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

[Enigman]

"I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: 'O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.' And God granted it."
-Voltaire

 

[sarvesh0303]

"I am no poet, but if you think for yourselves, as I proceed, the facts will form a poem in your minds."
- Michael Faraday

 

[krash661]

My passionate sense of social justice and social responsibility has always contrasted oddly with my pronounced lack of need for direct contact with other human beings and human communities.I am truly a " lone traveler " and have never belonged to my country, my home, my friends, or even my immediate family, with my whole heart; in the face of all these ties, I have never lost a sense of distance and a need for solitude-feelings which increase with the years.One becomes sharply aware,but without regret, of the limits of mutual understanding and consonance with other people. no doubt, such a person loses some of his innocence and unconcern; on the other hand, he is largely independent of the opinions, habits, and judgments of his fellows and avoids the temptation to build his inner equilibrium upon such insecure foundations.-Albert Einstien

 

[Enigman]

$\mathcal "Omne \ ignotum \ pro \ magnifico"$
"Everything unknown passes for something splendid"
-Tacitus, Life of Agricola.

 

[Crake]

My passionate sense of social justice and social responsibility has always contrasted oddly with my pronounced lack of need for direct contact with other human beings and human communities.I am truly a " lone traveler " and have never belonged to my country, my home, my friends, or even my immediate family, with my whole heart; in the face of all these ties, I have never lost a sense of distance and a need for solitude-feelings which increase with the years.One becomes sharply aware,but without regret, of the limits of mutual understanding and consonance with other people. no doubt, such a person loses some of his innocence and unconcern; on the other hand, he is largely independent of the opinions, habits, and judgments of his fellows and avoids the temptation to build his inner equilibrium upon such insecure foundations.-Albert Einstien

Albert EinstEIN* Sorry, but I had to do this.

 

[HayleySarg]

"Causing people to suffer because you hate them is terrible, but causing people to suffer because you have forgotten how to care... that's really hard to understand."

Dr. Julian Bashir (Star Trek: Deep Space Nine)

 

[nitsuj]

Bender as he stretches out on the beach under the sun...

"Ahh sweet photons, I don't now if you're waves or particles, but you go down smooth."

 

[Enigman]

Physica forums est maximum et optimum

 

[Borg]

From a reddit thread that I ran across: What are two events in history that you never would've guessed happened around the same time?

The Guillotine stopped being the official method of execution in France the same year that MS-DOS premiered.

A later poster writes...

Historians are still arguing about which one ultimately caused more pain and suffering.

 

[Enigman]

The guillotine's use was actually advocated as it was considered more humane than using an axe or a sword (took generally more than one stroke) or hanging (took a longer time).
On a lighter note:
“There is only one cure for grey hair. It was invented by a Frenchman. It is called the guillotine.”
― P.G. Wodehouse

 

[tanzanos]

Frank Ocean — 'Don't confuse my personality with my attitude. My personality is who I am. My attitude depends on who you are.'

 

[Astronuc]

We want to live by each other's happiness, not by each other's misery.

Charles Chaplin as the Great Dictator.
(skip to 1:06)

 

[Sriki]

"Be civil to all, sociable to many, familiar with few, friend to one, enemy to none."
--- Benjamin Franklin

 

[MathJakob]

It's not really a quote, more a speech

"The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.

Recognize that the very molecules that make up your body, the atoms that construct the molecules, are traceable to the crucibles that were once the centers of high mass stars that exploded their chemically rich guts into the galaxy, enriching pristine gas clouds with the chemistry of life. For this reason, we are biologically connected to every other living thing in the world. We are chemically connected to all molecules on Earth. And we are atomically connected to all atoms in the universe. We are not figuratively, but literally stardust. It’s not that we are better than the universe, we are part of the universe. We are in the universe and the universe is in us.

The nitrogen in our DNA, the calcium in our teeth, the iron in our blood, the carbon in our apple pies were made in the interiors of collapsing stars. We are made of stardust."

Dr. Neil deGrasse Tyson

 

[mfb]

There is music based on that (and similar) speech(es).

 

[lambda90]

The fundamental cause of trouble in the world today is that the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
-- Bertrand Russell,

Are you cocksure about that?

 

[lambda90]

"The good thing about science is that it's true whether or not you believe in it.

While scientific theories can be disproved, they are never proven "true" -- there are only theories more well supported than others. This is a statement of scientism.

 

[epenguin]

Are you cocksure about that?

While scientific theories can be disproved, they are never proven "true" -- there are only theories more well supported than others. This is a statement of scientism.

Is there some subtle joke here? Is it only on my device that I can see two posts by lambda90 and that his total number of posts is 0? Apparently 0 ≥ 2.

Anyway what he cites us not an example of 'scientism' which is a derogatory term used to describe certain superficial ideological misapplications of the general idea of science.

 

[Borg]

Is there some subtle joke here? Is it only on my device that I can see two posts by lambda90 and that his total number of posts is 0? Apparently 0 =/> 2.

Anyway what he cites us not an example of 'scientism' which is a derogatory term used to describe certain superficial ideological misapplications of the general idea of science.

Are you forgetting that General Discussion posts don't count toward your post count?

 

[epenguin]

Are you forgetting that General Discussion posts don't count toward your post count?

I had not forgotten that because I did not know it till now. Not such a bad rule I guess, or at least understandable. creep creep

 

[epenguin]

Have we had this one already?

La pensée ne doit jamais se soumettre, ni à un dogme, ni à un parti, ni à une passion, ni à un intérêt, ni à une idée préconçue, ni à quoi que ce soit, si ce n'est aux faits eux-mêmes, parce que, pour elle, se soumettre, ce serait cesser d'être.

Thought must never submit itself, neither to a dogma, nor to a party, nor to a passion, nor to an interest, nor to a preconceived idea, nor to anything whatever, other than to facts themselves, because, for it, to submit would be to cease to be.

Henri Poincaré

 

[JayJohn85]

"The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success." Bruce Feirstein

 

[lisab]

"The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success." Bruce Feirstein

Reminded me of another quote about distance:

Civilization is the distance that man has placed between himself and his own excreta.

-Brian W. Aldiss

 

[Nikitin]

An open mind is like a fortress with its gates un-barred and its walls unguarded

Guard yourselves against the liberal.

 

[OmCheeto]

A closed mind is like a closed book; just a block of wood.

--- Chinese Proverb​

Guard yourselves from the head-shaped oaken block.

-------------------------------
blockhead (n.)
also block-head, ... 1540s (implied in blockheaded), from block (n.) + head (n.); probably originally an image of the head-shaped oaken block used by hat-makers, though the insulting sense is the older one.

 

[Enigman]

May you live in interesting times.
May you gain the attention of important people.
May you find what you are looking for.
-Three (alleged) Chinese Curses

 

[Enigman]

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for nature cannot be fooled.
-Richard Feynman
Rogers Commisission Report
(Full quote here
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Richard_Feynman#Rogers_Commission_Report_.281986.29 )
-------------
Blame Borek for getting me intrigued.

 

[epenguin]

A consolation for some likely to be found here who may sometimes feel they've missed out on stuff.

"Work is so much more fun than fun!" - Noel Coward.

 

[Enigman]

Children are wormholes. They're portals into the unreachable future and unattainable past.
-Numb3rs

 

[Enigman]

"Tiger got to hunt, bird got to fly; Man got to sit and wonder, 'Why, why, why?' Tiger got to sleep, bird got to land; Man got to tell himself he understand."
Kurt Vonnegut