "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110
+ -- Victor Belenko, MiG-25 fighter pilot who defected in 1976
+ "Defense Electronics", Vol 20, No. 6, pg. 110
%
FORTRAN? The syntactically incorrect statement "DO 10 I = 1.10" will parse and
generate code creating a variable, DO10I, as follows: "DO10I = 1.10" If that
"I knew then (in 1970) that a 4-kbyte minicomputer would cost as much as
a house. So I reasoned that after college, I'd have to live cheaply in
an apartment and put all my money into owning a computer."
--- Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, EE Times, June 6, 1988, pg 45
+ -- Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, EE Times, June 6, 1988, pg 45
%
HP had a unique policy of allowing its engineers to take parts from stock as
long as they built something. "They figured that with every design, they were
getting a better engineer. It's a policy I urge all companies to adopt."
--- Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, "Will Wozniak's class give Apple to teacher?"
- EE Times, June 6, 1988, pg 45
+ -- Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak, "Will Wozniak's class give Apple
+ to teacher?" EE Times, June 6, 1988, pg 45
%
"I just want to be a good engineer."
--- Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer, concluding his keynote speech
- at the 1988 AppleFest
+ -- Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer, concluding his keynote
+ speech at the 1988 AppleFest
%
"There's always been Tower of Babel sort of bickering inside Unix, but this
is the most extreme form ever. This means at least several years of confusion."
--- Bill Gates, founder and chairman of Microsoft,
- about the Open Systems Foundation
+ -- Bill Gates, founder and chairman of Microsoft,
+ about the Open Systems Foundation
%
"When in doubt, print 'em out."
--- Karl's Programming Proverb 0x7
+ -- Karl's Programming Proverb 0x7
%
"If you want the best things to happen in corporate life you have to find ways
to be hospitable to the unusual person. You don't get innovation as a
Certainly you get it as an anthitetical process, so you have to have an
environment where the body of people are really amenable to change and can
deal with the conflicts that arise out of change an innovation."
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc.,
- "Herman Miller's Secrets of Corporate Creativity",
- The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc.,
+ "Herman Miller's Secrets of Corporate Creativity",
+ The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
"In corporate life, I think there are three important areas which contracts
can't deal with, the area of conflict, the area of change and area of reaching
as shared ideals and shared value systems and shared ideas and shared
agreement as to the processes we are going to use for working together. In
many cases they develop into real love relationships."
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
- Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
+ Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
Another goal is to establish a relationship "in which it is OK for everybody
to do their best. There are an awful lot of people in management who really
designers if we are willing to have this kind of relationship and if we're
willing to be vulnerable to what will come out of it, we get really good
work."
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
- Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
+ Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
In his book, Mr. DePree tells the story of how designer George Nelson urged
that the company also take on Charles Eames in the late 1940s. Max's father,
'Charles Eames is an unusual talent. He is very different from me. The
company needs us both. I want very much to have Charles Eames share in
whatever potential there is.'"
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
- Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
+ Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
Mr. DePree believes participative capitalism is the wave of the future. The
U.S. work force, he believes, "more and more demands to be included in the
all in deep trouble. If we don't find ways to begin to understand that
capitalism's highest potential lies in the common good, not in the individual
good, then we're risking the system itself."
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
- Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
+ Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
Mr. DePree also expects a "tremendous social change" in all workplaces. "When
I first started working 40 years ago, a factory supervisor was focused on the
is in jail on a drunk-driving charge and I don't know how to raise bail.'
What that means is that if the supervisor wants productivity, he has to know
how to raise bail."
--- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
- Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
+ -- Max DePree, chairman and CEO of Herman Miller Inc., "Herman Miller's
+ Secrets of Corporate Creativity", The Wall Street Journal, May 3, 1988
%
Fools ignore complexity. Pragmatists suffer it.
Some can avoid it. Geniuses remove it.
--- Perlis's Programming Proverb #58, SIGPLAN Notices, Sept. 1982
+ -- Perlis's Programming Proverb #58, SIGPLAN Notices, Sept. 1982
%
"What if" is a trademark of Hewlett Packard, so stop using it in your
sentences without permission, or risk being sued.
over the brink into planetary suicide, despite their occasional pompous
suggestions that they may feel obliged to do so, we may survive beyond
1988.
--- George Rostky, EE Times, June 20, 1988 p. 45
+ -- George Rostky, EE Times, June 20, 1988 p. 45
%
The essential ideas of Algol 68 were that the whole language should be
precisely defined and that all the pieces should fit together smoothly.
The basic idea behind Pascal was that it didn't matter how vague the
language specification was (it took *years* to clarify) or how many rough
edges there were, as long as the CDC Pascal compiler was fast.
--- Richard A. O'Keefe
+ -- Richard A. O'Keefe
%
"We came. We saw. We kicked its ass."
--- Bill Murray, _Ghostbusters_
+ -- Bill Murray, _Ghostbusters_
%
"The stars are made of the same atoms as the earth." I usually pick one small
topic like this to give a lecture on. Poets say science takes away from the
any artists of the past imagined! Why do the poets of the present not speak
of it? What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if he were like a man, but
if he is an immense spinning sphere of methane and ammonia must be silent?
--- Richard P. Feynman (1918-1988)
+ -- Richard P. Feynman (1918-1988)
%
If you permit yourself to read meanings into (rather than drawing meanings out
of) the evidence, you can draw any conclusion you like.
--- Michael Keith, "The Bar-Code Beast", The Skeptical Enquirer Vol 12 No 4 p 416
+ -- Michael Keith, "The Bar-Code Beast", The Skeptical Enquirer Vol 12
+ No 4 p 416
%
"Pseudocode can be used to some extent to aid the maintenance
process. However, pseudocode that is highly detailed -
appreciation of beauty, for the greatest part of man's wisdom may be traced
back to the eternal questions of beginnings and endings, the quest to give
meaning to his existence, to life itself.
--- Selma Fraiberg, _The Magic Years_, pg. 193
+ -- Selma Fraiberg, _The Magic Years_, pg. 193
%
A comment on schedules:
Ok, how long will it take?
Hall Software Series. Brian Kerrighan, Advisor. 1988.
%
"Laugh while you can, monkey-boy."
--- Dr. Emilio Lizardo
+ -- Dr. Emilio Lizardo
%
"Floggings will continue until morale improves."
--- anonymous flyer being distributed at Exxon USA
+ -- anonymous flyer being distributed at Exxon USA
%
"Hey Ivan, check your six."
--- Sidewinder missile jacket patch, showing a Sidewinder driving up the tail
+ -- Sidewinder missile jacket patch, showing a Sidewinder driving up the tail
of a Russian Su-27
%
"Free markets select for winning solutions."
--- Eric S. Raymond
+ -- Eric S. Raymond
%
"I dislike companies that have a we-are-the-high-priests-of-hardware-so-you'll-
like-what-we-give-you attitude. I like commodity markets in which iron-and-
silicon hawkers know that they exist to provide fast toys for software types
like me to play with..."
--- Eric S. Raymond
+ -- Eric S. Raymond
%
"The urge to destroy is also a creative urge."
--- Bakunin
+ -- Bakunin
[ed. note - I would say: The urge to destroy may sometimes be a creative urge.]
%
"A commercial, and in some respects a social, doubt has been started within the
give fair play to those who might suffer by ignorance. It cannot be too ear-
nestly urged, that an acquaintance with real facts will, in the end, be better
for all parties."
--- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks,
+ -- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks,
published around 1850
%
In respect to lock-making, there can scarcely be such a thing as dishonesty
lates invention. Nothing but a partial and limited view of the question
could lead to the opinion that harm can result: if there be harm, it will be
much more than counterbalanced by good."
--- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks,
+ -- Charles Tomlinson's Rudimentary Treatise on the Construction of Locks,
published around 1850.
%
"Wish not to seem, but to be, the best."
--- Aeschylus
+ -- Aeschylus
%
"Survey says..."
--- Richard Dawson, weenie, on "Family Feud"
+ -- Richard Dawson, weenie, on "Family Feud"
%
"Paul Lynde to block..."
--- a contestant on "Hollywood Squares"
+ -- a contestant on "Hollywood Squares"
%
"Little else matters than to write good code."
--- Karl Lehenbauer
+ -- Karl Lehenbauer
%
To write good code is a worthy challenge, and a source of civilized delight.
--- stolen and paraphrased from William Safire
+ -- stolen and paraphrased from William Safire
%
"Stupidity, like virtue, is its own reward"
--- William E. Davidsen
+ -- William E. Davidsen
%
"If a computer can't directly address all the RAM you can use, it's just a toy."
--- anonymous comp.sys.amiga posting, non-sequitur
+ -- anonymous comp.sys.amiga posting, non-sequitur
%
"Never laugh at live dragons, Bilbo you fool!" he said to himself, and it became
a favourite saying of his later, and passed into a proverb. "You aren't nearly
through this adventure yet," he added, and that was pretty true as well.
--- Bilbo Baggins, "The Hobbit" by J.R.R. Tolkien, Chapter XII
+ -- Bilbo Baggins, "The Hobbit" by J.R.R. Tolkien, Chapter XII
%
"A dirty mind is a joy forever."
--- Randy Kunkee
+ -- Randy Kunkee
%
"You can't teach seven foot."
--- Frank Layton, Utah Jazz basketball coach, when asked why he had recruited
+ -- Frank Layton, Utah Jazz basketball coach, when asked why he had recruited
a seven-foot tall auto mechanic
%
"A car is just a big purse on wheels."
--- Johanna Reynolds
+ -- Johanna Reynolds
%
"History is a tool used by politicians to justify their intentions."
--- Ted Koppel
+ -- Ted Koppel
%
"Gozer the Gozerian: As the duly appointed representative of the city,
county and state of New York, I hereby order you to cease all supernatural
activities at once and proceed immediately to your place of origin or
the nearest parallel dimension, whichever is nearest."
--- Ray (Dan Akyroyd), _Ghostbusters_
+ -- Ray (Dan Akyroyd), _Ghostbusters_
%
It must be remembered that there is nothing more difficult to plan, more
doubtful of success, nor more dangerous to manage, than the creation of a
new system. For the initiator has the enmity of all who would profit by
the preservation of the old institutions and merely lukewarm defenders in
those who would gain by the new ones.
--- Machiavelli
+ -- Machiavelli
%
God grant me the senility to accept the things I cannot change,
The frustration to try to change things I cannot affect,
should have done. Calculate that one rebellion in 13 states in the course
of 11 years, is but one for each state in a century and a half. No country
should be so long without one.
--- Thomas Jefferson in letter to James Madison, 20 December 1787
+ -- Thomas Jefferson in letter to James Madison, 20 December 1787
%
"Nine years of ballet, asshole."
--- Shelly Long, to the bad guy after making a jump over a gorge that he
- couldn't quite, in "Outrageous Fortune"
+ -- Shelly Long, to the bad guy after making a jump over a gorge that he
+ couldn't quite, in "Outrageous Fortune"
%
You are in a maze of UUCP connections, all alike.
%
broadcast networks have covered them. As you are probably the only person
to have heard the news on the radio, be sure to post as soon as you can.
--- Brad Templeton, _Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette_
+ -- Brad Templeton, _Emily Postnews Answers Your Questions on Netiquette_
%
What did Mickey Mouse get for Christmas?
It's always sad when the fleas leave, because that means your dog is dead.
-- Wesley T. Williams
%
+It's always sad when the fleas leave, because that means your dog is dead.
+ -- Wesley T. Williams
+%
projects / fortune-mod / commitdiff