Memorable quotes
Some of my favorite quotes:
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it." — Jorge Santayana
"Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster." — Friedrich Nietsche
"You have enemies? Good. That means you have stood up for something!" — Winston Churchill
"The probability of random chemical processes coming together to generate life, he said, was as likely as a tornado blowing through a junkyard and assembling a jumbo jet by chance." - in:"Life on the Edge: The Coming of Age of Quantum Biology" by Johnjoe Mcfadden, Jim Al-Khalili
"By socialism’s twilight the only classes that took ideology at face value were professional Party activists and dissidents. They were an overwhelming minority. Everyone else eked out a daily life in the holes and crevices of the creaking machinery of power." - in: "Mastering the Art of Soviet Cooking" by Anya Von Bremzen
"Tremendous interest in the superficial is very characteristic of cultures in decline." — Martin Amis
"A government that is big enough to give you everything you want, is big enough to take everything from you." — Gerald Ford
"Civilizations die from suicide, not murder." — Arnold Toynbee
"If we know anything it is that weakness is provocative." — Donald Rumsfeld
"Nature has made up her mind that what cannot defend itself shall not be defended." — Ralph Waldo Emerson
"What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence." — Christopher Hitchens
"We sleep safe in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm." — George Orwell
"An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last." — Winston Churchill
"Politics today has become a religion. Republicans are hunting for converts. Democrats are hunting for heretics." — author unknown
"If you think you can experience the power of the Internet on a 1-inch screen, you've got to be out of your mind." — Martin Cooper (inventor of cell phone)
"If the rest of the world likes Americans only when we're dying, the rest of the world can go to hell." — James Taranto
"Give a person a fish and you feed him for a day; teach that person to use the Internet and he won't bother you for weeks." — author unknown
"Some people change their ways when they see the light, most when they feel the heat." — Caroline Schroeder
"Always tell the truth. That way you won't have to remember what you said." — Mark Twain
"Be mindful of the toes you step on today as they may be connected to the ass you may have to kiss tomorrow." — author unknown
"It would have been very alarming - morally, and in other ways too - if an attack of that nature, the 11 September attacks, had not aroused in us and in our governments and societies the spirit of self-defense. If that had not been one of the responses it seems to me there would have been very grave cause for concern." — Christopher Hitchens
"Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without an accordion. All you do is leave behind a lot of noisy baggage." — author unknown
"I've been struck by the inconsistency of liberals who oppose racial profiling when done by police but applaud it when done by admissions officers or employers." — John Rosenberg
"That's the thing about conspiracy theories: in a comforting sort of way, they give rise to the feeling that someone, somewhere, knows what's going on." — Glenn Reynolds
"The Ark was built by an amateur. Professionals built the Titanic" — author unknown
"Politicians are like diapers: they should be changed frequently and for the same reason." — author unknown
"One day Alice came to a fork in the road and saw a Cheshire cat in a tree. 'Which road do I take?' she asked. 'Where do you want to go?' was his response. 'I don't know,' Alice answered. 'Then,' said the cat, 'it doesn't matter.'" — Lewis Carroll
"It is difficult to make predictions, especially about the future." — Niels Bohr (?)
"If everything is under control, you're not going fast enough" — Mario Andretti
"Most players go where the puck is. I go where the puck will be." — Wayne Gretzky
"Those with engineering skills will build tomorrow's genius computers. But those with the ability to create knowledge of any kind will be the ones who are best able to extract great value from them. The way to create value in the age of genius machines will be to compile and disseminate knowledge that other people will find useful." — Ray Kurzweil
"There is no more delicate matter to take in hand, nor more dangerous to conduct, nor more doubtful of success, than to step up as a leader in the introduction of change. For he who innovates will have for his enemies all those who are well off under the existing order of things, and only lukewarm support in those who might be better off under the new." — Niccolo Machiavelli
"Technology is an inseparable part of humanity and for true progress to occur, the two must walk hand in hand, with neither one acting as servant to the other." — Michael L. Dertouzos.
"An expert is someone who knows more and more about less and less, until eventually he knows everything about nothing." — author unknown
"I have the courage to be mistaken." — Friedrich Hegel
"I have only made but one prayer in my life: 'O Lord, make my enemies ridiculous.' And it was granted." — Voltaire
"I love America, yet America is hated. I guess that makes me Bush's poodle. But I would rather be a dog in New York City than a Prince in Riyadh." — Tony Parsons