Great Quotes III: Source and Context are Key

[Traitorfish]

Pratchett's musings on good and evil are always quite interesting. My favourite is from Carpe Jugulum:

[Granny Weatherwax:] "And sin, young man, is when you treat people as things. Including yourself. That's what sin is."
[Mightily Oats:]"It's a lot more complicated than that--"
"No it ain't. When people say things are a lot more complicated than that, they means they're getting worried that they won't like the truth. People as things, that's where it starts."
"Oh, I'm sure there are worse crimes-"
"But they starts with thinking about people as things."

 

[gay_Aleks]

Ooh, another Pratchett reader? I didn't expect any here.

 

[Arakhor]

Sir Terry Pratchett is one of the UK's most popular authors. I'd be surprised if there weren't other Pratchett readers here.

I don't tend to read his books, but I did like Mort and I recently read his Victorian action-adventure story Dodger, which was enjoyable.

 

[Borachio]

Ooh, another Pratchett reader? I didn't expect any here.

Yup. I had a cupboard full of the books until ~ 5 years ago, when I took them all down the charity shop. I kind of regret it now.

But his latest ones I borrowed from the library were decidedly not up to his usual, albeit not very high, standard.

They're mildly amusing books. It's transparent what he's doing, though.

Oh, oh, what was the last one called? Tears of the Mushroom, or something? No, that's not it. Snuff. That's it!

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

"Not believing in science is like not being sexually attracted to the sun: It's not applicable, it doesn't care, and it still works to make your modern life possible, whether you like it or not."
-Luke McKinney, 6 Ways a Creationist Textbook Sabotaged Science

 

[Borachio]

Hang on. So, believing in science is like being sexually attracted to the Sun?

No, that can't be right.

I can see what he means. But why "not being sexually attracted to the Sun"? Who is sexually attracted to the Sun?

(I can see it doesn't care one way or another.)

(I can also see why people thought the Sun was God, though. Who knows? Maybe the Sun is God. It's certainly got some of her attributes.)

 

[gay_Aleks]

Hang on. So believing in science is like being sexually attracted to the sun?

No, that can't be right.

I can see what he means. But why "not being sexually attracted to the sun"? Who is sexually attracted to the sun?

(I can see it doesn't care one way or another.)

Mister McKinney has a way with metaphors.

He doesn't understand them how they work or when you gotta cut it down.

 

[Kyriakos]

Apollo is the Sun-god (among other things; well, god of Light that is, the actual deified sun spirit was Helios), and supposedly he also looked great (his sibling was Artemis).

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Hang on. So, believing in science is like being sexually attracted to the Sun?

No, that can't be right.

It isn't because the quote does not imply that.

 

[Terxpahseyton]

"The arguments with which we justify our conduct are often dumber than our actual conduct. It is more tolerable to watch men live than to hear them spout their opinions."

-Nicolás Gómez Dávila

That is a great one.

 

[Borachio]

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Thomas Gray

 

[Borachio]

The concept of sovereignty relates to government as a whole, and not to a certain form of rule or to a political regime. Democracy can be direct or representative, real (which has never actually existed in the human history), formal (as in antiquity, or the modern Western countries), or a fiction (as in the USSR and other so-called socialist countries)

Yuri Semyonov

(writing about "Sovereign Democracy" as used in modern Russia.)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_democracy

 

[Mouthwash]

"If an expert says it can't be done, get another expert." -David Ben-Gurion

 

[onejayhawk]

Nothing is more guaranteed to make one start acting like a child than to be treated like one. ...

You can't make them—whoever your particular them is—do anything, really. Adulthood isn't an award they'll give you for being a good child. You can waste years, trying to get someone to give that respect to you, as though it were a sort of promotion or raise in pay. If only you do enough, if only you are good enough. No. You have to just—take it.

LM Bujold - A Civil Campaign

 

[Phrossack]

“In our civilization, and under our republican form of government, intelligence is so highly honored that it is rewarded by exemption from the cares of office.”

"Nothing matters."

"O proud philanthropist, your hope is vain
To get by giving what you lost by gain."

"The most intolerant advocate is he who is trying to convince himself."

-Ambrose Bierce

 

[onejayhawk]

"The most intolerant advocate is he who is trying to convince himself."

-Ambrose Bierce

I didn't know Bierce frequented this forum. Is this more widely true?

J

 

[Phrossack]

I didn't know Bierce frequented this forum. Is this more widely true?

J

What?

 

[madviking]

"In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer."

Albert Camus

 

[Borachio]

The real man smiles in trouble, gathers strength from distress, and grows brave by reflection.

Thomas Paine

 

[Thorvald of Lym]

What?

I'm guessing it's a dig at OT.

A passage from a book I quite enjoyed:

"Zuheir, have you ever wondered why we keep herds of goats in the Middle East, rather than sheep?"

Zuheir's cheek twitched in annoyance.

"It's because Middle Easterners are extremists," Omar Yussef said. "Sheep crop the grass when they eat. It grows back, and they eat some more. But goats rip out the grass at the roots to get a little more food right away. In the end, it's disastrous, because the grass that is ripped out doesn't grow back and the soil on the bare hillsides is blown away. The next year, the goats find nothing but rocks to eat."

"I'm a goat? Is that what you're saying?"

"Don't be childish. I mean that we Arabs dismiss gradual change. We're only interested in all or nothing. But if I wait until I can rip corruption out by the root, or until the government announces that justice will henceforth be upheld, I'll wait forever. If I nibble at the problem, it's a start."