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Simone de Beauvoir: Truth rewarded me
“I tore myself away from the safe comfort of certainties through my love for truth — and truth rewarded me.” —Simone de Beauvoir.
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Richard Hamming: Little acorns
“The great scientists often make this error. They fail to continue to plant the little acorns from which the mighty oak trees grow. They try to get the big thing right off. And that isn’t the way things go.”— Richard Hamming.
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Bob Dylan: Money swears
“Money doesn’t talk, it swears.” —Bob Dylan.
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Kahlil Gibran: Radiations of their personalities
“The lights of stars that were extinguished ages ago still reach us. So it is with great men who died centuries ago, but still reach us with the radiations of their personalities.” —Kahlil Gibran.
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Richard J Daley: Disorderly police
“The police are not here to create disorder, they’re here to preserve disorder.” -– Richard J. Daley.
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Rich Hickey: It’s about thinking
“Programming is not about typing, it’s about thinking.” — Rich Hickey.
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Benjamin Franklin: Be always at war
“Be always at war with your vices, at peace with your neighbours, and let each new year find you a better man.” —Benjamin Franklin.
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Umberto Eco: Fear prophets
“Fear prophets and those prepared to die for the truth, for as a rule they make many others die with them, often before them, at times instead of them.” —-Umberto Eco.
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Max Eastman: In favor of the status quo
“People who demand neutrality in any situation are usually not neutral but in favor of the status quo.” —-Max Eastman.
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J R R Tolkien: Round the corner
“Still round the corner there may wait, / a new road or a secret gate.” —-J.R.R. Tolkien.
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Isaac Asimov: Morals
“Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what’s right.” —Isaac Asimov.
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James Clear: Habits
“Habits do not restrict freedom. They create it. In fact, the people who don’t have their habits handled are often the ones with the least amount of freedom. Without good financial habits, you will always be struggling for the next dollar. Without good health habits, you will always seem to be short on energy. Without…
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Peter Kaufman: Patience
“Patience is a product of confidence and trust.” —Peter Kaufman.
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William Gass: I write because I hate
‘If someone asks me, “Why do you write?” I can reply by pointing out that it is a very dumb question. Nevertheless, there is an answer. I write because I hate. A lot. Hard. And if someone asks me the inevitable next dumb question, “Why do you write the way you do?” I must answer…
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Karen Lamb: A year from now
“A year from now, you will wish you had started today.” — Karen Lamb.
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Pablo Casals: Perfect technique
“The most perfect technique is that which is not noticed at all.” —Pablo Casals.
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Rose Franken: Silly real lovers
“Anyone can be passionate, but it takes real lovers to be silly.” —Rose Franken.
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Steve Allen: Absence of prayers
“If you pray for rain long enough, it eventually does fall. If you pray for floodwaters to abate, they eventually do. The same happens in the absence of prayers.” — Steve Allen.
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P J O’Rourke: Smart and stupid people
“Smart people don’t start many bar fights. But stupid people don’t build many hydrogen bombs.” —P J O’Rourke.
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John Cleese: Being right
“The trouble is that most people want to be right. The very best people, however, want to know if they’re right.” — John Cleese.
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Peter Medawar: Respect
“A scientist who wishes to keep his friends and not add to the number of his enemies must not be forever scoffing and criticizing and so earn a reputation for habitual disbelief; but he owes it to his profession not to acquiesce in or appear to condone folly, superstition, or demonstrably unsound belief. The recognition…
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Peter Medawar: Deceit
“A scientist who habitually deceives himself is well on the way toward deceiving others.” —Peter Medawar.
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Richard Feynman: Easiest person to fool
“The first principle is that you must not fool yourself—and you are the easiest person to fool.” —Richard Feynman.
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Peter Medawar: Groundless
“There is no certain way of telling in advance if the daydreams of a life dedicated to the pursuit of truth will carry a novice through the frustration of seeing experiments fail and of making the dismaying discovery that some of one’s favourite ideas are groundless.” —Peter Medawar.
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Andrea Wulf: Republic of freedom
“Nature itself was a republic of freedom.” —Andrea Wulf.
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Yousuf Karsh: Lonely great men
“I’ve also seen that great men are often lonely. This is understandable, because they have built such high standards for themselves that they often feel alone. But that same loneliness is part of their ability to create.” —-Yousuf Karsh.
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Aesop: Thieves and public office
“We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.” —Aesop.
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Muhammad Ali: Rude to the waiter
“I don’t trust anyone who’s nice to me but rude to the waiter. Because they would treat me the same way if I were in that position.” —Muhammad Ali.
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Russell Brand: Inequality
“When I was poor and complained about inequality they said I was bitter; now that I’m rich and I complain about inequality they say I’m a hypocrite. I’m beginning to think they just don’t want to talk about inequality.” —Russell Brand.
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Jeff Weiner: Best products
“Almost without exception, the best products are developed by teams with desire to solve a problem; not a company’s need to fulfil a strategy.” —Jeff Weiner.
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Trent Johnson: Next level of disruption
“If you focus only on diversity numbers, you might get people to join your team, but if they don’t feel included, they’ll leave. I personally believe inclusion is the next level of disruption.”— Trent Johnson.
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Jean-Michel Basquiat: Artistic space, musical time
“Art is how we decorate space, music is how we decorate time.” —Jean-Michel Basquiat.
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Rebecca West: If there is a God
“If there is a God, I don’t think He would demand that anyone bow down or stand up to him.” —Rebecca West.
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John F Kennedy: Conformity
“Conformity is the jailer of freedom and the enemy of growth.” – John F. Kennedy.
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Susanne Langer: New questions, new knowledge
“If we would have new knowledge, we must get us a whole world of new questions.” —Susanne Langer.
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Phil Ochs: World of hunger in vengeance
“And the evil is done in hopes that evil surrenders / But the deeds of the devil are burned too deep in the embers / And a world of hunger in vengeance will always remember.” —Phil Ochs.
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Colleen Hoover: Best outcomes
“Sometimes the hardest decisions a person can make will most likely lead to the best outcomes.” — Colleen Hoover.
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Vincent Van Gogh: I must still have hope
“Many people seem to think it foolish, even superstitious, to believe that the world could still change for the better. And it is true that in winter it is sometimes so bitingly cold that one is tempted to say, ‘What do I care if there is a summer; its warmth is no help to me…
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Bill Bullard: Opinion
“Opinion is really the lowest form of human knowledge. It requires no accountability, no understanding. The highest form of knowledge… is empathy, for it requires us to suspend our egos and live in another’s world. It requires profound purpose larger than the self kind of understanding.” —Bill Bullard.
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Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Judging
“We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, while others judge us by what we have already done.” —Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
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Margaret Mead: Someone to wonder where you are
“One of the oldest human needs is having someone to wonder where you are when you don’t come home at night.” —Margaret Mead.
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Joyce Wheeler: Leave alone and pause
“Sometimes it’s better to leave something alone, to pause, and that’s very true of programming.” ––Joyce Wheeler.
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Muriel Rukeyser: Made of stories
“The universe is made of stories, not of atoms.” —Muriel Rukeyser.
