Finding Solace in Favourite Quotes: Escaping Despair with Words of Wisdom

[Ivan Seeking]

Reporter: Some analysts are predicting that gasoline will hit $4 a gallon this summer.

Bush: Really, I hadn't heard that.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

“Fear is strange soil. Mainly it grows
obedience like corn, which grows in
rows and makes weeding easy. But
sometimes it grows the potatoes of
defiance, which flourish underground.”

· Terry Pratchett​

​

―​

“Oh many a peer of England brews
Livelier liquor than the Muse,
And malt does more than Milton can
To justify God's ways to man.”

· A.E. Houseman​

​

―​

“For all your days prepare
And meet them ever alike:
When you are the anvil, bear;
When you are the hammer, strike.”

· Spanish Proverb​

​

―​

“All the armies of Europe, Asia and Africa combined,
with all the treasure of the Earth in their military chest;
with a Buonaparte for a commander, could not by force,
take a drink from the Ohio, or make a track on the
Blue Ridge, in a trial of a thousand years.”

“At what point then is the approach of danger
to be expected? I answer, if it ever reach us, it must
spring up amongst us. It cannot come from abroad.
If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its
author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must
live through all time, or die by suicide.”

· Abraham Lincoln​

​

⚛​

 

[Astronuc]

The only thing worse than not knowing something, is not knowing that you don't know.

a colleague (this has to do with unforseen problems that could lead to injuries or fatalities)

Similar to "what you don't know may kill you".

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I know that Saddam poses no imminent and direct threat to the United States, or to his neighbors, that the Iraqi economy is in shambles, that the Iraqi military is a fraction of its former strength, and that in concert with the international community he can be contained until, in the way of all petty dictators, he falls away into the dustbin of history.

I know that even a successful war against Iraq will require a U.S. occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences. I know that an invasion of Iraq without a clear rationale and without strong international support will only fan the flames of the Middle East, and encourage the worst, rather than best, impulses of the Arab world, and strengthen the recruitment arm of al-Qaeda. I am not opposed to all wars. I’m opposed to dumb wars.

- Barack Obama, October, 2002
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16903253/page/2/

 

[lisab]

The only thing worse than not knowing something, is not knowing that you don't know.

a colleague (this has to do with unforseen problems that could lead to injuries or fatalities)

Similar to "what you don't know may kill you".

Reports that say something hasn't happened are interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the ones we don't know we don't know.

Donald Rumsfeld

Same idea; a lot more words.

 

[CaptainQuasar]

Reports that say something hasn't happened are interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns — the ones we don't know we don't know.

Donald Rumsfeld

Same idea; a lot more words.

LOL! I remember reading that in a little book called “Donald Rumsfeld: Zen Master Poet.”

⚛​

 

[Jame]

I don't remember the quote litterally, but Einstein once said something like that the most remarkable thing about nature is that we can actually understand it.

I have a long way to go in the world of science, but the more I learn the more amazed I am that we can make even a slightest sense out of anything. The odds seem so small to me, how come all these square laws work, why and how do the mathematical constants pi and e arise. And what is that we human beings are actually doing when we're "thinking"? If the slightest thing in nature would change it seems that nothing would work anymore.

 

[Ephratah7]

Basically anything Samuel L Jackson says.

"I'm a mushroom cloud laying mothaf***a, mothaf***a"
"I am the foot f***in masta"
"God came down from heaven and stopped these motha f***in bullets"
"you know cops tend to notice s*** like you're drivin a car drenched in f***in blood"

Some of his best work is in dialogue though, he's Jules.

Jules: Hey f*** nigga what the f*** did you just do to his towel, man?
Vince: I was dryin my hands
Jules: Well you're supposed to wash em first
Vince: Well you watched me wash em
Jules: I saw you get em wet
Vince: I was washin em, this s***'s hard to get off; maybe if I had lather I could do a better job
Jules: I used the same f***in soap you did and when I finished the towel didn't look like no god damn maxipad

Ah I love that movie

God Is Great! God Is Love! God is Good!

 

[Quincy]

"When history was written, it will say..." -- George Bush at some speech. Lol, looks like he needs to review some basic grammar.

"Gentlemen you can't fight in here, this is the War Room!" from the movie Dr. Strangelove.

"As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to be a gangster." from the movie GoodFellas

 

[morphism]

"I could never understand ethnic or national pride, because to me pride should be reserved for something you achieve or attain on your own -- not something that happens by accident of birth." - George Carlin

 

[Ivan Seeking]

[William F] Buckley and I debated Ronald Reagan and John McCain's father... and we beat Reagan so badly that day in 1978 that he was never heard from again!

~ George Will

 

[moe darklight]

"Dreams" by Poe

O! that my young life were a lasting dream!
My spirit not awakening, till the beam
Of an Eternity should bring the morrow.
Yes! tho' that long dream were of hopeless sorrow,
'Twere better than the cold reality
Of waking life, to him whose heart must be,
And hath been still, upon the lovely earth,
A chaos of deep passion, from his birth.
But should it be- that dream eternally
Continuing- as dreams have been to me
In my young boyhood- should it thus be given,
'Twere folly still to hope for higher Heaven.
For I have revell'd, when the sun was bright
I' the summer sky, in dreams of living light
And loveliness,- have left my very heart
In climes of my imagining, apart
From mine own home, with beings that have been
Of mine own thought- what more could I have seen?
'Twas once- and only once- and the wild hour
From my remembrance shall not pass- some power
Or spell had bound me- 'twas the chilly wind
Came o'er me in the night, and left behind
Its image on my spirit- or the moon
Shone on my slumbers in her lofty noon
Too coldly- or the stars- howe'er it was
That dream was as that night-wind- let it pass.

I have been happy, tho' in a dream.
I have been happy- and I love the theme:
Dreams! in their vivid coloring of life,
As in that fleeting, shadowy, misty strife
Of semblance with reality, which brings
To the delirious eye, more lovely things
Of Paradise and Love- and all our own!
Than young Hope in his sunniest hour hath known.

 

[moe darklight]

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel” — Socrates

 

[Danger]

It's been so many decades since I read this that I can't remember who said it. I believe that it was either one of the old-time scientists like Einstein or Bucky Fuller, or one of the 'Golden Age' SF writers. "Knowledge is the ultimate instrument of Mankind's survival in the universe." I always loved that one for its simplistic truth.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

Dr Wolper: I tell you Boris, that one of these days we'll look into our microscope and find ourselves staring right into God's eyes, and the first one who blinks is going to lose his testicles.

Peter O'Toole: from the film Creator.

 

[ffleming7]

"We cannot achieve perfection, but if we reach for it, then we can achieve excellence."

Patrick Awuah at a TEDGlobal conference.
http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/156

 

[mikelepore]

"The working class and the employing class have nothing in common. There can be no peace so long as hunger and want are found among millions of the working people, and the few who make up the employing class have all the good things of life. Between these two classes a struggle must go on until the workers of the world organize as a class, take possession of the means of production, and abolish the wage system."

Preamble to the Constitution of the Industrial Workers of the World, ratified in 1905

 

[moe darklight]

Praise no day until evening, no wife before cremation, no sword till tested, no maid before marriage, no ice till crossed, no ale till it's drunk.

Tend the oak if you want to live under it.

Great deeds and ill deeds often fall within each other's shadow.

Confide in one, never in two. Confide in three and the whole world knows.

Only a fool lies awake all night and broods over his problems. When morning comes he is exhausted. And his troubles are the same as before.

Old Norse sayings (from the Poetic Edda/Hávamál)

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Chris Mathews [Hardball] ~ Senator Obama, do you ever go to bed laughing at the absurdity of the events of the day?

Obama: Yes, every time I watch a cable news station.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

~ It was announced today that the Clinton's combined income of 109 million dollars was derived mainly from Bill Clinton's speaking engagements, book sales, and stud fees.
- SNL

 

[Astronuc]

How true is this?

Politicians consider a collection of platitudes a plan.

~ Elizabeth Edwards on someone's health care plan

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Robin Wright: I have covered six wars in the Middle East...

Stephen Colbert: Which one did you like best?

 

[qspeechc]

Ok, not to sound, er, insulting? but american politics? C'mon... So much for 'favourite quotes'...

 

[vincentm]

Now it is such a bizarrely improbably coincidence that anything so mindbogglingly useful [the Babel fish] could have evolved by chance that some thinkers have chosen to see it as a final and clinching proof of the non-existence of God.
The argument goes something like this: "I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
"But," says Man, "the Babel fish is a dead giveaway isn't it? It could not have evolved by chance. It proves you exist, and so therefore, by your own arguments, you don't. QED"
"Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that," and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic.
-- Douglas Adams, The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (book one of the Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy series), p 50

 

[Vosh]

If you're going to tell people the truth, you had better make them laugh, or they'll kill you. -G.B. Shaw

 

[Astronuc]

"Dignity is more important to the human spirit than wealth"

~ Jacqueline Novogratz

http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/view/id/157

Jacqueline Novogratz is pioneering new ways of tackling poverty. In her view, traditional charity rarely delivers lasting results. Her solution, outlined here through a series of revealing personal stories, is "patient capital": support for "bottom of the pyramid" businesses which the commercial market alone couldn't provide. The result: sustainable jobs, goods, services -- and dignity.

http://www.acumenfund.org/

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I had to laugh when I saw a uniquely British protest sign:

"Make Tea Not War"

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

I had to laugh when I saw a uniquely British protest sign:

"Make Tea Not War"

Wise words, unless China is involved, or the US, ungrateful cads. That was no party! Jeez it wasn't the rebellion, it was all that tea gone to waste, now steady on!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Is it true that the French make better tea than the Brits?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

The Pope's jet has the call sign "Shepherd 1"

 

[Alienjoey]

"Is there intelligent life on Earth?" -- Frank Drake, founder of SETI.

 

[Moridin]

"It is difficult to imagine a set of beliefs more suggestive of mental illness than those that lie at the heart of many of our religious traditions." - Sam Harris, The End of Faith.

"Philosophical theology is intellectual tennis without a net" - Daniel Dennett, Darwin's Dangerous Idea.

"Cheetahs give every indication of being superbly designed for something, and it should be easy enough to reverse-engineer them and work out their utility function. They appear to be well-designed to kill antelopes. The teeth, claws, eyes, nose, leg muscles, backbone and brain of a cheetah are all precisely what we should expect if God's purpose in designing cheetahs was to maximize deaths among antelopes. Conversely, if we reverse-engineer an antelope we find equally impressive evidence of design for precisely the opposite end: the survival of antelopes and starvation among cheetahs. It is as though cheetahs had been designed by one deity and antelopes by a rival deity. Alternatively, if there is only one Creator who made the tiger and the lamb, the cheetah and the gazelle, what is He playing at? Is he a sadist who enjoys spectator blood sports? Is he trying to avoid overpopulation in the mammals of Africa? Is He maneuvering to maximize David Attenborough's television ratings?

[...]

The total amount of suffering per year in the natural world is beyond all decent contemplation. During the minute it takes me to compose this sentence, thousands of animals are being eaten alive; others are running for their lives, whimpering with fear; others are being slowly devoured from within by rasping parasites; thousands of all kinds are dying of starvation, thirst and disease. It must be so. If there is ever a time of plenty. this very fact will automatically lead to an increase in population until the natural state of starvation and misery is restored. In a universe of electrons and selfish genes, blind physical forces and genetic replication, some people are going to get hurt, other people are going to get lucky, and you won't find any rhyme or reason in it, nor any justice. The universe that we observe has precisely the properties we should expect if there is, at bottom, no design, no purpose, no evil, no good, nothing but pitiless indifference." - Richard Dawkins

"Mathematics is a religion" - Kent Hovid (excellent example of creationist 'logic')

 

[SpitfireAce]

that third quote sounds like it's making a case for polytheism =), and I think it contradicts the fourth quote

 

[Astronuc]

"True friends are those, who when you make of fool of yourself, do not think that it is a permanent condition" - Irwin T. Randall

I wonder how many friends he had?

 

[LightbulbSun]

love maynard's lyrics and Robin Williams is one of the most brilliant comedians ever.

Man invented language to satisfy his deep need to complain. ~
Lily Tomlin

Reality is a crutch for people who can't cope with drugs. ~
Lily Tomlin

Egotism is the anesthetic that dulls the pain of stupidity. ~Frank Leahy

Maynard is pretty good when he doesn't get on his high horse about Buddhism or some other new age concept.


"Drugs are a crutch for people who can't cope with reality." -Me

 

[Poop-Loops]

"Drugs are a crutch for people who can't cope with reality." -Me

I'm tired, so I'm not sure if you're doing this on purpose, but you DO realize that her quote was a deliberate play on that exact quote you "came up with", right? That's the usual quote, and she made a funny out of it.

 

[LightbulbSun]

I'm tired, so I'm not sure if you're doing this on purpose, but you DO realize that her quote was a deliberate play on that exact quote you "came up with", right? That's the usual quote, and she made a funny out of it.

And I made a deliberate play on hers.

 

[moe darklight]

Reality is a crutch for people who can't cope with drugs. ~
Lily Tomlin

"Drugs are a crutch for people who can't cope with reality." -Me

I'm tired, so I'm not sure if you're doing this on purpose, but you DO realize that her quote was a deliberate play on that exact quote you "came up with", right? That's the usual quote, and she made a funny out of it.

And I made a deliberate play on hers.

"Crutches are people for people who really can't cope with drugs." — Me

there. settled?

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Polls from last week in Pa.

Amongst hunters, Clinton 56, Obama, 31.
Gun owners, Clinton, 53; Obama, 28.
Bowlers, 54-to-33.
Beer drinkers, 44-to-44.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24226233/page/6/

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

Is it true that the French make better tea than the Brits?

We've gone to war for less than that. That's the equivalent of me saying is it true that Americans are all fat and patriotic hidebound idiots.

Steady on!

Only the Chinese make better tea than the English and that's theoretical.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

We've gone to war for less than that.

Yeah, we noticed!

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Clinging to anger is like drinking poison and expecting someone else to die - Mitch Albom

 

[Astronuc]

"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm."
- Winston Churchill


In the case of George Bush, success is going from failure to failure while being totally oblivious.

 

[Schrodinger's Dog]

"Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm."
- Winston Churchill


In the case of George Bush, success is going from failure to failure while being totally oblivious.

Well that's quotable in itself.

 

[Astronuc]

Concerning the US Presidential Election of 2008 -

The American electorate is faced with a trio running for office whose ability to self-destruct would be the envy of kamikaze pilots. - Bonnie Erbe, US News & World Report

 

[Ivan Seeking]

I started to realize that green jobs means blue jobs. Green technologies need welders, pipefitters, plumbers...

-- former steel worker living in the rust belt.

 

[Texag]

Sad that I haven't seen any Groucho Marx!

"A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five."

"Behind every successful man is a woman, behind her is his wife. "

"I don't care to belong to a club that accepts people like me as members. "

"Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read. "

-Groucho Marx

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Sometimes silence is golden, and sometimes it is just yellow. - a local church sign.

 

[Ivan Seeking]

Eleanor Clift: Rupert Murdoch predicts a landslide this November.

Pat Buchanan: When was the last time that you quoted Rupert Murdoch?

 

[bassplayer142]

Money can't buy life. ~ Bob Marley spoken on his death bed to his son (Ziggy I think)