"To paraphrase the Christian Bible (Matthew 16): For what is a man profited if he shall make beaucoup bucks while transforming the planet into a cesspool."
~~ G.E. Nordell
"Let others praise ancient times; I am glad I was born in these."
~~ Ovid [43 B.C.E. – 17 or 18 C.E.]
"Computers are useless, they can only give you answers."
~~ Pablo Picasso [1881-1973]
"The pessimist sees difficulty in every opportunity ... the optimist sees opportunity in every difficulty."
~~ Sir Winston Churchill [1874-1965]
"It is not enough to have knowledge, one must also apply it. It is not enough to have wishes, one must also accomplish."
~~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe [1749-1832]
"It is well remembered that the entire universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others."
~~ John Andrew Holmes, circa 1927
"When the only tool you own is a hammer, every problem resembles a nail."
~~ Abraham Maslow [1908-70]
"Science has proven the existence of global warming. So our position is like the moment in the old tales when you smell the dragon. The only question is which way to run – run or die! Mankind must reverse global warming or die."
~~ G.E. Nordell
"Life need not be easy, provided only that it is not empty."
~~ physicist Lise Meitner [1878-1968]
"A distributed system is one that stops you from getting any work done when a machine you've never even heard of crashes."
~~ Leslie Lamport
"Just because something doesn't do what you planned it to do doesn't mean it's useless."
~~ Thomas Alva Edison [1847-1931]
"Women have not yet achieved the right to be mediocre."
~~ Anonymous
"All we know about the new economic world tells us that nations which train engineers will prevail over those which train lawyers. No nation has ever sued its way to greatness."
~~ Richard Lamm
"It is a damn poor mind indeed which can't think of at least two ways to spell any word."
~~ Andrew Jackson [1767–1845], in 1833
“We are so accustomed to the apparently rational nature of our world that we can scarcely imagine anything happening that cannot be explained by common sense.”
~~ Carl G. Jung [1875-1961], in "Man and His Symbols", 1964
“Almost every desire [that] a poor man has is a punishable offense.”
~~ Louis-Ferdinand Céline [1894-1961]
"A healthy nation is as unconscious of its nationality as a healthy man of his bones. But if you break a nation’s nationality it will think of nothing else but getting it set again."
~~ George Bernard Shaw [1856-1950]
"The decrease in the number of mature persons in the world is a shocking indictment of our civilization."
~~ Katharine White [1892-1977], in 1938
"The hard truth is that [the climate movement] has failed not because conservatives are stupid, but because liberals are cowards."
~~ Tim De Christopher
"Silence is so accurate."
~~ painter Mark Rothko [1903-70]
"Reason should direct and appetite obey."
~~ Marcus Tullius Cicero [106 B.C.E. – 43 B.C.E.]
"Virtue and riches seldom settle on one man."
~~ Niccolò Machiavelli [1469-1527]
"Enthusiasm is the fever of reason."
~~ Victor Hugo [1802-1885]
"We shape our buildings, thereafter they shape us."
~~ Sir Winston Churchill [1874-1965]
"For writers the most important question is simply, What is interesting?"
~~ Saul Bellow [1915-2005]
"Nobody likes to eat his own beef."
~~ New Mexico saying, as quoted by Tony Hillerman [1925-2008]
"Die dulci freure" (Have a nice day)
"Non illigitami carborundum" (Don't let the b*stards grind you down)
"A hero is no braver than an ordinary man, but he is brave five minutes longer."
~~ Ralph Waldo Emerson [1803-82]
"The best director is the one you don't see."
~~ movie director Billy Wilder [1906-2002]
"Join the Army, meet interesting people, kill them."
~~ comedian Steven Wright
"The arrogance of the artist is a very profound thing, and it fortifies you."
~~ James A. Michener [1907-97]
"Man is flying too fast for a world that is round. Soon he will catch up with himself in a great rear-end collision."
~~ James Thurber [1894-1961]
Bumper Stickers & T-shirts
"We have enough youth, how about a fountain of smart?"
"Make it idiot proof and someone will make a better idiot."
"Always remember you're unique, just like everyone else."
"This marriage of money and politics has produced an America of gross inequality at the top and low social mobility at the bottom ... Millions of Americans have awakened to a sobering reality: they live in a plutocracy, where they are disposable. [In an earlier era] the remedy was a popular insurgency that ignited the spark of democracy ... Democracy only works when we claim it as our own."
~~ TV journalist Bill Moyers
"It is my ambition to say in ten sentences what other men say in whole books, what other men do not say in whole books."
~~ Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche [1844-1900]
“Money talks. And writes. And publishes. And reviews. But it can't read.”
~~ Jack Woodford [1894-1971]
"I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters."
~~ Frank Lloyd Wright [1867-1959]
"This would be a cleaner, better world if mankind had been omitted from the scheme of things."
~~ S.S. Van Dine [1888-1939]
"I just made pictures I would've liked to see."
~~ movie director Billy Wilder [1906-2002]
{each set of posted quotations are then posted at the Working Minds website, alphabetical by author}
