Don't take life too serious. You'll never escape it alive anyway. - Elbert Hubbard

Only the wisest and the stupidest of men never change. - Confucius (551?-479? B.C.)

Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Never forget that only dead fish swim with the stream - Malcolm Muggeridge

Those who desire to give up Freedom in order to gain Security, will not have, nor do they deserve, either one. - Thomas Jefferson

I think that technologies are morally neutral until we apply them. It's only when we use them for good or for evil that they become good or evil. - William Gibson

Without order nothing can exist - without chaos nothing can evolve.

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. - John F. Kennedy

Violence as a way of achieving racial justice is both impractical and immoral. It is impractical because it is a descending spiral ending in destruction for all. The old law of an eye for an eye leaves everyone blind. It is immoral because it seeks to humiliate the opponent rather than win his understanding; it seeks to annihilate rather than convert. Violence is immoral because it thrives on hatred rather than love. It destrous community and makes brotherhood impossible. It leaves society in monologue rather than dialogue. Violence ends by defeating itself. It creates bitterness in the survivors and brutality in the destroyers. - Dr. Martin Luther King, jr.

The interpretation of dreams is the royal road to a knowledge of the unconscious activities of the mind - Freud

Nature abhors a hero. For one thing, he violates the law of conservation of energy. For another, how can it be the survival of the fittest when the fittest keeps putting himself in situations where he is most likely to be creamed? - Solomon Short

96.37% of all statistics are made up. - Kevin D. Quitt

He has read everything, and, to his credit, written nothing. - A. J. Raffles

You can only be young once, but you can be immature forever. - Larry Anderson

The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not "Eureka!" (I found it!) but "That's funny..." - Isaac Asimov

I'm not afraid of dying. I just don't want to be there when it happens. - Woody Allen

It's not easy, being green. - Kermit

History is made at night. Character is what you are in the dark. - Lord John Whorfin

The more head downwards I am, the more I keep inventing new things. - Alice, "Through the Looking Glass" by Lewis Carroll

The wise man never argues with the fool; casual observers may not be able to tell which is which.

No matter what hits the fan, it's never distributed evenly.

If you ain't the lead dog, the scenery never changes.

If we make peaceful revolution impossible, we make violent revolution inevitable. - John Kennedy

"Everything you say is boring and incomprehensible," she said, "but that alone doesn't make it true." - Kafka

Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans. - John Lennon

If you make people think they're thinking, they'll love you; but if you really make them think, they'll hate you.

Can't have everything, where would you put it? - Steven Wright Everywhere! - Anonymous

Neckties can impair blood flow to the brain and interfere with clear thinking, alertness, and judgment.

The more things change, the more they stay insane.

It's only words... unless they're true. - David Mamet

When you're swimmin' in the creek And an eel bites your cheek That's a moray - Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers

Any clod can have the facts, but having opinions is an art. - Charles McCabe, San Francisco Chronicle

An ounce of pretention is worth a pound of manure.

At this distance they couldn't hit the broad side of a ba - last words of some Southern Civil War general

A good idea doesn't care who has it, and neither should you.

I'm not cynical - just experienced.

Democracy is the worst possible political system, except for all the others.

You can lie with statistics, but not to a statistician.

To learn which questions are unanswerable, and not to answer them; this skill is most needed in times of stress and darkness. - Ursula LeGuin, The Left Hand of Darkness

I have committed the worst sin of all that a man can commit. I have not been happy. May the glaciers of oblivion drag me and mercilessly let me fall. - J. L. Borges

I don't mind anybody dropping out of anything, but it's the imposition on somebody else I don't like. The moment you start dropping out and then begging off somebody else to help you, then it's no good. - George Harrison

Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana. - Groucho Marx

To recognize that nature has neither a preference for our species nor a bias against it takes only a little courage. - James Randi

Tell us what you despise; by this are you truly known.

There is an evil tendency underlying all our technology - the tendency to do what is reasonable even when it isn't any good. - Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. - H.P. Lovecraft

Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent. - Isaac Asimov

Some say I'm a visionary, others just say I'm seeing things.

It is impossible to prepare simultanteously for war and peace and still have time for golf.

Excuse me, my karma just ran over your dogma.

I'm not under the alcafluence of inkahol that some thinkle peep I am. It's just the drunker I sit here the longer I get.

A conclusion is the place where you got tired of thinking. - Arthur Block

Nothing was ever achieved by accepting reality.

An ounce of example is worth a pound of theory.

It is a weak mind that can think of only one way to spell a word. - Mark Twain

Man will occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of the time he will pick himself up and continue on. - Winston Churchill

The world is not to be narrowed till it will go into the understanding (which has been done hitherto), but the understanding is to be expanded and opened till it can take in the image of the world. - Francis Bacon, On the Improvement of the Understanding, The Parasceve

The right to be right is irrelevant. It is the right to be wrong that makes one free.

Do not go gentle into that good night, Rage, rage against the dying of the light. - Dylan Thomas

Pereant qui ante nos nostra dixerunt! (A plague on those who said our good things before we did!) Confound those who have said our remarks before us. - Aelius Donatus

Opinion - knowledge without the hindrance of silly facts.

The road to Hell is paved with good intentions. - Karl Marx The road to nowhere's paved with plans that never quite got done. - Mark T. Shirey

Never knock on Death's door; ring the bell and run away! Death really hates that! - Dr. Mike Stratford (Matt Frewer, "Doctor, Doctor")

First, get the facts, then you can distort them at your leisure. - Mark Twain

Life is like arriving late for a movie, having to figure out what was going on without bothering everybody with a lot of questions, and then being unexpectedly called away before you find out how it ends.

Politics is comedy plus pretense. Comedy is tragedy plus time.

An ill-chosen word is the fool's messenger.

There's a certain freedom to being completely screwed. - The Freshman (movie)

Everything you know is wrong. - Firesign Theatre Everything you know is wrong - but some of it is a useful approximation!

I'm leaving early today to make up for coming in late yesterday.

I wept because I had no shoes, until I met a man who had no feet. So I took his shoes. - Dave Barry

If Christ had died in the 20th century, Catholics would be wearing little electric chairs around their necks. - Lenny Bruce

In view of the stupidity of the majority of the people, a widely held opinion is more likely to be foolish than sensible. - Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals

Fear most of all to be in error. - Kierkegaard, quoting Socrates

Cogito ergo sum (I think, therefore I am). - Rene Descartes Cogito ergo non sumo (I think, therefore I don't like pro wrestling). - Mark T. Shirey Cogito ergo spud (I think, therefore I yam). I think too much, therefore I am too much. I wonder, therefore I might be. - Baron of Greymatter Dipso ergo sum (I drink therefore I am). I rhyme, therefore iamb. - Caldwell I think not! - conceivably the last words of Rene Descartes

In times like these, it helps to recall that there have always been times like these. - Paul Harvey

'Truth' never set anyone free. It is only _doubt_ which will bring mental emancipation. - Anton LaVey, quoted by Arthur Lyons, Satan Wants You

I have read your article, Mr. Johnson, and I am no wiser now than when I started. "Possibly not, sir, but far better informed."

If you are lonely when you are alone, then you are in bad company. - Jean Paul Sartre

The mind, once expanded to the dimensions of larger ideas, never returns to its original size. - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. The mind of a bigot is like the pupil of the eye. The more light you shine on it, the more it will contract. - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Basically, the problem is this: You find yourself shot with an arrow. Do you try to find how the arrow was made, who shot it, and why? NO, you try to pull the thing out! - Buddha (paraphrased)

The man who pretends to be a modest inquirer into the truth of a self-evident thing is a knave. - William Blake

Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows. - Robert G. Ingersoll

When choosing between two evils, give preference to the council of your tummy over that of your testes. The history of mankind is full of disasters that could have been averted by a good meal, followed by a nap on the couch.

The problem about real life is that moving one's knight to QB3 may always be replied to with a lob across the net. - Alasdair Macintyre

The lesser of two evils is evil. - Seymour Leon

Concord and time, each needeth each: The ripest fruit hangs where not one But only two can reach. - William Plomer, Gloriana

Logic - The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding. - Ambrose Bierce

The U.S. Constitution has its flaws, but it's a damn sight better than what we have now!

Only our concept of time makes it possible for us to speak of the Day of Judgment by that name; in reality it is a summary court in perpetual session. - Franz Kafka

Here at First National, you're not just a number - you're two numbers, a dash, three more numbers, another dash, and another number. - Saturday Night Live

Men and women can never be friends because the sex thing always gets in the way. - Billy Crystal as Harry Burns, When Harry Met Sally (movie)

A man said to the universe, "Sir, I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me a sense of obligation." - Stephen Crane

Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us. - Calvin and Hobbs

A man's grammar, like Caesar's wife, must not only be pure, but above suspicion of impurity. - Edgar Allan Poe

Here lies a Technophobe, no whimper, no blast. A life's goal accomplished, zero risk at last.

I used to think that the brain was the most wonderful organ in my body. Then I realized who was telling me this. - Emo Phillips

I have not failed, I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work. - Thomas Edison

If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about answers.

There is no indigestion worse than that which comes from having to eat your own words.

Convictions cause convicts. - Robert A. Wilson

I am ever a student of the mysteries, lest the world be as it appears.

The trouble with normal is it always gets worse. - Bruce Cockburn

If you have no reason for your opinion, change it.

I hung my honor plaque with pride on the wall above my bed I told her that I hoped it would not fall and hit my head As we ponder the plaque and how big the threat is She says, "It all depends on how big your head is." - Mark T. Shirey

Faithfulness is a social not a biological law.

A truly moral life requires a great deal of luck. - Tracey Ullman

Man is ready to die for an idea, provided that idea is not clear to him. - Paul Eldridge

Do not suffer the company of fools. - Buddha

As Mark Twain approached his death he was seen reading the Bible, most unusual for him. Someone asked him if he was repenting as his time drew near. Twain replied, "No, I'm looking for loopholes."

Sooner or later reality bites you in the ass.

If _I_ were God, I would force everyone to take a minimal amount of science, statistics, and logic courses so that no one in _my_ universe was STUPID enough to believe in creationism, new age crap, perpetual motion machines, UFO's making crop circles, ESP, astrology, or any such nonsense. To make up for the inflexible science requirements, I would otherwise be an extraordinarily cool god who threw lots of really great parties and was generally lenient about the whole heaven/hell thing. - somebody in Usenet news

Oh no, my dear, I'm a very good man; I'm just a very bad Wizard. - The Wizard of Oz, by Frank Baum

Where there is no solution, there is no problem.

Courage is the willingness of a person to stand up for his beliefs in the face of great odds. Chutzpah is doing the same thing wearing a Mickey Mouse hat.

Don't edit reality for the sake of simplicity.

I'd rather go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company. - Mark Twain

He's suffering from Anal-Cranial Inversion!

Know what I hate most? Rhetorical questions.

I will go insane, and I WILL TAKE YOU WITH ME! - Beetlejuice (movie)

Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by stupidity.

Humility to a genius is as an extinguisher to a candle. - Shenstone

Ignorance is the mother of adventure.

Life is too short to take seriously. Life is too important to take seriously. - Corky Siegel Do not take life too seriously; you will never get out of it alive. - Elbert Hubbard He allus said, "Don't take life too serious, it ain't nohow permanent." - Walt Kelly, Pogo

Genius is talent exercised with courage. - L. Wittgenstein

If you save everything until the last minute, it only takes a minute. The sooner you start, the longer it takes.

Love between the ugly is the most beautiful love of all. - Todd Rundgren

There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like a fool. - Steven Wright

There is only one success - to be able to spend your life in your own way. - Christopher Morley

I'm like oil, crude but precious.

The best way of learning something is to take a leap into the unknown without looking back. - Yevgeny Yevtushenko

He that hath wife and children hath given hostages to fortune; for they are impediments to great enterprises, either of virtue or mischief. - Sir Francis Bacon, Of Marriage and Single Life

A nice man is a man of nasty ideas. - Jonathan Swift

Question Authority - bumper sticker Question Authority and the authorities will question you.

For every vision, there is an equal and opposite revision.

Stepping in others footsteps, doesn't bring you ahead.

If the facts do not conform to the theory, they must be disposed of.

When you steal from one author, it's plagarism. When you steal from many, it's research. - Wilson Mizner

You have just dined, and however scrupulously the slaughterhouse is concealed in the graceful distance of miles, there is complicity. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

The love you take is equal to the love you make. - The Beatles, "The End"

Forcing the issue is always worth it. - Jello Biafra

It's difficult to work in a group when you're omnipotent. - Q, "Deja Q", Star Trek:TNG

Believing presupposes understanding. - al-Ghazali

Absurdity - A statement of belief manifestly inconsistent with one's own opinion. - Ambrose Bierce

I read a book once. Green it was. - Porridge I took a course in speed reading and was able to read War and Peace in twenty minutes. It's about Russia. - Woody Allen

There is converging evidence only for 5 personality characteristics: Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness to Experience (this means intellectual curiosity, need for variety), Agreeableness, and Conscientiousness. - Ursula Hess, Department of Psychology, University of Geneva

A ship in the harbor is safe, but ships are not built for this.

Some terribly insightful quote that shakes the foundation of all your beliefs.

Any idiot can face a crisis - it's this day-to-day living that wears you out. - Chekhov

Das computenmachine is nicht fur gefingerspoken und mittengrabben. Is easy schnappen der springewerk, blowenfusen, und poppencorken mit spittzensparken. Ist nicht fur gerwerken by das dummkopfen. Das rubbernecken sightseeren keepen hands in das pockets, relaxen und watch das blinkenlights.

Judge a man not by his looks but by his actions.

We are the friends of liberty everywhere, but the guarrantors of only our own. - Thomas Jefferson

"Most people are idiots," said Wimsey, gravely, "but it isn't kind to tell them so. I expect you do tell them so."

America: Love it or change it. America: change it or lose it.

New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common. - John Locke

Never let a fool kiss you or a kiss fool you. - Joey Adams

The meek shall inherit the earth; the rest of us will escape to the stars!

This is Great-Grandpa's axe. The head has been replaced a few times, and the handle, too, but it's the oldest axe I'VE ever seen.

When you talk to God, you are called religious. When God answers back, you are called crazy.

When you come to a fork in the road, take it. - Yogi Berra

The trouble with everyone is that they generalize too much.

TLA - Three Letter Acronym TINA - This Is Not an Acronym

It's better to get mugged than to live a life of fear. - Freeman Dyson

Too many people fight for the right to say what they think, and then say too much without thinking.

If all statisticians were laid end to end, it would be a good thing.

If you cannot successfully combat words with words, and only words, your message is inferior. - Dan Holtzman

If a million people do a dumb thing, it's still a dumb thing.

Last but not least, avoid cliches like the plague. Find viable alternatives. - William Safire

Everybody lies about sex. - Lazarus Long

I do not find in orthodox Christianity one redeeming feature. - Thomas Jefferson

Experience is something you get just after you really needed it. Experience is that marvelous thing that enables you recognize a mistake when you make it again. - Franklin P. Jones Experience is the worst teacher - it always gives the test first and the instructions afterward.

Your manuscript is both good and original. But the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good. - Samuel Johnson

Ninety percent of life is just showing up. - Woody Allen

Listen, three-eyes, don't try to out-weird me; I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal. - Zaphod Beeblebrox, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (HGG)

To err is human, to moo bovine.

Think anyone will mind that I don't have a tie? - Clifford Stoll Don't worry, Cliff, at your level of abstraction, it doesn't make any difference. - Robert Morris, chief scientist, NSA

Words are flowing out like endless rain into a paper cup... - John Lennon, "Across the Universe"

And malt does more than Milton can to justify God's ways to man. - A.E. Housman

North's Law: 20% of any population fall in the lunatic fringe (on one subject or another).

jamais-vu - the feeling of being in a totally strange environment and seeing everything (including one's own body) for the first time. vuja-de - the feeling that this has never happened to you before.

Modern art is what happens when a painter stops looking at girls and persuades himself he has a better idea. - John Ciardi

Life is like a sewer: what you get out of it depends on what you put into it. - Tom Lehrer, comedian-pianist

William James used to preach the 'will to believe.' For my part, I should wish to preach the 'will to doubt.' What is wanted is not the will to believe but the will to find out, which is the exact opposite. - Bertrand Russell, Sceptical Essays, 1928

You are what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

Sagehood is nothing but sincerity. - Chou Tun-I

They call television a medium. That's because it is neither rare nor well done. - Ernie Kovacs

I'm a great housekeeper. I get divorced; I keep the house. - Zsa Zsa Gabor

An atheist is someone with no invisible means of support. - John Buchan

Never try to teach a pig to sing. You'll only waste your time, and annoy the pig. - Mark Twain Never wrestle with a pig. You'll both get dirty and the pig will love it.

Institutions are only as good as the people who are committed to them.

Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. - Martin Luther King

In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is.

He who will not reason is a bigot; he who cannot is a fool; and he who dares not is a slave. - Sir William Drummond

Die Welt ist alles, was Zerfall ist. (The world is all decaying (?)). - Peter Cash (apologies to Ludwig Wittgenstein)

If it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.

How come everybody was somebody famous in their former lifetimes? Somebody must have been Joe Schmoe. - Kevin Costner, Bull Durham (movie)

There are times when you have to choose between being human and having good taste. - Bertold Brecht

The purpose of advertising is to destroy the freedom of the market.

To distinguish the real from the unreal, one must experience them both. - S. Gorn's Compendium of Rarely Used Cliches

Religion is a defense mechanism against religious experiences. - Carl Jung

It is only with the heart that one see rightly; what is essential is invisible to the eye.

Life is a forge, and the purest metal comes from the hottest fire.

Sometimes, I think we are alone. Sometimes I think we are not. In either case, the thought is quite staggering. - R. Buckminster Fuller

You don't have to be cleverer than other people, you just have to be one day earlier. - Leo Szilard It's not know-how that counts, it's know-when. - Jerry Weinberg, www.geraldmweinberg.com

I feel like a fugitive from the law of averages. - Mauldin

The most formidable weapon against errors of every kind is reason. - Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason

Every jumbled pile of person has a thinking part that wonders what the part that isn't thinking isn't thinking of. - They Might be Giants

Never hate your enemies, it clouds your judgment. - Michael Corleone, The Godfather (movie)

"Surely you can't be serious!" I AM serious, and don't call me Shirley. - Leslie Neilsen in Airplane (movie)

"Werewolf?" There wolf, there castle. - Marty Feldman as Igor in Young Frankenstein (movie)

Walk this way. No, _this_ way, with your knees bent. - Marty Feldman as Igor in Young Frankenstein (movie)

My father owned a small piece of land... he carried it with him wherever he went. He was an idiot but I loved him. - Woody Allen, Love and Death (movie)

I've a good mind to join a club and beat you over the head with it. - Marx Brothers

A Tree is a Tree - title of King Vidor's autobiography

Oh, I don't know. We all go a little mad, sometimes. - Anthony Perkins (as Norman Bates), Psycho (movie)

"Wasn't he your superior?" "No, he was my boss." - Graham Marshall, A Shock To the System

Life's a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. - William Shakespeare, Macbeth

With God all things are possible. - Matthew 19:26, The Bible, c 71 CE When men stop believing in God, everything is permitted. - Dostoyevsky When people stop believing in God, they don't believe in nothing; they believe in anything. - G.K. Chesterton

The United States is in no sense founded upon the Christian doctrine. - George Washington

It does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods or no god. It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg. - Thomas Jefferson

I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of. My mind is my own church. - Thomas Paine

The Bible is not my book, and Christianity is not my religion. I could never give assent to the long, complicated statements of Christian dogma. - Abraham Lincoln

No absurdity is too fantastic to gain support. - Antoine Arnauld

You can lead a horse to water, but a pencil must be lead. - Stan Laurel

"Can I borrow a pencil?" Regular or unleaded? - Mark T. Shirey

Wise man once told me all the blues was was a good man feeling bad, thinking 'bout the woman he once was with. - Blind-Dog Fulton (Joe Seneca), Crossroads (movie)

I hate the goddamn system, but until someone comes along with some changes that make sense, I'll stick with it. - Clint Eastwood, Magnum Force

Naturally the common people don't want war... but after all it is the leaders of a country who determine policy, and it is always a simple matter to drag the people along... All you have to do is tell them they are being attacked, and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. - Hermann Goering, 1936

Love is the triumph of imagination over intelligence. - H.L. Mencken

Eat a live toad first thing in the morning, and nothing worse will happen to you the rest of the day.

Obeying their rules only encourages them to create new ones. Disobey as often as possible: for gain, for sport, for the art of it. - Ethan Mordden

To summarize the summary of the summary: people are a problem. - Douglas Adams, HGG

How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds Makes deeds ill done! - Shakespeare, King John, Act IV: Scene 2

I don't want to achieve immortality through my work. I want to achieve immortality through not dying. - Woody Allen

The only true law is that which leads to freedom. - Richard Bach, Jonathan Livingston Seagull

It's good to know that if I behave strangely enough, society will take full responsibility for me. - Ashleigh Brilliant

The really important problems require greater earnestness. - John Cage

From whence, then, could arise the solitary and strange conceit that the Almighty, who had millions of worlds equally dependent on His protection, should quit the care of all the rest, and come to die in our world, because, they say, one man and one woman had eaten an apple? - Thomas Paine

Another Saturday night and I ain't got no body. - A. Ghost (c/o Mark Shirey) This is dedicated to the one-eye love. - Cyclops (c/o Mark Shirey)

Did I contradict myself? Very well then, I contradict myself. - Walt Whitman

Sanity is in the mind of the beholder. - Ray Cardillo (Truck)

Everything should be as simple as possible, but no simpler. - Albert Einstein

I'm all in favor of keeping dangerous weapons out of the hands of fools. Let's start with typewriters. - Solomon Short

Where is the wisdom we lost in knowledge? Where is the knowledge we lost in information? - T.S. Eliot

The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. - Bertrand Russell

The height of cultivation runs to simplicity. Halfway cultivation runs to ornamentation. - Bruce Lee

Where it is a duty to worship the sun, it is pretty sure to be a crime to study the laws of heat. - John Morley

A fanatic is one who can't change his mind and won't change the subject. - Winston Churchill

Any noun can be verbed. - Alan Perlis

Doubt is the beginning of wisdom. - Clarence Darrow

It is good for an uneducated young man to read books of quotations. - Winston Churchill

God is on the side of the big guns. - Ney God is on the side not of the heaviest battalions, but of the best shots. - Voltaire to Ney

The direct use of physical force is so poor a solution to the problem of limited resources that it is commonly employed only by small children and great nations. - David Friedman

Triviality and certainty are the kinderkrankheiten of knowledge. - Imre Lakatos

Badges? We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you no stinking badges. - Gold Hat Bandito, often mis-quoted, from Treasure of the Sierra Madre, starring Humphrey Bogart Badges? We don't need no stinking badges. - Head Bandito, Blazing Saddles Badgers? We don't need no stinking badgers! - Weird Al Yankovic, UHF Bagpipes? They don't need no stinking bagpipes! - Central PA Festival of the Arts Program Guide '88?, Scottish band promo Bridges? Banjos? Begasse? Bagels? Baguettes? Badinage? Baggage? Bandage? Bangles? Barges? Bashes? Bastions? Bathos? Beggars?

In the midst of the word he was trying to say, In the midst of his laughter and glee, He had softly and suddenly vanished away - For the Snark _was_ a Boojum you see. - Lewis Carroll

In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy. - Ivan Illich

Argue for your limitations and, sure enough, they're yours. - Richard Bach Argue for your greatness and that too shall be yours. - Michael Sky

The truth knocks on the door and you say, "Go away, I'm looking for the truth," and so it goes away. Puzzling. - Robert Pirsig (quoted in Zen To Go by Jon Winokur) Looking for Truth is like riding an ox in search of an ox. - Chinese proverb

What the public reproaches you for - cultivate it! It's you. - Jean Cocteau

I'm too old to grow up. - Dennis Hopper as Huey Walker in Flashback (movie) The 90's are going to make the 60's look like the 50's. - Dennis Hopper as Huey Walker in Flashback (movie)

Life is complex - it has both real and imaginary parts.

The only way to turn water into wine is with a vineyard. - Mark T. Shirey

Truth happens. - James

If I am not for myself, who is for me? And when I am for myself, what am I? And if not now, when? - Hillel "The Elder", 30 BCE - 10 CE, Wisdom of the Jewish Fathers

Tug on anything in nature and you will find it connected to everything else. - John Muir Explore the fundamental interconnectedness of all things.

There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. - Shakespeare, Hamlet II:2

I'm prejudiced against bigots.

He was, of Lord Essex's opinion, 'rather to go a hundred miles to speak with one wise man, than five miles to see a fair town.' - Boswell on Samuel Johnson

I've always said, 'There's nothing an agnostic can't do if he doesn't know whether he believes in anything or not.' - Graham Chapman of Monty Python, the Bells sketch

There smites nothing so sharp nor smelleth so sour as shame. - William Langland

Make your learning a fixture; Say little and do much; And receive everyone with a friendly attitude.

There's a clear moral to this tale, now that I think about it: When you're dead, you're dead. And yet another moral occurs to me now: Make love when you can. It's good for you. - Kurt Vonnegut

Everybody was terrified of Doug; he used... SARCASM. - Monty Python

A good listener is not only popular everywhere but after a while he knows something.

In these matters the only certainty is that nothing is certain. - Pliny the Elder

All women grow up to be like their mothers; that is their tragedy. No man does, and that's his. - Oscar Wilde

Live simply so that others may simply live.

And clever rogues with far less valid cause, have trapped their victims in a web of laws. - Moliere

A society run by the media is a mediocracy.

Imagine what it would be like if TV actually were good. It would be the end of everything we know. - Marvin Minsky

Practioners of a discipline should have the discipline to practice.

The longer I live the more I see I am never wrong about anything, and that all the pains I have so humbly taken to verify my notions have only wasted my time. - George Bernard Shaw

Where there's smoke, there's smoke. - Mark T. Shirey

If out of sight means out of mind, why does absence make the heart grow fonder? If you should look before you leap, why is he who hesitates lost? - Mark T. Shirey

Hell for engineers is a place without right angles.

Half of marriages end in divorce, and the other half end in death.

Politics is not the world's oldest profession, but the results are the same.

I perceive the Universe as a single equation... and it's so simple! - Lt. Barkley, Star Trek:TNG

The mind is its own place, and in it self Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n - Lucifer (on occasion of being tossed out of Heav'n), Paradise Lost

millihelen - the amount of beauty required to launch a single ship. - Isaac Asimov, (Helen of Troy had the "face that launched 1000 ships") fig newton - the force required to accelerate a fig 39.37 inches/sec. - J. Hart

I know it's spelled 'Raymond Luxury-Yacht', but it's pronounced "Throat Warbler-Mangrove"! - Monty Python

Give a skeptic an inch and he'll measure it.

If your nose runs and your feet smell, you're built upside-down.

If you want to make it big in life, remember, take care, You must know whom to kiss, and also where... - PDQ Bach, A Little Nightmare Music

There are only two truly infinite things: the universe and stupidity. And I am unsure about the universe. - Albert Einstein

Civilization rests on two things: the discovery that fermentation produces alcohol, and the voluntary ability to inhibit defecation. - Robertson Davies, The Rebel Angels (movie)

Many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our point of view. - Obi-Wan Kenobi in Return of the Jedi (movie)

Non Sequitur Society motto: We don't have regular meetings, but we do like pizza.

He doesn't know when he's beaten, this boy. He doesn't know when he's winning, either. He doesn't have any sort of sensory apparatus known to man. - Monty Python

If I were two-faced, would I be wearing this one? - Abraham Lincoln

Ich bin ein Berliner! (I am a jelly donought!) - President Kennedy in Berlin

Einstein claimed that if he were smarter he would have been a plumber.

Given the correlation between heterosexuality and such habits as drinking beer while watching football games on Sunday afternoons, beating up on your kids, and maybe whacking the wife if she don't put out... well, I have a VERY difficult time admitting I'm straight sometimes. - Brian Siano

Trust only change. - Meg Davis, et al

Dogs come when they're called; cats take a message and get back to you.

If there's a fine line, be extra careful that you're on the right side of it. - Mark T. Shirey

We don't receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us. - Marcel Proust

You may be right - I may be crazy, but it just may be a lunatic you're looking for. - Billy Joel

A gentle answer turns away wrath, but a harsh word stirs up anger. - Proverbs 15:1, The Bible

Live in harmony with one another. Do not be proud, but be willing to associate with people of low position. Do not be conceited. Do not repay anyone evil for evil. Be careful to do what is right in the eyes of everybody. If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone... Do not take revenge... On the contrary, if your enemy is hungry, feed him; if he is thirsty, give him something to drink... Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. - Romans 12:16-21, The Bible

Neoteny is the basis of intelligence.

Time is nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once.

We have met the enemy and they are ours. - ? We have met the enemy and he is us. - Pogo

One secret of success is a sense of urgency about getting things done.

Apatheist - One who does not care if there is a supreme being.

Try and be nice to people. Avoid eating fat. Read a good book every now and then. Get some walking in. And try to live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations. - Monty Python, The Meaning of Life (movie)

A cattle rancher died and left Focus Ranch to his sons. Now Focus Ranch is where the mourning son's raise meat. - a 4-way pun

Life is suffering. - Buddha Life is difficult. - Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled

The time is always right to do right. - Martin Luther King

Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever. - Napolean Bonaparte

Statues of marble or brass will perish; and statues made in imitation of them are not the same statues... But print and reprint a thought a thousand times over, and that with materials of any kind... the thought is eternally and identically the same thought in every case. - Thomas Paine

Some see a meadow and feel wonder at the glory of a god. I feel wonder at the glory of the meadow itself, which is boundless.

Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would seem more consistent that we called it the word of a demon than the Word of God. It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind. - Thomas Paine The most detestable wickedness, the most horrid cruelties, and the greatest miseries that have afflicted the human race have had their origin in this thing called revelation, or revealed religion. It has been the most dishonorable belief against the character of the Divinity, the most destructive to morality and the peace and happiness of man that ever was propagated since man began to exist. - Thomas Paine

They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety. - Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania

The greatest possible mint of style is to make the words absolutely disappear into the thought. - Nathaniel Hawthorne

In the beginning, the Universe was created. This has made a lot of people very angry and has been widely regarded as a bad move. - Douglas Adams, HGG, Restaurant at the End of the Universe

Come now, let us reason together, says the Lord. - Isaiah 1:18, The Bible

Hydrogen - a colorless, odorless gas which, given time, turns into people.

The Electric Monk was a labour-saving device, like a dishwasher or a video recorder. Dishwashers washed tedious dishes for you,... video recorders watched tedious television for you,... Electric Monks believed things for you... - Douglas Adams, Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

If God can exist without being created, then why can't the world exist without being created?

Just remember: wherever you go, there you are. - Buckaroo Banzai, Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension

The study of theology, as it stands in the Christian churches, is the study of nothing; it is founded on nothing; it rests on no principles; it proceeds by no authority; it has no data; it can demonstrate nothing; and it admits of no conclusion. - Thomas Paine

I think you hit the nose on the head. - overheard at work Now they've changed their song and dance. - overheard at work

Look! Plain donuts, powdered donuts, ooh, even cinnamon donuts! How's THAT for freedom of choice? - Homer Simpson, The Simpsons (TV show)

Prizes bring bad luck. Academic prizes, prizes for virtue, decorations, all these inventions of the devil encourage hypocrisy and freeze the spontaneous upsurge of a free heart. - Baudelaire

If we breed like rabbits, in the long run we have we have to die like rabbits. - Carlson

People are people. Life is a universe. - Timothy Bouvia

Since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. - Romans 1:19, The Bible

Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of man will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice without constraint. - Alexander Hamilton

Justice is incidental to law and order. - J. Edgar Hoover

Reading musses up my mind. - Henry Ford

The great tragedy of science: the slaying of an original, beautiful hypothesis by an ugly fact. - Oliver W. Jones

If they give you ruled paper, write the other way.

I spent a lot of money on wine and women and like a fool I squandered the rest. - Benny Hill

Occam's Razor: Pluralitas non est ponenda sine necessitate. - William of Ockham "The Myth of Occam's Razor," Thornburn, _Mind_ 27, 345-353, 1918 Non sunt multiplicanda entia sine necessitate. (Do not multiply entities without necessity) - John Ponce of Cork (1639) Entia non sunt multiplicanda, praeter necessitatem. - John Clauberg of Groningen, _Logica Vetus et Nova_, 1654 Frustra fit per plura, quod potest fieri per paucoria. - Duns Scotus (It is vain to do with more, what can be done with less). Extraordinary claims require extraordinary proof. - Gell-Mann's Law

A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeed be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear and punishment and hope of reward after death. - Albert Einstein

"Holy Macro, Tabman! The Grin Reaper is a shizofrantic infomaniac!" "Right, Robit. We must kill him before he stops again!" In next week's episode, Tabman and Robit battle the Ghost Reader. Same Tab time, same Tab channel. - Mark T. Shirey, Tabman and Robit in "I Want To Be Determined"

For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn? - Jane Austen's Mr. Bennet

I have a memory like a hawk. - overheard in a store

I was so surprised when I was born that I could not talk for a year and a half.

It's better to have loved and lost than to have won and then be bossed.

If you can't do great things, you can do little things great.

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe. She hadn't any children - she knew what to do.

The chains of habit are generally too small to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.

There is no right way to do a wrong thing.

I want to share all your joys and sorrows. "But I haven't any sorrows." I mean AFTER we're married.

The greatest cause of divorce is marriage.

A bachelor is a guy who leans towards women, but not far enough to lose his balance.

Male, old enough to know better, wishes correspondence with female not quite that old.

A bachelor is a man who does not make the same mistake once.

Keep your eyes wide open before you're married and half-closed afterwards.

Life is one fool thing after another. Love is two fool things after each other.

Wanted: 25-year-old with 40 years experience.

Had I known I'd live this long, I would've taken better care of myself.

To entertain some people, all you have to do is listen.

Be yourself, but don't overdo it.

I am the Lord and there is none else, there is no God beside me: I girded thee, though thou hast not known me... I form light and create darkness: I make peace and create evil: I the Lord do all these things. - Isaiah 45:5-7, The Bible

You evil witches... "Yes, we can!" I hear you can foretell the future. - I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again (BBC radio comedy)

It would be thought a hard government that should tax its people one tenth part. - Benjamin Franklin

A bigot delights in public ridicule, for he begins to think he is a martyr. - Sydney Smith

In Germany they came first for the Communists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Communist. Then they came for the Jews, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a Jew. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I didn't speak up because I wasn't a trade unionist. Then they came for the Catholics, and I didn't speak up because I was a Protestant. Then they came for me, and by that time no one was left to speak up. - Martin Niemoller

A consultant is an ordinary person a long way from home.

Eschew obfuscation, ponderous verbosity, sesquipedalianism, archaisms, and neologisms!

Life's too short to drink cheap beer. Drink better, drink less. - Randy the Bartender

Is God willing to prevent evil, but not able? Then he is impotent. Is he able, but not willing? Then he is malevolent. - David Hume

Information is the key to power and the key to prevent power abuse. In the knowledge lies the power. - Edward Feigenbaum

Tis distance lends enchantment to the view, And robes the mountain in its azure hue. - Campbell

Tis pleasant, sure, to see one's name in print; A book's a book, although there's nothing in't. - Lord Byron

A company is known by the people it keeps.

Quick to judge Quick to anger Slow to understand Ignorance and prejudice And fear Walk hand in hand - Neil Peart (RUSH)

A good book is the precious life-blood of a master spirit, embalmed and treasured up on purpose to a life beyond life. - Milton

A man should be greater than some of his parts.

A poet begins in delight and ends in wisdom. - Robert Frost

Question with boldness even the existence of God; because if there be one, He must more approve of the homage of reason, than of the blindfold of fear. - Thomas Jefferson

"Fire at will!" Poor Will! - John K. Shirey (from WWII/CBI)

"Can I help?" A hundred years or so from now, a novelist will write a classic on that theme. He'll recommend those words over "I love you." - Kirk, Star Trek, The Guardian of Forever

In every revolution there's one man with a vision. - Kirk, Star Trek, Mirror, Mirror

They seem to be bisexual - reproducing at will. - McCoy, Star Trek, The Trouble With Tribbles

There is something about the underhanded use of power that makes it seem so shrewd, even when it is abysmally stupid. - Thomas Sowell

You can bury the hatchet, but you'll always remember where it's buried.

It is difficult beyond description to conceive that space can have no end; but it is more difficult to conceive an end. It is difficult beyond the power of man to conceive an eternal duration of what we call time; but it is more impossible to conceive a time when there shall be no time. - Thomas Paine

Counter-argument to the Golden Rule ("Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"): A fundamentalist Christian might say, "Since I now know about the salvation of Christ, if I was in your state of wretched unbelief and you were a Christian, I'd want YOU to do everything in your power to convert ME."

God is not dead, he is merely unemployed. - Walt Kelly, Pogo

There's a very fine line between a groove and a rut, a fine line between eccentrics and people who are just plain nuts. - Christine Lavin

The biggest break anyone ever gets is being born in the first place! And they don't see what a good deal it is until they realize they ain't gonna be stuck with it forever. - Porky Pine

Yippee! That may have been a small one for Neil, but it was a big one for me. - Pete Conrad, on the moon

Graffiti in a subway (re: Fermat's Last Theorem): I've just developed a proof that demonstrates that, where n>2, the equation (a^n) + (b^n) = c^n cannot be solved with integers. Unfortunately, my train is coming.

Being in a minority, even a minority of one, does not make one insane. - Winston Smith in "1984" by George Orwell

Anyone who thinks they can explain away any inconsistency in the Bible is begging to be cold-cocked by facts like the following. 2 Samuel 8:4 says that David took 700 horsemen from Hadadezer. Telling the same story, 1 Chronicles 18:4 says David took 7000 horsemen from Hadadezer. 2 Samuel 28:8 says Joshebbasshebeth once killed 800 men. Telling the same story, 1 Chronicles 11:11 says it was 300 men. Etc.

Seek not, my soul, the life of the immortals; but enjoy to the full the resources that are within thy reach. - Pindar (518-438 CE)

How good is man's life, the mere living! How fit to employ all the heart and the soul and the senses forever in joy! - Robert Browning, 1855

A man's life of any worth is a continuous allegory. - Keats

The very purpose of existence is to reconcile the glowing opinion we hold of ourselves with the appalling things that other people think about us. - Quentin Crisp

A physicist is an atom's way of knowing about atoms. - George Wald

Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. - Arthur C. Clarke Any sufficiently undocumented computer program is indistinguishable from magic. Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.

The only good is knowledge and the only evil ignorance. - Socrates

When choosing between two evils, I always like to try the one I've never tried before. - Mae West

What a wonderful day we've had. You have learned something, and I have learned something. Too bad we didn't learn it sooner, we could have gone to the movies instead. - Balki Bartokomous, Perfect Strangers (TV show)

I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam; I looked into the soul of the guy next to me. - Woody Allen

Rule #1: Don't sweat the small stuff. Rule #2: It's all small stuff.

Pick battles big enough to matter; small enough to win. - Jonathan Kozol

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers. - Pablo Picasso

More than any time in history mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness, the other to total extinction. Let us pray that we have the wisdom to choose correctly. - Woody Allen

I hate quotations. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Whenever he thought about it, he felt terrible. And so, at last, he came to a fateful decision. He decided not to think about it.

Arthur Dent: You know, it's at times like this, when I'm stuck in a Vogon air lock with a man from Betelgeuse, about to die of ashpyxiation in deep space, that I really wish I'd listened to what my mother told me when I was young. Ford Prefect: Why? What did she tell you? Arthur: I don't know - I didn't listen! - Douglas Adams, HGG

Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not; it is the first lesson that ought to be learned; and however early a man's training begins, it is probably the last lesson that he learns thoroughly. - Thomas Huxley

Decide what you want; decide what you are willing to exchange for it. Establish your priorities and go to work. - H.L. Hunt

The purpose of life is a life of purpose. - Robert Byrne

Lack of money is the root of all evil. - George Bernard Shaw

A friend is a gift you give yourself. - Robert Louis Stevenson

Happiness is having a large, loving, caring, close-knit family in another city. - George Burns

We are here and it is now. Further than that, all knowledge is moonshine. - H.L. Mencken (1880-1956)

Sometimes I sits and thinks and sometimes I just sits. - Pennsylvania Dutch (Deutsch) saying

If every word were recorded, then every word would count and everyone would be accountable. - Mark T. Shirey

Ah! I see you have the machine that goes 'BING!'. - Monty Python

The economy and the environment are not closed systems. - Mark T. Shirey

Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness. - Thomas Paine

There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy. - Shakespeare, Hamlet I,v,166 The universe is not only queerer than we imagine, it is queerer than we CAN imagine. - misattributed to Jean Paul Sartre Now, my suspicion is that the universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we _can_ suppose... I suspect that there are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of, in any philosophy. That is the reason why I have no philosophy myself, and must be my excuse for dreaming. - John B.S. Haldane (1892-1964), Possible Worlds, 1927

There's a seeker born every minute.

When in danger, or in doubt Run in circles, scream and shout - Robert A. Heinlein

It has yet to be shown that intelligence has any survival value. - Arthur C. Clarke

If people did not sometimes do silly things, nothing intelligent would ever get done. - Wittgenstein

Did you hear about the dyslexic agnostic insomniac? He stays up all night wondering if there's a dog.

I put in an application to the optimists club, but I don't think they're going to accept it.

I don't have problems; I have puzzles. - Mark T. Shirey

I will not be punched, stamped, filed, indexed, briefed, debriefed, or numbered! - The Prisoner

"I think you're indecisive and argumentative." Well, I'm not sure about the "indecisive" part, but I must take issue with "argumentative"!

How is it that we know so little, given that we have so much information? - Noam Chomsky

If we only wanted to be happy, it would be easy; but we want to be happier than other people, and that is almost always difficult, since we think them happier than they are. - Montesquieu

There's lies, damn lies, and statistics. - Mark Twain

If God thought that nudity was okay, we would have been born naked.

By the time a man reads women like a book he's too old to collect a library.

Give up sainthood, renounce wisdom, and it will be a hundred times better for everyone. - Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching #19

Thank you for sharing that at me.

Reality is what refuses to go away when you stop believing in it. - Philip K. Dick

I don't have a drinking problem; I drink, I get drunk, I fall down. No problem.

And what can I get for you today sir? Truth? Oh, I _am_ sorry sir, but we haven't carried that for ever so long. There was never any call for it. Perhaps we can interest you in some points-of-view?

He who speaks does not know. He who knows does not speak. - Lao Tsu

In pursuit of learning, every day something is acquired. In pursuit of Tao, every day something is dropped. - Lao Tsu

Yield and overcome; Bend and be straight; Empty and be full; Wear out and be new; Have a little and gain; Have much and be confused. - Lao Tsu

Knowing others is wisdom; knowing the self is enlightenment. Mastering others requires force; mastering the self needs strength. - Lao Tsu

Fame or self: which matters more? Self or wealth: which is more precious? Gain or loss: which is more painful? - Lao Tsu

If the phone rings at 3 A.M., the last voice you want to hear is that of a loved one. But when you're IN love, that's the FIRST voice you want to hear. - Marilyn vos Savant, Parade Magazine

Is he a tough guy? "Pretty tough." What will he do? "Understand, probably." Boy, that IS tough. - Robert Redford, Three Days of the Condor (movie)

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. - T.S. Elliot

O wad some Power the giftie gie us To see oursels as ithers see us! It wad frae monie a blunder free us, An' foolish notion: What airs of dress an' gait wad lae'e us, An' ev'n devotion! - Robert Burns, "To a Louse"

I sing the body electric, The armies of those I love engirth me and I engirth them They will not let me off till I go with them, respond to them, And discorrupt them, and charge them full with the charge of the soul. - Walt Whitman, "I Sing the Body Electric"

If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be called research. - Argonne, Atlas by Ayne Rand Research is what I'm doing when I don't know what I'm doing. - Werner von Braun

Being white, male, and straight does not automatically make me racist, sexist, or homophobic.

"Can you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here," asked Alice. "That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the cat. - Lewis Carroll (Charles Dodgson) "Alice in Wonderland"

Forewarned is forearmed.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness. That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and happiness. - Thomas Jefferson

Indecision is the key to flexibility.

Champagne for my real friends, real pain for my sham friends. - Tom Waits

If anyone considers himself religious and yet does not keep a tight rein on his tongue, he deceives himself and his religion is worthless. Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world. - James 1:26-27, The Bible

Young man - Young man - Your arm's too short to box with God. - James Weldon Johnson, The Prodigal Son, _God's Trombones: Seven Negro Sermons in Verse_, 1927

If I were a good man, I'd understand the spaces between friends. - Roger Waters

Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Anyone can be bought or killed - anyone.

It's not so much an afterlife as an apres vie. - Arthur Dent, HGG

I believe in everything - nothing is sacred, I believe in nothing - everything is sacred! - The Chink, Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, by Tom Robbins

A computer is like an Old Testament god, with a lot of rules and no mercy. - Joseph Campbell

The enemy of the good is the better. - William "Wild Bill" Donovan

I don't care if there's chemicals in it, as long as my lettuce is crisp! - Grace Slick, 1972

Evil will always triumph over good, because good is DUMB. - Dark Helmet, Space Balls (movie)

The cow is of the bovine ilk; One end is moo, the other, milk. - Ogden Nash

The dog's rule of life: If you can't eat it or screw it, then piss on it!

Enjoy the Universe - it's the only one you're likely to experience.

Everybody knows that the dice are loaded Everybody rolls with their fingers crossed Everybody knows that the war is over Everybody knows the good guys lost Everybody knows the game is fixed The poor stay poor and the rich get rich That's how it goes, and everybody knows. - Leonard Cohen, Canadian poet and singer/songwriter

Q: But I AM mortal. How can I prove it to you? Worf: Die. - Star Trek:TNG

Live long and prosper. - Spock, Star Trek (Vulcan farewell)

Infinite diversity in infinite combinations. - Spock, Star Trek (the "IDIC", a Vulcan saying)

It's not enough that I succeed. Everyone else must fail. - Atilla the Hun It's not enough that I should succeed - others should fail. - David Merrick

Men are rats. Men are fleas on rats. Men are ameobas on fleas on rats. - Frenchy, in Grease (movie)

The price of liberty is, always has been, and always will be blood: the person who is not willing to die for his liberty has already lost it to the first scoundrel who is willing to risk dying to violate that person's liberty. Are you free? - Andrew Ford

I would give the Devil benefit of the law for my own safety's sake. - Robert Bolt, A Man for All Seasons

Let there be peace on Earth and let it begin with me. - St. Francis of Asissi

There are no personal problems which cannot be solved by the suitable application of high explosives.

Le bon Dieu est dans le detail. ("The good God is in the details"). - Flaubert God is in the details. - Ludwig Mies van der Rohe, architect, after Flaubert

No one goes there - it's too crowded.

The more I study religions the more I am convinced that man never worshipped anything but himself. - Sir Richard F. Burton

To suppose that the eye with all its inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to different distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic aberration, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degrees. - Charles Darwin, The Origin of Species (quoted out of context)

The chief end of man is to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever. - opening of the Westminster Catechism

Bibamus, moriendum est. (Let's drink, death is inevitable.) - Seneca the Elder, c.55 BCE - 37 CE

Life is just a metaphor, masquerading as a simile.

Anyone who is remotely interesting is insane in some way.

Ah, this is obviously some new usage of the word 'safe' I was previously unaware of. - Arthur Dent, HGG

Everything always ends well; if it's not well by now, it's not ended by now.

He is all pine and I am apple orchard. My apple trees will never get across And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him. He only says, 'Good fences make good neighbors.' - Robert Frost

As long as capitalism and socialism exist we cannot live in peace: in the end one or the other will triumph - a funeral dirge will be sung over the Soviet Republic or over world capitalism. - Vladimir Lenin

Two can live as cheaply as one - for half as long.

Remember, all ye who falter, that the true way to exist is through purity of thought, mind, and body. Be thou worthy.

Never murder a man who is committing suicide. - Woodrow Wilson

I accept the universe. - Margaret Fuller By God, she'd better! - Thomas Carlyle

A ruthless, doctrinaire avoidance of degeneracy is a degeneracy of another sort. Getting drunk and picking up bar-ladies and writing metaphysics is a part of life. - Robert Pirsig

"I have a hunch..." "Just fly by the book, kid. You're not old enough to have hunches." - Battlestar Galactica

Be excellent to each other, and PARTY ON DUDES! - Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure

It's not my goddamn planet, y'understand, monkey-boy? - The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the Eighth Dimension (movie)

A fool and his opinion are seldom parted.

My cup's been run over. - Mark T. Shirey

Anna is my Gramma's name Now, some may find this comic: Not only is she an "anagram", she's Acrostically palindromic! - Mark T. Shirey

Experiment with alternative belief systems, enter alternative cognitive grids and, as the Zen Master said when asked the way of the Tao, "Move!"

God is a ridiculously small human concept compared to the coherent intelligence of Universe. Everything doesn't need to have a primate Alpha male in charge to be an intelligent system. - Robert A. Wilson

In the beginning, there was nothing - but nothing is unstable. And nothing borrowed nothing from nothing, within the limits of uncertainty, and became something. The rest is just math. - Prof. Kim, Macalester College, Physics

So, if we're dumb, then God is dumb... and maybe even a little ugly. - Frank Zappa, "Dumb All Over"

No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible. - Stanislaw Jerzy Lec

Why can't we fight and win, Mommy? Because they have weapons and technology. We just have love. - Ralph Bakshi, Wizards (movie)

I am too much of a skeptic to deny the possibility of anything. - Aldous Huxley

The Moral Majority is neither.

You don't have to be born again, you just need to grow up.

Don't be humble, you're not that great. - Golda Meir (1898-1978)

Do you have reservation, sir? Yes, but we've decided to eat here anyway.

It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. - Sherlock Holmes, "The Beryl Coronet" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle An exception disproves the rule. - Sherlock Holmes, "The Sign of Four" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle When a fact appears opposed to a long train of deductions, it invariably proves to be capable of bearing some other interpretation. - Sherlock Holmes, "A Study in Scarlet" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

The Seven Dwarfs had a bath and felt Happy. Happy left, so they felt Grumpy.

If you make $50,000 today, you have the same buying power as the average coal miner did in 1949, adjusted for taxes and inflation. - John Sestina, nationally recognized Certified Financial Planner, 1987

Apology - the best way to have the last word.

The lesser of two evils is still evil. - Winston Churchill

Reason and experience both forbid us to expect that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle. - George Washington Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people, It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other. - John Adams Religion and morality are the foundations of all government. Without these restraints no free government could long exist. - PA Supreme Court, 1824 Religion, morality, and knowledge are necessary to good government, the preservation of liberty, and the happiness of mankind. - US Supreme Court, 1892

In hell it is difficult to tell people from other people. - Jack Spicer

Dangling prepositions is something up with which I will not put.

Always do right. This will gratify some people and astonish the rest. - Mark Twain

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time - like tears in rain. Time to die. - Roy Batty, in Blade Runner (movie) by Ridley Scott & Philip K. Dick

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul and all your mind and all your strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. - The Bible

The human mind is too complex to understand for the human mind, or, in other words, the human mind is too simple to understand the human mind.

Q: Where do these stairs go? A: Up.

It's never too late for a happy childhood. - John Bradshaw

You have heard that it was said, 'You shall not commit adultery.' But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman lustfully has already committed adultery with her in his heart. - Jesus Christ, Matthew 5:27, The Bible, c 71 CE

Q: Is it possible to travel in time? A: Yes, but only forward and only by waiting. You can wait "faster" by traveling near the speed of light.

Women think men will change after marriage. Men think women won't. They're both wrong.

"I can prove you're not here." [Rattles off a list of places that the other person is not] "So, if you're not in any of those places, you must be somewhere else, right?" "Right." "Well, if you're somewhere else, then you can't be here!" - Abbot and Costello

I bet the main reason police keep people away from a plane crash is they don't want anybody walking in and lying down in the debris, then, when somebody comes up, act like they just woke up and go, "What was THAT?!" - Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy

Some mornings it just doesn't seem worth it to gnaw through the leather straps. - Emo Phillips

Eternity is the amount of time that it takes to know everything.

The art of living is deciding what facts are incidental and which are vital. - Sherlock Holmes

Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.

Q: What is the definition of a bachelor? A: A very selfish man who is cheating some woman out of alimony.

What if there were no such thing as hypothetical situations?

The world is a comedy for those who think and a tragedy for those who feel. - Horace Walpole

Diplomacy is to do and say the nastiest things in the nicest way. - Isaac Goldberg

I say you _are_ the Messiah, Lord! And I ought to know, I've followed a few! - Monty Python, Life of Brian (movie)

Did you go crazy all at once, or did it happen gradually? - Jake Lucas to "Ethel Merman", The Fisher King (movie)

I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races - I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of making voters or jurors of Negroes, nor of qualifying them to hold office, nor to intermarry with white people. - Abraham Lincoln, First Lincoln-Douglas Debate, 21 August 1858

Your life is in the hands of fate, chance, kings, and desperate men. - Anonymous

Consistency is not really a human trait. - Maude, Harold & Maude (movie)

Lead me not unto temptation! Just point the way - I'll find it!

'Faith' means not _wanting_ to know what is true. - Nietzsche, Der Antichrist

The rules are written so that they can get you for just about anything, if they want to. The trick is to not make them want to. Laws are felt only when the individual ocmes into conflict with them. - Susanne LaFollette

Capitalism is the unequal distribution of wealth. Socialism is the equal distribution of poverty.

Management's biggest problem is all the unemployed people on the payroll.

What men call a hero is merely a man who is seen doing what a brave man does as a matter of course. - Louis L'Amour

Simply follow nature, Rousseau declares. Sade, laughing, grimly agrees. - Camille Paglia, "Sexual Personae"

You gave your life to become the person you are right now. Was it worth it?

It's not the years, honey, it's the mileage. - Indiana Jones

Feudalism - it's your count that votes!

In ten years, computers will just be bumps in cables. - Gordon Bell, 1990ish

The only resources which will always be in short supply and therefore command high value are high intelligence, creativity, and common sense.

The quest for power and control comprises the basest longings of the human spirit, and is centered upon a lust for security via antagonism.

If you have a hero, look again. You have probably diminished yourself in some way. - Sheldon Kopp

...that one was good, that one was good, that one was good... "Wadd'ya doin?" Testing fuses... that one WAS good, that one WAS good... Could you tell me if my turn signal is working? "Sure - working, not working, working, not working..."

Either you are part of the solution or you are part of the precipitate.

I cannot conceive of a God who rewards and punishes his creatures, or has a will of the type of which we are conscious in ourselves. An individual who should survive his physical death is also beyond my comprehension...; such notions are for the fears or absurd egoism of feeble souls. - Albert Einstein

Suppose the world was only one of God's jokes, would you work any the less to make it a good joke, instead of a bad one? - George Bernard Shaw

Good palindrome: Doc, note, I dissent. A fast never prevents a fatness. I diet on cod.

Fight floccinaucinihilpillification and antidisestablishmentarianism.

When in doubt, use brute force. - Ken Thompson

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

We lay away the gleanings of our years in the edifice of our character, where nothing is ever lost. - Laura Ingalls Wilder

Kant's principle of universalizability in ethics is often alluded to by the common question: "What if everybody did it?" But to this, there is a common rejoinder: "They don't." - T.V. Morris, Bluffer's Guide to Philosophy

Only dead fish swim with the stream.

Life is filled with settling. We settle for a certain job, a certain mate, a certain home, and a certain self-image.

Mary wrote a little verse It didn't even rhyme This one's not by Mary But it's very similar. - Mark T. Shirey

I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in the forest And I - I chose the one less traveled by And that has made all the difference. - Robert Frost, from "The Road Not Taken" Two roads diverged in the forest And I - I chose to climb the nearest tree And that has made all the difference. - Anonymous, after Robert Frost

If you bought every ma and pa grocery store, you'd corner the corner market market.

Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.

Maddest of all: to see life as it is, and not as it should be. - Cervantes, Don Quixote

Most of the solutions had to do with the movement of small green pieces of paper. This is unusual, since on the whole it was not the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy. - Douglas Adams

Mary had a little lamb Her father shot it dead Now she carries it to school each day Between two hunks of bread! - Darrin Nottingham

Mary had a little sheep With the sheep she went to sleep The sheep turned out to be a ram Mary had a little lamb. - M. Thomas

I ran out of gas! I got a flat tire! I locked my keys in the car! An old friend came in from out of town! I lost my tux at the cleaners! Someone stole my car! There was an earthquake! A terrible flood! Locusts! It wasn't MY FAULT! - Jake Blues, played by John Belushi, in The Blues Brothers (movie)

Once the trust goes out of a relationship, it's no fun lying to them anymore. - Sam Malone, Cheers (TV show)

One day the price of meat went up, Which really didn't please her. Mary's having leg of lamb, The rest is in the freezer. - collected by "Uncle Jake" Rhine

Mary had a little lamb, You've heard this one before. But did you know she passed her plate, And had a little more? - collected by "Uncle Jake" Rhine

When Mary had a little lamb, The Doctor was surprised. But when Old MacDonald had a farm, The Doctor nearly died!

The problem with being middle-of-the-road is you tend to get run over! - Jason Zarin

Duct tape is like the force. It has a light side, a dark side, and it holds the universe together. - Carl Zwanzig

Suddenly, the door was kicked open, and with nostrils flaring and manes flying, wild horses dragged Sam away. - Gary Larson, The Far Side

Don't go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first. - Mark Twain

This limerick's last line doesn't rhyme And I've been thinking for quite a long time What is a word That won't sound absurd But will make this whole thing sound just great? - Mark T. Shirey, 1982

I was morose For hours and hours When they dumped manure All over the flowers. In the spring, they'll grow So pretty and sweet; It just goes to show That you aren't what you eat. - Mark T. Shirey, 1985

A man who kills another man is a murderer. A man who kills 10,000 men is a hero. - Tolstoi

I can marry anyone I please; the problem is, I don't _please_ anyone! - Groucho Marx

Heisenberg might have slept here.

If a train station is where the train stops, what's a workstation? - Roger B. Dannenberg

To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question... or is it?

Do not be angry with me if I tell you the truth. - Socrates

If I had had more time, I could have written you a shorter letter. - Blaise Pascal

I think all right-thinking people in this country are sick and tired of being told that ordinary decent people are fed up in this country with being sick and tired. I'm certainly not, and I'm sick and tired of being told that I am. - Monty Python, Matching Tie and Handkerchief (record)

Asking if a computer can think is like asking if a submarine can swim.

Kim, where Bob had had had had had had had Had had had had the teacher's O.K. (Kim, where Bob had had "had had," had had "had." "Had had" had had the teacher's "O.K.")

Purgamentum init, exit purgamentum. (Garbage in, garbage out.)

Nil significat, nil oscilat. (It don't mean a thing if it ain't got that swing.)

Kept apart these years more by a missed understanding than by the unknown distance and lost address between us. - Simran Singh

Why is the symbol for anarchy always written the same way?

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. - Abraham Lincoln

In his will will will will will will will will will will willingly. (Will is writing a will and bequeathing his dog Will to his friend Will: "In his will, Will will will Will Will. Will Will will Will willingly?")

The beliefs you now focus your attention on will create the realities that you live with, play with, best, or are beaten by. - Harry Palmer

Believe what you want, but DON'T believe it here. - John Candy, Harry Crumb (movie)

It's better to spend money like there's no tomorrow than to spend tonight like there's no money. - P.J. O'Rourke, "Modern Manners"

She offered her honor so I honored her offer, and all night I was on her and off her.

Illegitimi non carborundum. (Don't let the bastards grind you down.)

Carpei diem. (Seize the day.)

Marty had a girlfriend And he was glad to find her She has good things ahead of her And a rather nice behinder - Mark T. Shirey

And you see this ring right here, Jimmy?... That's another time when this old fellow miraculously survived some big forest fire. - Gary Larson, The Far Side

Falsifiability - a theory is not scientific unless there are conceivable instances of evidence that could disprove the hypothesis.

Para bailar La Bamba, se necesita un poco de gracia, para mi y para ti y mi patria, y arriba y arriba, por ti sere por ti sere, yo no soy marinero, soy capitan. (To dance La Bamba, a little grace is needed, for you and for me and my country, and up and up, for you I will be. I'm not a sailor, I'm the captain.) - La Bamba (old Spanish folk song)

Divorce is nature's way of saying you have too much furniture.

Here's to our wives and our girlfriends - may they never meet!

A witty saying proves nothing. - Voltaire

I feel more like I do now than I did last week.

When the student is ready, the Master will appear.

George Will's list of the three least credible remarks. 1) The check is in the mail. 2) I'm from the government and I'm here to help you. 3) Of course I'll respect you in the morning.

It is a fool's prerogative to utter truths that no one else will speak. - Shakespeare, A Midsummer Night's Dream

Time travel, by its very nature, was invented in all periods of history simultaneously. - Douglas Adams, HGG

Everyone is right. Everyone experiences what they believe. - Harry Palmer

The effect is like being hit by a slice of lemon wrapped round a large gold brick. - Douglas Adams on the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster, HGG

It's better to have a gun and not need it than to need a gun and not have it.

A woman met a man walking along the street wearing only one shoe. "Just lost a shoe?" she asked. He answered, "Nope, just found one."

Adeu! Adeus! Adiaux! Adieu! Adios! Adjψ! Ahoj! Ajuus! Ajφ! Aloha! Arrividerci! Ate' logo! Au revoir! Auf Wiedersehen! Ave! Bakia Musuri! Beannachd leibh! Bless! Ciao! Czesc! Dag! Do svidan'ya! Doei! Fare ye weill! Farvel! G^is la revido! Goodbye! Ha det bra! Hajje! Hamba gabotse! Hamba gahle! Hasta la vista! Hasta luego! Heippa! Hej dε! Hoi! Hou Doe! Hwyl! Joi Gin! Khoda hafez! Kwaheri! Kwenda Musuri! Lehitraot! Lekker bly! Ma salaama! Mar sin leibh! Mata ashita! Moj! Nδkemiin! Na shledanou! Pε gensyn! Pε gjensyn! Poka! Sakha! Sala gahle! Sayonara! Sepala gabotse! Shalom! Slan leibh! Tchao! Tchau! Tioraidh! Tot ziens! Totsiens! Tschόss! Tutaonana tena! Vasbyt! Zai Jian! - Tor Slettnes on sci.lang

Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must remain silent. - Wittgenstein

The shorter the tether, the sooner the goat starves. - Mark Peterson

We feel that even if all possible scientific questions be answered, the problems of life have still not been touched at all. Of course there is then no question left, and just this is the answer. The solution of the problem of life is seen in the vanishing of the problem. Is not this the reason why men to whom after long doubting the sense of life became clear, could not then say wherein this sense consisted? - Wittgenstein

Cynicism is the first religion. It is the means by which to discover all else, since cynicism implies skepticism. Skepticism results in examination, and examination leads to understanding. - David Carradine, The Spirit of Shaolin

Remember: "i" before "e" except after "c" and in WEIRD words like Einstein. - Mark T. Shirey

Mathematicians do it continuously, discretely, and sometimes in large numbers.

Urban legend: A philosophy final exam had but one question; "What is courage?". One student wrote "This is.", signed it, and turned it in.

Namaste means "I honor the place within you where the entire universe resides, the place within you of love and light, of peace and truth where, when you are in that place in you and I am in that place in me, there is only one of us."

Each man hides a secret pain. Share your pain and gain strength from the sharing. - Sybok, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (movie)

If I'm not careful, I'll end up talking to myself. - McCoy (to himself), Star Trek V (movie)

Perhaps "Because it is there" is not sufficient reason for climbing the mountain. - Spock to Kirk, Star Trek V (movie)

You never cease to amaze me. Nor I myself. - McCoy & Spock, Star Trek V (movie)

When I turned two I was really anxious because I'd doubled my age in a year. I thought, 'If this keeps up, by the time I'm six I'll be ninety.' [32] - Steven Wright

There is no finite line of demarcation which limits the powers of the Analytical Engine. - Ada Augusta, Countess of Lovelace, the first programmer

It's 106 miles to Chicago; we got a full tank of gas and half a pack of cigarettes; it's dark and we're wearing sunglasses. HIT IT. - Elwood Blues (Dan Ackroyd), The Blues Brothers (movie)

Drugs have taught an entire generation of American kids the metric system. - P.J. O'Rourke

Two things teach man about his whole nature: instinct and experience. Two excesses: to exclude reason, and to admit nothing but reason. - Blaise Pascal

Dangling prepositions: Daddy, what did you bring that book I didn't want to be read to out of about over in Down Under up from down below for?

You can lead a horse to water but you'll have a hell of a time drowning him.

I find it hard to sit still in one spot, and impossible to sit still in two spots. - Brother Theodore

Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar. - Sigmund Freud

This is grain... which any fool can eat, but for which the Lord intended a more divine means of consumption. Let us give praise to our Maker, and glory to His works, by learning about... beer! - Friar Tuck, Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves

"Daddy, do people _buy_ houses?" "Yes." "How do they get them home?" - true story

This is the story of the bee The little bee is never still Whose sex is very hard to see She has no time to take the pill You cannot tell the he from the she And that is why, in times like these But she can tell, and so can he There are so many sons of bees.

Song of the Open Road I think that I shall never see A billboard lovely as a tree. Perhaps, unless the billboards fall I'll never see a tree at all. - Ogden Nash

I'm very good at integral and differential calculus, I know the scientific names of beings animalculous; In short, in matters vegetable, animal, and mineral, I am the very model of a modern Major-General. - Gilbert & Sullivan, "Pirates of Penzance"

Everyone knows that dragons don't exist. But while this simplistic formulation may satisfy the layman, it does not suffice for the scientific mind. The School of Higher Neantical Nillity is in fact wholly unconcerned with what does exist. Indeed, the banality of existence has been so amply demonstrated, there is no need for us to discuss it any further here. The brilliant Cerebron, attacking the problem analytically, discovered three distinct kinds of dragon: the mythical, the chimerical, and the purely hypothetical. They were all, one might say, nonexistent, but each nonexisted in an entirely different way... - Stanislaw Lem, Cyberiad

There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. - Douglas Adams, HGG

Ozman's Laws: 1. If someone says he will do something "without fail," he won't. 2. The more people talk on the phone, the less money they make. 3. People who go to conferences are the ones who shouldn't. 4. Pizza always burns the roof of your mouth.

Laugh at your problems; everybody else does.

Think "honk" if you're a telepath. - bumpersticker

This is a test. Had this been an actual emergency, we would have fled in terror, and you would not have been informed.

If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of car payments. - Earl Wilson

Others will look to you for stability, so hide when you bite your nails.

Once... in the wilds of Afghanistan, I lost my corkscrew, and we were forced to live on nothing but food and water for days. - W. C. Fields, My Little Chickadee (movie)

A celebrity is a person who is known for his well-knownness.

Spouse - someone who'll stand by you through all the trouble you wouldn't have had if you'd stayed single.

Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm. - Publilius Syrus

Entropy isn't what it used to be.

I really hate this damned machine. I wish that they would sell it. It never does quite what I want but only what I tell it.

A new dramatist of the absurd Has a voice that will shortly be heard. I learn from my spies He's about to devise An unprintable three-letter word.

It may be that your whole purpose in life is simply to serve as a warning to others.

Afternoon - That part of the day we spend worrying about how we wasted the morning.

We ARE as gods and might as well get good at it. - Whole Earth Catalog

In America, any boy may become president and I suppose that's just one of the risks he takes. - Adlai Stevenson

They told me I was gullible... and I believed them!

Ducharme's Precept: Opportunity always knocks at the least opportune moment.

If you're not very clever you should be conciliatory. - Benjamin Disraeli

If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars. - J. Paul Getty

I think you should laugh once a day, because a day without sunshine is like... night. - Steve Martin

There was a young lady from Hyde Who ate a green apple and died. While her lover lamented The apple fermented And made cider inside her inside.

A well-adjusted person is one who makes the same mistake twice without getting nervous.

As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. - Albert Einstein

Harris's Lament: All the good ones are taken.

After his Ignoble Disgrace, Satan was being expelled from Heaven. As he passed through the Gates, he paused a moment in thought, and turned to God and said, "A new creature called Man, I hear, is soon to be created." "This is true," He replied. "He will need laws," said the Demon slyly. "What! You, his appointed Enemy for all Time! You ask for the right to make his laws?" "Oh, no!" Satan replied, "I ask only that he be allowed to make his own." It was so granted. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Too much of a good thing is WONDERFUL. - Mae West

Ninety-Ninety Rule of Project Schedules: The first ninety percent of the task takes ninety percent of the time, and the last ten percent takes the other ninety percent.

The lion and the calf shall lie down together but the calf won't get much sleep. - Woody Allen

Anarchy may not be the best form of government, but it's better than no government at all.

I do not know myself and God forbid that I should. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Miksch's Law: If a string has one end, then it has another end.

Hartley's Second Law: Never sleep with anyone crazier than yourself.

Any excuse will serve a tyrant. - Aesop

Cancel me not - for what then shall remain? Abscissas, some mantissas, modules, modes, A root or two, a torus and a node: The inverse of my verse, a null domain. - Stanislaw Lem, Cyberiad

"I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't - till I tell you. I meant 'there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'" "But glory doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice objected. "When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in a rather scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less." "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things." "The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master - that's all." - Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking Glass

Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly ninety-eight million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea. - Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Langsam's Laws: 1) Everything depends 2) Nothing is always 3) Everything is sometimes.

Nothing recedes like success. - Walter Winchell

Sometimes I worry about being a success in a mediocre world. - Lily Tomlin

While money can't buy happiness, it certainly lets you choose your own form of misery.

Economics is extremely useful as a form of employment for economists. - John Kenneth Galbraith

"Have you lived in this village all your life?" No, not yet.

Le coeur a ses raisons que la raison ne connait point. (The heart has its reasons that reason cannot know.) - Blaise Pascal

"You can't fight City Hall" is the biggest piece of propaganda City Hall ever put out.

Don't say, "They're just words," because words are all we have. - Sally Maud Robertson

A good memory does not equal pale ink.

You cannot control without being controlled.

Jesus Christ was a good teacher, but he didn't publish.

A closed mouth gathers no foot. A rolling stone gathers momentum.

We are too soon old and too late smart. - Pennsylvania Dutch saying

A wise man can see more from the bottom of a well than a fool can from a mountain top.

Adultery is the application of democracy to love. - H.L. Menchen

Jones' Motto: Friends come and go but enemies accumulate.

Affirmative Action is mediocrity's answer to Darwin.

All unhappiness is caused by _comparison_.

An idea is not responsible for the people who believe in it.

I need to add some numbers - where's the complicator? - Gretchen Joy Shirey, at age 10

Anger is one letter short of danger.

Hope is what keeps all suffering in place.

Any system that takes responsibility away from people, dehumanizes them.

If you don't know what direction to take, you haven't acknowledged where you are.

You don't have to be positive, you just have to be yourself.

Cole's Law: Thinly sliced cabbage.

Colson's Law: When you've got them by the balls, their hearts and minds will follow.

Harrison's Postulate: For every action, there is an equal and opposite criticism.

Comin's Law: People will accept your idea much more readily if you tell them Benjamin Franklin said it first.

Conversation enriches the understanding, but solitude is the soul of genius.

Crane's Law: There ain't no such thing as a free lunch. (TANSTAAFL)

Etorre's Observation: The other line moves faster.

Fools rush in where fools have been before.

For people who like that sort of thing, that is about the sort of thing they would like. - Abraham Lincoln (see "Nice Guys Finish Seventh" by Ralph Keyes) Very nice sort of place, Oxford, I should think, for people that like that sort of place. - George Bernard Shaw It's the kind of thing that people who like that kind of thing will like. - Mark T. Shirey (after Lincoln and Shaw)

Ginsberg's Theorems: 1) You can't win, 2) You can't break even, 3) You can't even quit the game.

Good leaders are scarce, so I am following myself.

Do not clog intellect's sluices with knowledge of questionable uses.

It is much easier to apologize than to get permission. - Grace Hopper It's far better to seek forgiveness than to ask permission. - Grace Hopper

For every difficult question, there is an answer that is clear and simple and wrong. - George Bernard Shaw Grossman's Misquote: Complex problems have simple, easy to understand, wrong answers.

Harver's Law: A drunken man's words are a sober man's thoughts.

Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want and deserve to get it good and hard. - H.L. Menchen

Holy Virgin who conceived without sin, let me sin without conceiving.

Your enemy might become your friend, if you allow him to be who he is.

Hoping and wishing are excuses for not doing.

Beware of all enterprises that require new clothes. - Henry David Thoreau

Horngren's Observation (generalized): The real world is a special case.

I can tell you in two words: im possible. - Samuel Goldwyn

If you and your partner always agree, one of you is unnecessary!

Q: What's brown and sticky? A: A stick.

If you do not change your beliefs your life will be like this forever. Is that good news?

If you don't have what you want, you are not committed to it 100%.

Jones' Principle: Needs are a function of what other people have.

If you have a college degree you can be absolutely sure of one thing... you have a college degree.

If you make a mistake, you should right it immediately to the best of your ability.

If you require someone to change, you require that person to lie to you.

My job is so secret, even I don't know what I'm doing.

If you stick your head in the sand, you'll get your ass kicked.

The ampersand ("&") is named after the printer named Ampers who invented it.

How many clever kleptomaniacs does it take to - Hey! Where's the lightbulb?!

The Immaculate Conception, as defined by the Catholic Church, was what happened to Mary's MOTHER, when she conceived Mary to be without sin.

It is impossible to fully enjoy procrastination unless one has plenty of work to do.

Korman's conclusion: The trouble with resisting temptation is it may never come your way again.

Law of Communications: The result of improved and enlarged communications is a vastly increased area of misunderstanding.

Learn to create, not compete.

Q: How many surrealists does it take to change a lightbulb? A1: Fish. A2: Two. One to hold the giraffe, the other to fill the bathtub with brightly colored machine tools.

Life is a journey, not a destination.

Life is like an onion: You peel off layer after layer, then you find there is nothing in it.

God is dead. - Nietzche Nietzche is dead. - God God is NOT dead. - Billy Graham Who in the hell is Billy Graham? - God

Lynch's Law: When the going gets tough, everybody leaves.

Make new friends but keep the old; one is silver and the other's gold.

If little else, the brain is an educational toy. - Tom Robbins

Only the mediocre can always be at their best. - H.L. Mencken

Q: How many Dumb Guys does it take to change a lightbulb? A: What's a lightbulb?

Most of our lives are about proving something, either to ourselves or to someone else.

We neither get better or worse as we get older, but more like ourselves.

Most of the time we don't communicate; we just take turns talking.

Perkin's Postulate: The bigger they are, the harder they hit.

My life has a superb cast but I can't figure out the plot. - Ashleigh Brilliant

O'Toole's Commentary on Murphy's Laws: Murphy was an optimist.

You will live your life to the end.

There are none so righteous as the newly converted.

A hundred years from now, no one will _care_!

Sometimes you just have to say, "What the f%$#." - Risky Business (movie)

Expenditures rise to meet income.

People concern themselves with being normal, rather than natural.

I'd rather be _right_ than happy.

May all your wishes be granted. - Ancient Chinese Curse May you live in interesting times. - Ancient Chinese Curse

You can love someone and not like the way they act.

Mistakes are often the stepping stones to failure.

You will never "have it all together." That's like trying to eat once and for all!

Peter's Placebo: An ounce of image is worth a pound of performance.

Q: Does a cow have Buddha-nature? A: Mu.

Q: What's the male equivalent of the maternity dress? A: The paternity suit.

Quantized Revision of Murphy's Law: Everything goes wrong all at once.

If you don't like the direction the river is flowing, don't jump in.

Quantum particles: the dreams that stuff is made of. - David Moser

"Polysyllabic" is. "Monosyllabic" isn't. - Mark T. Shirey, after Douglas Hofstadter

Success isn't how far you got, but the distance you traveled from where you started.

The Sausage Principle: People who love sausage and respect the law should never watch either one being made.

You must give up the way it is to have it the way you want it.

The Ultimate Law: All general statements are false (including this one).

The average woman would rather have beauty than brains because the average man can see better than he can think.

The best way to escape from your problem is to solve it.

It is easier to say what we believe than to be what we believe.

The biggest lie on the planet: "When I get what I want I'll be happy."

The biggest mistake that you can make is to believe that you are working for somebody else.

To think is to be. - Descartes To be is to do. - Nietzsche To do is to be. - Confuscius Do be do be do. - Sinatra

The biggest risk in life is not risking.

The harder I work, the luckier I get!

Sweer's Impossibility Theorem: Nothing can be both completely general and internally consistent at the same time.

You are the only teacher you will ever have.

The purpose of art is to hold the mirror up to life. Life, obviously, needs to get more sleep.

Q. How many mice does it take to screw in a lightbulb? A. Two, but they have to be very small.

One way to win is to make it ok to lose.

If your life isn't working the way you want it to, notice you're lying.

Therapists are expensive friends.

There are many things I want, but few things I need.

You get treated in life the way you _train_ others to treat you.

Hare Krishna, Hare Krisna / Krishna Krishna, Hare Hare / Hare Rama, Hare Rama / Rama Rama, Hare Hare - Hare Krishna Mantra from The Bhagavad Gita

There is no growth without discontent.

Sickness is faulty problem solving.

There is no right or wrong, only consequences.

We move towards what we picture in our mind.

There is no security between the cradle and the grave.

We're all going down the same road in different directions.

There is only one difference between a madman and me. I am not mad. - Salvador Dali

There's a fine line between love and hate. It's called marriage.

If some unemployed punk in Trenton, New Jersey, lying on a sofa with a bong, can get a cassette to make love to Elle McPherson for $19.95, this virtual reality stuff is going to make crack look like Sanka. - Dennis Miller

Things are not what they seem - they are what they are.

Those of you who think you know everything are annoying to those of us who do.

Ultimately you have no choice but to feel what you are feeling.

Vique's Law: A man without a religion is like a fish without a bicycle. A woman without a man is like a fish without a bicycle. - bumper sticker

What you are afraid to do is a clear indicator of the next thing you need to do.

What you can't communicate runs your life.

It is more shameful to distrust one's friends than to be deceived by them. - La Rochefoucauld

What you said is exactly what you intended to say.

There is no way to know before experiencing.

Whatever you are trying to avoid won't go away until you confront it.

Whatever you are willing to put up with, is exactly what you will have.

The usefulness of a meeting is inversely proportional to its attendance.

Without fools there would be no wisdom.

Words must be weighed, not counted.

Worry comes from the belief you are powerless.

You are the cause, not the effect.

You can be happy or you can be justified; you can't be both.

Fear of embarrassment can cause unexpected, even violent, reactions in people. - Mark T. Shirey

It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them. - Alfred Adler

It is much harder to find a job than to keep one. - Jules Becker

When your work speaks for itself, don't interrupt.

Use it or lose it.

You love what you find time to do.

People don't change; they only become more so. - John Bright-Holmes

Your ability to relax is in direct proportion to your ability to trust life.

Your success is measured by your ability to complete things.

I don't belong to an organized political party. I'm a Democrat. - Will Rogers

If at first you don't succeed, find out why THEN try again.

It may be better to be a live jackal than a dead lion, but it is better still to be a live lion, and usually easier. - Robert A. Heinlein

The most abstract system of philosophy is, in its method and purpose, nothing more than an extremely ingenious combination of natural sounds. - Carl G. Jung

If you don't know where you're going, you'll never get there. - Anonymous If you don't know where you're going, you'll get there - like it or not! - Mark T. Shirey If you don't know where you're going, any road will take you there. - Doug Horton

Having read "The Society of Mind" in the smallest room in my house, I was quite happy to put it behind me. - Mikhail Zeleny, paraphrasing a famous book review

The triangular wheel is not an improvement over the square wheel just because it eliminates one bump!

Quantum Mechanics is made up of little pieces of muck, held together by other pieces of muck.

Osborn's Law: Variables won't; constants aren't.

Our little systems have their day. - Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Pennington's Observation: The probability that a given program will perform to expectations is inversely proportional to the programmer's confidence in his ability to do the job.

People have one thing in common: they are all different. - Robert Zend

In nature there are no rewards or punishments; there are just consequences.

In the province of the mind, what one believes to be true either is true or becomes true. - John Lilly

In the realm of scientific observation, luck is granted only to those who are prepared. - Louis Pasteur

It does not matter how badly you paint as long as you don't paint badly like other people. - George Moore

It is against the grain of modern education to teach children to program. What fun is there in making plans, acquiring discipline in organizing thoughts, devoting attention to detail, and learning to be self-critical? - Alan Perlis

It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something. - Franklin D. Roosevelt

It is dangerous to be sincere unless you are also stupid. - George Bernard Shaw

Democracy is the recurrent suspicion that more than half of the people are right more than half the time. - E. B. White

The secret of the greatest fruitfulness and the greatest enjoyment of existence is: To live dangerously! - Nietzsche

There are three kinds of people in the world, the ones that can count and the ones that can't.

What care I how time advances; I am drinking ale today. - Edgar Allen Poe

Christopher Robin Hood steals from the rich to give to the Pooh.

If you're going to write, don't pretend to write down. It's going to be the best you can do, and it's the fact that it's the best you can do that kills you! - Dorothy Parker

There is no enemy. Anywhere. - a Fnord from the Illuminatus Trilogy

Forget chasing rainbows; it doesn't work. If you want rainbows, chase storms. - David P. Burdette, Office of the Registrar, Univ. of Florida

"Out of sight, out of mind," when translated into Russian by computer, then back again into English, became "Invisible maniac", "Blind idiot", or "Invisible, insane".

If you're against abortions, don't have one.

You know, I've thought about this very thoroughly, and have come to the conclusion that I have a tendency to over-analyze things.

Go placidly amidst the waste because part of it is yours.

Watch out where the huskies go and don't you eat that yellow snow. - Frank Zappa

Religion is for people who can't handle reality.

The weather is here, wish you were beautiful.

Life is what you make it. Just clean up after yourself.

If he was suspicious of adventuring heroes, it was because like that gentlest of dons, Quixote, they were wont to destroy useful windmills in the name of dragomachy. - John Barth, "Giles Goat-Boy, or, The Revised New Syllabus"

A top-secret government study indicates that we wouldn't be any worse off if we let the economists predict the weather and the meteorologists predict the economy. - Paul Harwitz, _Wall Street Journal_, March 19, 1980

To boost the British economy, I believe in taxing all foreigners living abroad. - Graham Chapman, Monty Python

"The point is, you see," said Ford, "that there is no point in driving yourself mad trying to stop yourself going mad. You might just as well give in and save your sanity for later." - Douglas Adams, Life, The Universe and Everything

I am not bound to win, but I am bound to be true. I am not bound to succeed, but I am bound to live up to what light I have. I must stand with anybody that stands right: Stand with him while he is right and part with him when he goes wrong. - Abraham Lincoln

The good things which belong to prosperity are to be wished, but the good things that belong to adversity are to be admired. - Francis Bacon

I never told my own religion nor scrutinized that of another. I never attempted to make a convert, nor wished to change another's creed. I am satisfied that yours must be an excellent religion to have produced a life of such exemplary virtue and correctness. For it is in our lives, and not from our words, that our religion must be judged. - Thomas Jefferson to Mrs. H. Harrison Smith, 1816

A sadist is someone who refuses to hurt a masochist.

"Mr. Churchill, you are drunk." And you, madam, are ugly, but I shall be sober in the morning.

Common methods of proof: Intimidation, Gesticulation (handwaving), "Try it; it works", Constipation (I was just sitting there and...), Blatant Assertion, Changing all the 2's to n's, Mutual Consent, Lack of a Counterexample, "It stands to reason", and Anal Extraction.

"I wish life was not so short," he thought. "Languages take such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about." - J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lost Road

All my life I've wanted to be somebody. I see now I should have been more specific. - Lily Tomlin

In the beginning, there was nothing. And God said,"Let there be Light!" And there was STILL nothing, but you could SEE IT!

Health is simply the slowest possible rate at which one can die.

There are two rules for success: First, never tell everything you know. - Roger H. Lincoln

Y'know, people often say to me, "Alexei, why are you drunk all the time?" And I say, "'Cause I can afford to be." - Alexei Sayle

I don't want to die; existence is one of my strong points!

It's hard to bargle nawdle zouss ith all these marbles in my mouth. - Weird Al Yankovic

Most of us, when all is said and done, like what we like and make up reasons for it afterwards. - Soren F. Peterson

It is well to remember, my son, that the entire population of the universe, with one trifling exception, is composed of others. - John Andrew Holmes

The average man is a stupid man. - Ed Mao Think how stupid the average person is, then realize half of them are stupider than that. - George Carlin Half of the people in the world are below average. Half of the people in the world have IQs below 100.

You can lead a gift horse to water, but you can't look him in the mouth when he drinks.

Human beings were created by water to transport it uphill.

The Earth is like a tiny grain of sand, only much, much heavier.

There are two kinds of egotists: those that admit it and the rest of us.

If it were done, when it is done, then it were well it were done quickly. - Shakespeare, Macbeth

Where were you? If I told you, you wouldn't understand... (quizzical look) I was trapped near the inner circle of fault. I don't understand. (smile) - Albert Brooks, Defending Your Life (movie)

I find that as I grow older that I love those most whom I loved first. - Thomas Jefferson

All things rest in heaven when you sleep beside a friend. - Paul Ryder

Let no man grumble when his friends fall off; instead let him go to the coffee house and take another. - Lord Byron

Doubtless, you want to be my friend. Come back on Tuesday. - Dorothy Parker

I have room for one more friend and he is everyman. - Woody Guthrie

Friendship only exists when men harmonize in their view of things human and divine. - Cicero

True friendship is a plant of slow growth. - George Washington

Friendship demands the ability to do without it. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Let the soul be assured that somewhere in the universe, it should rejoin its friend. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

I do not give lectures or a little charity. When I give, I give myself. - Walt Whitman

Quarrel with a friend and you are both wrong. - Lao Tsu

Friendships last when each friend thinks he has a slight superiority over the other. - Balzac

Memory is the enemy of friendship. - John Milton

When it becomes necessary to do a thing, the whole heart and soul should go into the measure, or not attempt it. - Thomas Paine

No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God. - George Bush

Unitarian - someone who believes that there is at most one god. Q: What do you get if you cross a Unitarian and a Jehovah's Witness? A: Someone who knocks on your door for no good reason.

Every psychic investigator of [the medium] Mrs. Piper was impressed by her simplicity and honesty. It never occurred to them that no charlatan ever achieves greatness by acting like a charlatan. No professional spy acts like a spy. No card cheat behaves at the table like a card cheat. - Martin Gardner

But he had such an honest face! Romana, you can't be a successful thief with a DIShonest face! - Dr. Who

There is no "I". Nobody's home. Ask any Buddhist.

I'd like to answer this question in two ways; first in my normal voice, and then in a silly, high-pitched whine. - Monty Python

Enthusiasm is one of the most powerful engines of success. When you do a thing, do it with all your might. Put your whole soul into it. Stamp it with your own personality. Be active, be energetic, be enthusiastic and faithful, and you will accomplish your object. Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Kisses are a better fate than wisdom.

A crisis is just the end of an illusion. - Gerald Weinberg

I am the lizard king, I can do anything - Jim Morrison

As we acquire more knowledge, things do not become more comprehensible but more mysterious. - Albert Schweitzer, "Paris Notes"

There is nothing in the marginal conditions that distinguish a mountain from a mole hill. - Kenneth Boulding

He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice. - Albert Einstein

Occasionally I believed I had thoughts of my own - who does not now and then become the victim of such delusions? - Paul Feyerabend

All is not golde that glistereth. - Becom, "Reliques of Rome", 1553 All that is gold does not glitter Not all who wander are lost The old that is strong does not wither Deep roots are not reached by the frost - J.R.R. Tolkein, Lord of the Rings

I have nothing to say and I am saying it. - John Cage, avante garde musician

They say smoking lowers your life expectancy, and frankly I think I've been expecting too much out of life.

He who breaks a thing to find out what it is has left the path of wisdom. - J.R.R. Tolkien

Of the many definitions of poetry, the simplest is still the best: "memorable speech." - W.H. Auden

Women only like me for my mind. - S.P. Morrissey

The secret is NOT MINDING. - G. Gordon Liddy on how to burn your hand with a candle to impress people, in his book, "Will" (Potter extinguishes a candle with his fingers after seeing Lawrence do it.) Potter: Ow! It damn well 'urts! Lawrence: Certainly it hurts. Potter: Well what's the trick then? Lawrence: The trick, William Potter, is not MINDING that it hurts. - Lawrence of Arabia (movie), 1962 [thanks to CGiordano@ids.net for this]

Stare. It is the way to educate your eye, and more. Stare, pry, listen, eavesdrop. Die knowing something. You are not here long. - Walker Evans

The secret of life is one thing. You stick to that and everything else don't mean nothing. "Yeah, but what's the one thing?" That's what you have to find out. - Jack Palance, City Slickers (movie)

We'll jump off that bridge when we come to it. - City Slickers We'll burn that bridge when we come to it.

To me, boxing is like a ballet, except there's no music, no choreography, and the dancers hit each other. - Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey

If God had intended for man to fly, he would have given us the brains to build airplanes.

You seem ah decent fellow. Ahd hate to keel you. - Montoya Well, you seem a decent fellow. I'd hate to die. - Wesley - Princess Bride (movie), directed by Rob Reiner

I don't have time for an algorithm, I've gotta get this program written!

See, when the GOVERNMENT spends money, it creates jobs; whereas when the money is left in the hands of TAXPAYERS, God only knows what they do with it. Bake it into pies, probably. Anything to avoid creating jobs. - Dave Barry

I would rather that a bigot thought I was a lesbian than that a lesbian thought I was a bigot. - Tovah Hollander (from Cindy Tittle Moore)

Lawyer: n. One skilled in circumventing the law. - Ambrose Bierce

Therefore thou shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Drink ye, and be drunken, and spue, and fall, and rise no more, because of the sword which I will send among you. And it shall be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then shalt thou say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Ye shall certainly drink. - Jeremiah 25:27-28, The Bible

I know what you're saying - you're saying, "Steve, when do you find time to juggle?" Well, I juggle in my _mind_. Oops. - Steve Martin

Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny. - Lazarus Long

Always listen to experts. They'll tell you what can't be done, and why. Then do it. - Lazarus Long

Pftph! - Bill the Cat

Marriage: It's not a word, it's a sentence.

You don't know what true happiness is until you're married. But then it's too late.

An unmarried man is incomplete; a married man is finished.

Every now and then when your life gets complicated and the weasels start closing in, the only cure is to load up on heinous chemicals and then drive like a bastard from Hollywood to Las Vegas... with the music at top volume and at least a pint of ether. - H.S. Thompson, "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas"

I cannot live without books. - Thomas Jefferson, 1815

You unlock this door with the key of imagination. Beyond it is another dimension: a dimension if sound, a dimension of sight, a dimension of mind. You're moving into a land of both shadow and substance, of things and ideas. You've just crossed over into... the Twilight Zone. - Rod Serling

In the common people there is no wisdom, no penetration, no power of judgment. - Marcus Cicero

For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them. - Aristotle

The great obstacle of progress is not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge.

Skepticism - the philosophical doctrine that absolute knowledge is impossible and that inquiry must be a process of doubting in order to acquire approximate or relative knowledge.

First they stole the fourth amendment. I said nothing because I don't deal drugs. Then they took the sixth amendment. I was silent because I know I'm not guilty. When they came for the second amendment, I kept quiet because I don't own a gun. Now they've come for the first amendment, and I can't say anything at all.

Many of my readers assume that I am dead and are quite surprised to find me still alive. Nevertheless this is indeed the case. - Isaac Asimov in 1979 (he died in 1992)

You don't ask a juggler which ball is his/her highest priority. Success is to do it all.

"Is this any time to make enemies?" - Voltaire, on his deathbed, on being told to renounce Satan.

Don't believe in ads. Don't believe in government. Watch yourself - everybody is trying to screw you!" - Bill Gaines, Mad Magazine, 1922-1992

The spear in the other's heart is the spear in your own; you are he. - Surak

Seek first to understand, then to be understood.

"Brevity is the soul of wit" But not, you see, the same as it. - Mark T. Shirey

NOBODY for President! Nobody's perfect! Nobody gives a damn!

It is a sin to believe evil of others, but seldom a mistake.

Shee, you guys are so unhip it's a wonder your bums don't fall off! - Zaphod Beeblebrox, in HGG by Douglas Adams

I teleported home one night With Ron and Sid and Meg Ron stole Meggie's heart away And I got Sidney's leg. - Douglas Adams

Q: How do you tell if there's a Rhino in your Refrigerator? A: Ask the elephant.

Q: How can you tell if there's a freedom fighter in your medicine cabinet? A: Contraindications. - Mark T. Shirey

Thinking is more interesting than knowing, but less interesting than looking. - Goethe

The enemies are laziness and pretentiousness. - Mark T. Shirey

Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong. - Oscar Wilde

Pick-up line: I seem to have lost my phone number, could I have yours?

Reading maketh a full man, conference a ready man, and writing an exact man. - Francis Bacon

The world is not analog; the world is digital, with an incredible number of bits. - Arthur C. Adams (not the comic-book artist)

Thou art God. - V.M. Smith, Stranger in a Strange Land, by Robert A. Heinlein I am God. - Shirley McLaine

Only the mediocre are always at their best. Stop "shoulding" all over yourself. - Stuart Smalley, Saturday Night Live

This wallpaper is killing me; one of us has got to go. - Oscar Wilde, last words

Don't let it end like this. Tell them I said something! - Pancho Villa's last words

"What should I be when I grow up?" Honest. - Robert M. Pirsig

Dying is not to be feared. It is the final comfort. As we all learn, eventually. - Robert A. Heinlein

A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read. - Mark Twain

Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored. - Aldous Huxley

The excursion is the same when you go looking for your sorrow as when you go looking for your joy. - Eudora Welty, The Wide Net

But I do not love the sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend. - Faramir, The Two Towers

You cannot depend on your eyes when your imagination is out of focus. - Mark Twain

God and I have this little understanding. I don't believe in Him and He questions my authority.

_Nature_, Mr. Allnutt, is what we are put in this world _to rise above_. - The African Queen

Lubarsky's Law of Cybernetic Entomology: There's always one more bug.

Shaw's Principle: Build a system that even a fool can use, and only a fool will want to use it.

Law of Selective Gravity: An object will fall so as to do the most damage.

Watson's Law: The reliability of machinery is inversely proportional to the number and significance of any persons watching it.

The probability of someone watching you is proportional to the stupidity of your action.

Non-Reciprocal Laws of Expectations: Negative expectations yield negative results. Positive expectations yield negative results.

Howe's Law: Everyone has a scheme that will not work.

Glib's Fourth Law of Unreliability: Investment in reliability will increase until it exceeds the probable cost of errors, or until someone insists on getting some useful work done.

Brook's Law: Adding manpower to a late project makes it later.

When you are in it up to your ears, keep your mouth shut.

Preudhomme's Law of Window Cleaning: It's on the other side.

There are two types of dirt: the dark kind, which is attracted to light objects, and the light kind, which is attracted to dark objects.

The shortest distance between two points is under construction. - Noelie Altito

Any small object that is accidentally dropped will hide under a larger object.

Pohl's law: Nothing is so good that somebody, somewhere, will not hate it. - Positive: Mistaken at the top of one's voice.

Hofstadter's Law: It always takes longer than you expect, even when you take Hofstadter's Law into account.

Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty - some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none _absolutely_ certain. - Richard P. Feynman

The bogosity in a field equals the bogosity imported from related areas, plus the bogosity generated internally, minus the bogosity expelled or otherwise disposed of. - K. Eric Drexler

Mathematicians deal with proofs of absolute certainty because they get to define completely the universe their proofs exists in. Scientists have no such luxury. - Mark Isaac

Q: Were all cooks in the Old West named "Cookie"? A: No, some were named "Bernie".

People with narrow minds usually have broad tongues.

I like your approach, now let's see your departure.

Stress - the confusion that results when the mind overrides the body's desire to choke the living shit out of some jerk who desperately needs it.

Simon says, "Don't be so suggestible."

Frisbeetarianism: The belief that when you die, your soul goes up on the roof and gets stuck.

Religious intolerance is getting to be a greater problem in this country. I understand some Unitarians were caught burning question marks on people's front lawns.

Foreign Aid - the transfer of money from poor people in rich countries to rich people in poor countries.

Have you heard about the new super-sensitive condoms? They hang around after the man leaves and talk to the woman.

Gravity is the soul of weight.

I always feel sorry for people who don't drink. When they wake up in the morning, that's the best they're going to feel all day.

Wife: "I was a fool when I married you." Husband: "Sure you were. But I was so much in love at the time that I didn't notice it."

He: Your husband is a brilliant man. I suppose he knows everything. She: Don't be silly. He doesn't even suspect.

California, n.: From Latin "calor", meaning "heat" (as in English "calorie" or Spanish "caliente"); and "fornia'" for "sexual intercourse" or "fornication." Hence: Tierra de California, "the land of hot sex." - Ed Moran

haiku's inventor must have had seven fingers on his middle hand

Q: What do you call a guy with no arms and no legs who can play 15 different musical instruments? A: Stump the band.

This limerick's signed "Anonymous" To keep the author autonomous 'Cause the rhyming scheme's bad And the scan is just sad And the punch line is really abominous - Anonymous (Ken Blackman)

'What scares you most will set you free' is what the Angel said to me... - Soft Boys

Knowing how things work is the basis for appreciation, and is thus a source of civilized delight. - William Safire

To love another person is to see the face of God. - Les Miserables

My boy, you are descended from a long line of determined, resourceful, microscopic tadpoles - champions every one. - Kurt Vonnegut, Galapagos

F$%& 'em if they can't take a joke. - J.R. 'Bob' Dobbs, Church of the Subgenius

Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by the age of eighteen. - Albert Einstein

Whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. - Luke 14:27, The Bible, c 80 CE

Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God; because many false prophets are gone out into the world. - 1 John 4:1, The Bible, c 100 CE

For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned. - Matthew 12:37, The Bible, c 71 CE

Heavier than air flying machines are impossible. - Lord Kelvin, 1900 Space travel is utter bilge. - Dr. Richard van der Riet Wolley (Astronomer Royal, 1956) The energy produced by the atom is a very poor kind of thing. Anyone who expects a source of power from the transformation of these atoms is talking moonshine. - Lord Rutherford, 1933 I estimate there is a world market for about five computers. - Thomas Watson, Head of IBM, 1943 Atmospheric nuclear tests do not seriously endanger either present or future generations. - Dr. Edward Teller, 1958

An astronomer, a physicist, a mathematician, and a chemist are hiking in Finland and see a black sheep. The astronomer says, "Gee, there are black sheep in Finland!" The physicist says, "You can't say that. All you can say is that on this mountain there is a black sheep." The mathematician shouts, "Are you crazy? All you can say is that on this slope of this mountain there is a sheep whose ONE SIDE is black!!!" To which the chemist adds, "For some period of time..."

A little girl goes into a toy store and asks the clerk, "Does Barbie come with Ken?" The clerk replies, "No, dear, Barbie comes with G.I. Joe - she fakes it with Ken."

This limerick would be quintessential Were it a little more experiential A little less haughty A little more naughty And a little less self-referential - Mark T. Shirey, 1992

Who hath no wyf [wife] he is no cokewold [cuckold]. - Chaucer, (A. 3152)

You've never had pre-marital sex if you never get married. - Mark T. Shirey

Have another day. - Armageddon, the musical

Death - to stop sinning suddenly.

A man's home is his hassle.

An anthropologist at Tulane has just come back from a field trip to New Guinea with reports of a tribe so primitive that they have Tide but not new Tide with lemon-fresh Borax. - David Letterman

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency, a great soul has simply nothing to do. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Did you hear about the atheistic solipsist? He doesn't believe in himself.

The word "politics" is derived from the word "poly", meaning "many", and the word "ticks", meaning "blood sucking parasites".

Only through a sort of deception - through allowing oneself to be persuaded - can a person feel he or she knows something.

Common sense is what tells us the Earth is flat and and the Sun goes around it.

Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours. - John Locke

North of Breckinridge, high in the Gore Range, I found myself craving an orange, But I'd not thought to pack That magnificent snack And alas! was six miles out of store range.

It has been said [by Anatole France], "it is not by amusing oneself that one learns," and, in reply, "it is _only_ by amusing oneself that one can learn." - Edward Kasner and James R. Newman

People often find it easier to be a result of the past than a cause of the future.

It has been said that man is a rational animal. All my life I have been searching for evidence which could support this. - Bertrand Russell

Man is the best computer we can put aboard a spacecraft... and the only one that can be mass produced with unskilled labor. - Wernher von Braun

It is a poor workman who blames his tools.

Never let your sense of morals prevent you from doing what is right. - Salvor Hardin, "Foundation"

It is difficult to produce a television documentary that is both incisive and probing when every twelve minutes one is interrupted by twelve dancing rabbits singing about toilet paper. - Rod Serling

Many an optimist has become rich by buying out a pessimist. A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty. - Winston Churchill

It is impossible to travel faster than light, and certainly not desirable, as one's hat keeps blowing off. - Woody Allen

Never let lack of money interfere with having fun.

I told my doctor I got all the exercise I needed being a pallbearer for all my friends who run and do exercises! - Winston Churchill

Never worry about theory as long as the machinery does what it's supposed to do. - Robert A. Heinlein

It's good to have money and the things that money can buy, but it's good too, to check up once and a while and make sure you haven't lost the things that money can't buy. - George Horace Lorimer

It's odd, and a little unsettling, to reflect upon the fact that English is the only major language in which "I" is capitalized; in many other languages "You" is capitalized and "i" is lower case. - Sydney J. Harris

It's the opinion of some that crops could be grown on the moon. Which raises the fear that it may not be long before we're paying somebody not to. - Franklin P. Jones

It took me fifteen years to discover I had no talent for writing, but I couldn't give it up because by that time I was too famous.

One, with God, is always a majority, but many a martyr has been burned at the stake while the votes were being counted. - Thomas B. Reed

Ours is a world where people don't know what they want and are willing to go through hell to get it.

Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life. - Eric Hoffer

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. - George Orwell, 1984

Never feel self-pity, the most destructive emotion there is. How awful to be caught up in the terrible squirrel cage of self. - Millicent Fenwick

People often mistakenly equate existence with need.

I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it. - Groucho Marx

Lewis's Law of Travel: The first piece of luggage out of the chute doesn't belong to anyone, ever.

Never try to outstubborn a cat. - Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love

I was part of that strange race of people aptly described as spending their lives doing things they detest to make money they don't want to buy things they don't need to impress people they dislike. - Emile Henry Gauvreay

Nature abhors a hero. For one thing, he violates the law of conservation of energy. For another, how can it be the survival of the fittest when the fittest keeps putting himself in situations where he is most likely to be creamed? - Solomon Short

Jones's First Law: Anyone who makes a significant contribution to any field of endeavor, and stays in that field long enough, becomes an obstruction to its progress, in direct proportion to the importance of their original contribution.

Just as most issues are seldom black or white, so are most good solutions seldom black or white. Beware of the solution that requires one side to be totally the loser and the other side to be totally the winner. The reason there are two sides to begin with usually is because neither side has all the facts. Therefore, when the wise mediator effects a compromise, he is not acting from political motivation. Rather, he is acting from a deep sense of respect for the whole truth. - Stephen R. Schwambach

Just because your doctor has a name for your condition doesn't mean he knows what it is. - John L. Shirey

Katz' Law: Man and nations will act rationally when all other possibilities have been exhausted.

The Whorfian Hypothesis: Language shapes the way we think, and determines what we can think about. - B. L. Whorf

Laws of Serendipity: (1) In order to discover anything, you must be looking for something. (2) If you wish to make an improved product, you must already be engaged in making an inferior one.

It's a good thing we don't get all the government we pay for.

Lazlo's Chinese Relativity Axiom: No matter how great your triumphs or how tragic your defeats - approximately one billion Chinese couldn't care less.

Measure with a micrometer. Mark with chalk. Cut with an axe.

Learn from the mistakes of others. You don't have time to make them all yourself.

Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage.

Liberty is always dangerous, but it is the safest thing we have. - Harry Emerson Fosdick

Life is like an analogy. Life is like a simile. Life is a metaphor.

It is not true that life is one damn thing after another - it's one damn thing over and over. - Edna St. Vincent Millay

It was a Roman who said it was sweet to die for one's country. The Greeks never said it was sweet to die for anything. They had no vital lies. - Edith Hamilton, "The Greek Way"

Lunatic Asylum, n.: The place where optimism most flourishes.

I used to get high on life but lately I've built up a resistance.

I've found thats it's not good to talk about your troubles. Eighty percent of the people who hear them don't care and the other twenty percent are glad you're having trouble. - Tommy LaSorda

Luck: when preparation and opportunity meet. - Pierre Trudeau

When you have spoken the word, it reigns over you. When it is unspoken, you reign over it.

You can get everything in life that you want, if you will help enough other people get what they want.

We weaken whatever we exaggerate.

You can lead a man to slaughter, but you can't make him think.

You can only have two things in life: reasons or results. Reasons don't count.

Whatever you assume to be true will become _real_ for you.

When it becomes more difficult to suffer than change, you will change.

You can observe a lot just by watchin'. - Yogi Berra

When you really take a good look at your life, success is all you've ever had.

Why can't life's big problems come when we are twenty and know everything?

Mathematicians are like Frenchmen: whatever you say to them they translate into their own language, and forthwith it is something entirely different. - Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

It would be nice if the Food and Drug Administration stopped issuing warnings about toxic substances and just gave me the names of one or two things still safe to eat. - Robert Fuoss

Maturity is only a short break in adolescence. - Jules Feiffer

Reflections on Ice-breaking: Candy is dandy but liquor is quicker. - Ogden Nash

On the Origin of Fleas: Adam had'em. - Ogden Nash

It's easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.

Measure twice, cut once.

It's kind of fun to do the impossible. - Walt Disney

It's lucky you're going so slowly, because you're going in the wrong direction.

Mayor Vincent J. 'Buddy' Cianci on the ACLU's suit to have a city nativity scene removed: They're just jealous because they don't have three wise men and a virgin in the whole organization.

Mediocrity finds safety in standardization. - Frederick Crane

People who dream impossible dreams and strive to achieve them raise man's stature a fraction of an inch in the process, whether they win or lose.

Mahatma Gandhi often changed his mind publicly. An aide once asked him how he could so freely contradict this week what he had said just last week. The great man replied that it was because this week he knew better.

Treat all rational autonomous moral agents, whether in the form of yourself or another, never as means solely, but always as ends in themselves. - Immanuel Kant, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals

Lockwood's Long Shot: The chances of getting eaten up by a lion on Main Street aren't one in a million, but once would be enough.

Loose bits sink chips.

Love does not consist in gazing at each other, but in looking together in the same direction. - Antoine de Saint-Exupery

Love is an ideal thing, marriage a real thing; a confusion of the real with the ideal never goes unpunished. - Goethe

Love thy neighbor as thyself, but choose thy neighborhood wisely. - paraphrase of Louise Beal

Progress means replacing something wrong with something more subtly wrong.

My rule is to be true rather than funny. - Bill Cosby

My theology, briefly, is that the universe was dictated but not signed. - Christopher Morley

It is impossible to make anything foolproof because fools are so ingenious. Naeser's Law: You can make it foolproof, but you can't make it damnfoolproof.

Never forget what someone says to you when they are angry.

I've known him as a man, as an adolescent and as a child - sometimes on the same day.

Never offend people with style when you can offend them with substance. - Sam Brown, The Washington Post, January 26, 1977

Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed by Thy name, Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread and forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors. Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory forever, Amen. - The Lord's Prayer, the Bible

No self-respecting fish would want to be wrapped in that kind of paper. - Mike Royko on the Chicago Sun-Times after taken over by Rupert Murdoch

Now is the time for all good men to come to. - Walt Kelly

Oh, I don't blame Congress. If I had $600 billion at my disposal, I'd be irresponsible, too. - Lichty & Wagner

Progress is made by lazy men looking for an easier way to do things. - Lazarus Long

Old age is the most unexpected of things that can happen to a man. - Trotsky, some time before getting his head caved in by an axe

schadenfreude - German for "pleasure at the misfortune of others"

One nice thing about egotists: they don't talk about other people.

There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action. - Goethe

One of life's little ironies is the fact that when you finally master a tough job, you make it look easy.

One of my less pleasant chores when I was young was to read the Bible from one end to the other. Reading the Bible straight through is at least 70 percent discipline, like learning Latin. But the good parts are, of course, simply amazing. God is an extremely uneven writer, but when He's good, nobody can touch Him. - John Gardner, NYT Book Review, Jan 1983

One of the lessons of history is that nothing is often a good thing to do and always a clever thing to say. - Will Durant

One Page Principle: A specification that will not fit on one page of 8.5 x 11 inch paper cannot be understood. - Mark Ardis

The paranoids are after me!

One reason why George Washington is held in such veneration: He never blamed his problems on the former Administration. - George O. Ludcke

It is the business of the future to be dangerous. - Hawkwind

It may be bad manners to talk with your mouth full, but it isn't too good either if you speak when your head is empty.

People who are funny and smart and return phone calls get much better press than people who are just funny and smart. - Howard Simons, The Washington Post

When the administrator feels himself to be the sole driving agency, and finds himself chiefly engaged in arousing those who are apathetic and coercing those who are antagonistic, there is something vitally wrong with the administration. - E.D. Jones, 1925

We trained hard... but it seemed that every time we were beginning to form up into teams we would be reorganized. I was to learn later in life that we tend to meet any new situation by reorganizing; and a wonderful method it can be for creating the illusion of progress while producing confusion, inefficiency, and demoralization. - Petronius Arbiter, 210 BCE

A little learning is a dangerous thing Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain And drinking largely sobers us again. - Alexander Pope, Essay on Criticism, 1711

Perfection is achieved only on the point of collapse. - C. N. Parkinson

Plato, by the way, wanted to banish all poets from his proposed Utopia because they were liars. The truth was that Plato knew philosophers couldn't compete successfully with poets. - Kilgore Trout (Philip J. Farmer), Venus on the Half Shell

On account of being a democracy and run by the people, we are the only nation in the world that has to keep a government four years, no matter what it does. - Will Rogers

Politics is like sports - you have to be smart enough to understand the game but not smart enough to lose interest.

Practical people would be more practical if they would take a little more time for dreaming. - J. P. McEvoy

Q: Do you know what the death rate around here is? A: One per person.

Remember there's an if in the middle of life.

Schizophrenia beats being alone.

You gotta be crazy, you gotta have a real need. You gotta sleep on your toes, and when you're on the street, you gotta be able to pick up the easy meat with your eyes closed. And then moving in silently, down wind and out of sight, you gotta strike when the moment is right without thinking. - Pink Floyd

I once believed in causes too I had my pointless point of view And life went on no matter who was wrong or right - Billy Joel, "Angry Young Man"

Wagner's music is better than it sounds. - Mark Twain

The trouble with leadership is that anyone who wants it shouldn't be trusted with it.

Yankee go OM! - Mark T. Shirey (or was it Allen Ginsberg?)

The Queue Principle: The longer you wait in line, the greater the likelihood that you are standing in the wrong line.

There are few people more often in the wrong than those who cannot endure to be thought so.

We are upping our standards... so up yours. - Pat Paulsen for President, 1988

There are no straight lines in space. - Albert Einstein (conceivably) There are no straight lines in space. - Woody Allen (conceivably)

There are people so addicted to exaggeration that they can't tell the truth without lying.

There are three ways to get something done: (1) Do it yourself. (2) Hire someone to do it for you. (3) Forbid your kids to do it.

There are two ways of teaching people: You can teach them how to think, or you can teach them what to think. Socrates taught people how to think; Jesus taught people what to think.

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. - George Bernard Shaw The man who follows the crowd will usually get no further than the crowd. The man who walks alone is likely to find himself in places no one has ever been. - Alan Ashley-Pitt

There has been an alarming increase in the number of things you know nothing about.

There is a saying among trial lawyers: "Never ask a question unless you are already SURE of the answer." For Dungeon Masters/Game Masters that should be Never roll the dice unless you're sure the outcome is acceptable." For computer scientists, it reads: "Never test for an error condition unless you know how to handle it." - Eric Holtman

There is no limit to the amount of good that people can accomplish if they don't care who gets the credit. - Anonymous

Living on Earth may be expensive, but it includes an annual free trip around the Sun.

Living your life is a task so difficult, it has never been attempted before.

There's a fine line between courage and foolishness. Too bad it's not a fence.

They're only trying to make me LOOK paranoid!

They're unfriendly, which is fortunate, really. They'd be difficult to like. - Avon

TV is chewing gum for the eyes. - Frank Lloyd Wright

Unless you love someone, nothing else makes any sense. - e.e. cummings

We judge ourselves by what we feel capable of doing, but others judge us by what we have already done. - Longfellow

One good reason why computers can do more work than people is that they never have to stop and answer the phone.

Well, now that we have seen each other, said the Unicorn, if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you. Is that a bargain? - Lewis Carroll

The word "gullible" is not in the dictionary.

What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I definitely overpaid for my carpet. - Woody Allen, Without Feathers

What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?

When a fellow says, "It ain't the money but the principle of the thing," it's the money. - Kim Hubbard

When you don't know what you are doing, do it neatly.

There are many people today who literally do not have a close personal friend.

When you know absolutely nothing about the topic, make your forecast by asking a carefully selected probability sample of 300 others who don't know the answer either. - Edgar R. Fiedler

"Wrong," said Renner. "The tactful way," Rod said quietly, "the polite way to disagree with the Senator would be to say, 'That turns out not to be the case.'"

You'd better beat it. You can leave in a taxi. If you can't get a taxi, you can leave in a huff. If that's too soon, you can leave in a minute and a huff. - Groucho Marx

Two physicists, on a lovely day, went hot-air balooning. After they'd been up for a while, they got lost. Eventually, they flew over a village and saw a man below. One of the physicists yells, "Hey! Where are we?" After about fifteen minutes, the physicists hear, "You're 100 feet above me." "That man is a mathematician," said the one physicist. "How do you know?" asked the other. "Well," he replied, "his answer was absolutely correct, it took him a long time to answer, and it was completely useless."

It is not a simple life to be a single cell, although I have no right to say so, having been a single cell so long ago myself that I have no memory at all of that stage of my life. - Lewis Thomas

One difference between a man and a machine is that a machine is quiet when well-oiled.

Why are you looking for more knowledge when you do not pay attention to what you already know?

The mind does not understand its own reason for being. - Rene Magritte

A picture without a frame is not a picture. - John Archibald Wheeler

Flout 'em and scout 'em - and scout 'em and flout 'em; Thought is free. - William Shakespeare, The Tempest III,ii,118

Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away. - Jesus Christ, Matthew 24:35, The Bible, c 71 CE

We may begin to see reality differently simply because the computer... provides a different angle on reality. - Heinz Pagels

Reality: what a concept! - Robin Williams

As long as the brain is a mystery, the universe will also be a mystery. - Santiago Ramon y Cajal

One of the most misleading representational techniques in our language is the use of the word "I".

All things are one. - Heraclitus, in G.S. Kirk's "Heraclitus: the Cosmic Fragments" ALLR1 - David Stickle's license plate, UU Fellowship, State College, PA

Nature tools along, not knowing that it's unified. - Allan Sandage

The mystical experience can neither be spoken nor written about. - Plato The way that can be spoken of is not the constant way. The name that can be named is not the eternal name. - Lao Tsu, Tao Te Ching

To see a World in a Grain of Sand And a Heaven in a Wild Flower Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand And Eternity in an hour. - William Blake, Auguries of Innocence

All is number. - Pythagoras of Samos

In the year of the Lord 1654 Monday November 23 From about half-past ten in the evening until half past twelve FIRE God of Abraham, God of Isaac, God of Jacob Not of the philosophers nor of the scholars. Certainty. Joy. Certainty, feeling, joy, peace... THE SUBLIMITY OF THE HUMAN SOUL Just Father, the world has not known thee but I have known thee. Joy, joy, joy, tears of joy. I do not separate myself from thee.... - Blaise Pascal, written beneath a gleaming cross on parchment, found in his "doublet" after his death in 1662

Progress is nothing but the victory of laughter over dogma. - Benjamin DeCasseres

Two old Jewish men were playing cards and the first one becomes extremely frustrated with the other's clumsiness and ignorance of the game. Throwing down his cards in disgust, he says, "What can I expect from a man who plays cards with ME?" I wouldn't belong to any club that would have me for a member. - Groucho Marx (a great lapidarist and Jew)

auslachen - German for "to attack and disarm someone by making jokes at his expense."

The Zen master accepts the absurdity of life, then transcends it, by living life exactly as if it were worth living. - Timothy Ferris

It is very beautiful over there. - Thomas Edison, on his deathbed This is eternal bliss, I thought. This cannot be described; it is far too wonderful. - Carl Jung, describing a near-fatal heart attack

The essence is coming. - graffiti on 5th St., Bloomsburg, PA, 1981

Dear Posterity, If you have not become more just, more peaceful, and generally more rational than we are (or were) - why then, the Devil take you. - Albert Einstein, message for a time capsule

MENE MEME TEKEL UPHARSIN (Thou art weighed in the balance and found wanting). [The words enscribed by the moving hand upon Belshazzar's wall.] - Daniel, The Bible

Hell is truth seen too late. - John Locke

The world is the totality of facts, not of things.

It from bit. Every IT - every particle, every field of force, even the spacetime continuum itself - derives its function, its meaning, its very existence entirely... from the apparatus-elicited answers to yes or no questions, binary choices, BITS. - John Archibald Wheeler

No phenomenon IS a phenomenon until it is OBSERVED. - John Archibald Wheeler, paraphrasing Niels Bohr

The word "algorithm" is a corruption of Al Kworesmi, the name of a 9th century Arab mathematician whose book on the subject was influential in Rennaissance Europe. - Timothy Ferris, The Mind's Sky

The term "bit" was coined by John Tukey, later of Princeton University, in a 1 Sep 1947 Bell Labs memo titled "Sequential Conversion of Continuous Data to Digital Data." - Timothy Ferris, The Mind's Sky

Quantum - German for "hunk".

Failure to emulate is the best revenge. - Marcus Aurelius Living well is the best revenge. - George Herbert

The Chemist's rule: Never take more than three data points. There will always be some kind of graph paper on which they fall in a straight line. The Chemist's rule, first corollary: if you have only one kind of graph paper, never take more than two data points.

No one is exempt from talking nonsense; the only misfortune is to do it solemnly. - Montaigne

Pick good people and stay out of their way.

Be able to say, "I never had a job I didn't like."

The trouble with self-made men is that they worship their creator.

One of the best ways to motivate people is friendly praise.

It is the capacity to enjoy life that brings contentment.

Occasional failure is the price of improvement.

If you have your sight, you are blessed. If you have insight, you are a thousand times blessed.

Most of us will never do great things, but we can do small things in a great way.

Thinking is the hardest work there is, which is probably why so few engage in it. - Henry Ford

It's tough to climb the ladder of success, especially if you're trying to keep your nose to the grindstone, your shoulder to the wheel, your eye on the ball, and your ear to the ground.

There's a surefire way to double your money - fold it in half and put it in your pocket.

Good supervision is the art of getting average people to do superior work.

Consider how hard it is to change yourself and you'll understand what little chance you have of changing others. - Jacob M. Braude

When you ask someone to do something, explain why. When you like what they did, tell them.

Only worry about your problems one at a time.

Even God discriminates against homosexuals - he only made 10% of us gay.

She's the only woman I ever thought about WHILE making love to her.

Mother lion to cub: "Don't forget to eat your fruits and vegetarians." - Mark T. Shirey

Don't LOOK at anything in a physics lab; don't TASTE anything in a chemistry lab; don't SMELL anything in a biology lab; don't TOUCH anything in a medical lab; and, most importantly, don't LISTEN to anything in the Philosophy Department.

In what furnace was thy brain? - William Blake

I perceived she was one of those creatures that are not the playthings of time. - J. Conrad

Why, back where I come from there are people who sit around all day and do nothing but think deep thoughts. They're called phila... philo... uh, deep-thought-thinkers - and with no more brains than you. But they do have something you don't have - a diploma. - The Wizard of Oz

By the Law of Periodical Repetition, everything which has happened once must happen again and again and again - and not capriciously, but at regular periods, and each thing in its own period, not another's, and each obeying its own law... and the same Nature which delights in periodical repitition in the skies is the Nature which orders the affairs of the earth. Let us not underrate the value of that hint. - Mark Twain

The more unusual the thought, the more important it is likely to be, for the world is more in need of new ideas than anything else. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

To free a man of error is to give, not to take away. Knowledge that a thing is false is a truth. - Schopenhauer Emancipation from error is the condition of real knowledge. - Henri Frederic Amiel (1821-1881), Swiss Philosopher

Ceci n'est pas une 'quote'. (This is not a quote.) - after Rene Magritte's painting of a pipe called "This is not a pipe"

It is a poor sort of skepticism which merely delights in challenging those claims which conflict with one's own belief system.

There goes Grace and, God, for the butt of Grace go I. - Mark T. Shirey

Faith, n: That quality which enables us to believe what we know to be untrue.

The Heinekin Uncertainty Principle: You can never be sure how many beers you had last night.

There are four kinds of homicide: felonious, excusable, justifiable, and praiseworthy. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

There was a young man from Japan Whose limericks never would scan When someone asked why He replied, with a sigh: "It's because I always try to get as many words into the last line as I possibly can."

Never trust anyone who volunteers to assume authority. Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. - Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Show respect for age. Drink good Scotch for a change.

Insisting on perfect safety is for people who don't have the balls to live in the real world. - Mary Shafer, NASA Ames Dryden

In the force if Yoda's so strong, construct a sentence with words in the proper order then why can't he?

If it's not worth doing, it's not worth doing well. - Donald Hebb

If pigs could vote, the man with the slop bucket would be elected swineherd every time, no matter how much slaughtering he did on the side. - Orson Scott Card

I am a fish of the sky! a cloud of the sea! blue is to fish, as sky is to me. - Steve Martin

O pointy birds, O pointy, pointy Annoint my head, Anointy, nointy - Steve Martin

A man, a plan, a canal - Panama! - famous palindrome A man, a plan, a cat, a canal - Panama! - a simple variation on a famous palindrome (some versions have 150+ words) A man, a plan, a canoe, pasta, heros, rajahs, a coloratura, maps, snipe, percale, macaroni, a gag, a banana bag, a tan, a tag, a banana bag again or: a camel, a crepe, pins, Spam, a rut, a Rolo, cash, a jar, sore hats, a peon, a canal - Panama! - a "non-trivial" variation on a famous palindrome, by Guy Steele, Common Lisp: The Language, 2nd ed.

With excitement like this, who is needing enemas? Tomorrow is the next day. We are wasting valueless time! I am thinking she's a virgin, or at least she used to be. I am standing here beside myself. Who is knowing how to read the mind of a robot? - the Indian guy (played by a caucasian), Short Circuit (movie)

"I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "because proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing." "But," says Man, "the Babel Fish is a dead giveaway, isn't it? It proves that you exist, so therefore by your own admission you don't." "Oh dear," says God, "I hadn't thought of that" and promptly vanishes in a puff of logic. - Douglas Adams, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

God made the integers, all else is the work of man. - Kronecker

Here, a piece of the True Cross. And in this case, we have the skull of John the Baptist at the age of twelve.

I try to skate to where I think the puck will be. - a pro hockey player

If you want to drive a cryptographer crazy, send her a page of random text. - Mark T. Shirey

The meek don't want it.

Just because you're paranoid doesn't mean they're NOT out to get you.

Nothing matters, so MAKE things matter.

Yes, I'm paranoid - but am I paranoid ENOUGH?

Reality is an allusion. - Mark T. Shirey

"I love you" is the most you can say in the fewest words. - Mark T. Shirey

Money is the root of all good. - Mark T. Shirey

When you meet a master swordsman, show him your sword. When you meet someone who is not a poet, do not show him your poem. - Rinzai (9th century Zen master)

Did you hear about the computer scientist they found dead in his shower? He was clutching a bottle of shampoo that said, "Lather, Rinse, Repeat".

People are great and life is good, let us thank THEM for our food. - Mark T. Shirey

I have only come here seeking knowledge Things they would not teach me of in college - Sting

Mickey's a mouse, Donald's a duck, Pluto's a dog - what's Goofy? - Stand By Me (movie)

I have seen the future brother, It is murder. Things are going to slide Slide in all directions Won't be nothing - Nothing you can measure anymore. - The Future, by Leonard Cohen

Everything will perish save love and music. - Scottish Gaelic proverb

Phantasie ist wichtiger als Wissen. (Imagination is more important than intelligence.) - Albert Einstein

Knee-jerk liberals and all the certified saints of sanctified humanism are quick to condemn this great and much-maligned Transylvanian statesman. - William F. Buckley, Jr., The Wit and Wisdom of Vlad the Impaler

Who shall guard the guardians? - a Roman philosopher

Jake liked his women the way he liked his kiwi fruit: sweet yet tart, firm- fleshed yet yielding to the touch, and covered with short brown fuzzy hair. They said I could have any kind of woman I wanted, so I asked for brown hair, long legs, and really horny. They brought me a moose. - Steve Martin

Gold dust from wheat fields, White dust from flowers floats by - Haiku! Gesundheit! - Mark T. Shirey

To be great is to be misunderstood. - Ralph Waldo Emerson To generalize is to be an idiot. - William Blake

Here's a good rule of thumb; Too clever is dumb. - Ogden Nash Too clever is dumb. - German proverb

Our policy is, when in doubt, do the right thing. - Roy L. Ash, ex-president Litton Industries

There are three schools of magic. One: State a tautology, then ring the changes on its corollaries; that's philosophy. Two: Record many facts. Try to find a pattern. Then make a wrong guess at the next fact; that's science. Three: Be aware that you live in a malevolent Universe controlled by Murphy's Law, sometimes offset by Brewster's Factor; that's engineering.

We have normality. Anything you still can't cope with is therefore your own problem. - Trillian, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (HGG) by Douglas Adams

I never went to bed with an ugly woman But I sure woke up with a few. Last night I came in at 2 with a 10 But at 10 I woke up with a 2. - Willie Nelson

Women want one man to satisfy their every need while men want every woman to satisfy their one need.

Two sodium atoms are walking along the street when one stops and says, "Oh my God, I think I've lost an electron!" "Are you sure?" asks the other sodium atom. "Yes," replies the first sodium atom, "I'm positive." - R.D. Hayler, "New Scientist" (magazine)

Just remember that you're standing on a planet that's evolving, revolving at 900 miles an hour. It's orbiting at 90 miles a second, so it's reckoned, the Sun which is the source of all our power. The Sun and you and me and all the stars that we can see, are moving at a million miles a day, in the outer spiral arm at 40 thousand miles an hour of a Galaxy we call the Milky Way. The Galaxy itself contains a hundred billion stars, it's a hundred thousand light years side to side. It bulges in the middle sixteen thousand light years thick but out by us it's just three thousand light years wide. It's thirty-thousand light years from Galactic Central Point, We go round every two hundred million years. And our galaxy is only one of millions and billions in this amazing and expanding Universe... ...The Universe itself keeps on expanding and expanding in all of the directions it can whiz. As fast as it can go, the speed of light you know, twelve million miles a minute and that's the fastest speed there is. So remember when you're feeling very small and insecure how amazingly unlikely is your birth, and pray that there's intelligent life somewhere up in space, 'cause there's bugger-all down here on earth. - Monty Python, The Meaning of Life (movie)

Fool! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is 'Never get involved in a land war in Asia,' but only slightly less well known is this: 'Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line.' - William Goldman, The Princess Bride (movie)

<>!*''# Transliteration: Waka waka bang splat tick tick hash, ^@`$$- Caret at back-tick dollar dollar dash, !*'$_ Bang splat tick dollar underscore, %*<>#4 Percent splat waka waka number four, &)../ Ampersand right-paren dot dot slash, |{~~SYSTEM HALTED Vertical-bar curly-bracket tilde tilde CRASH - Fred Bremmer and Steve Kroese, Calvin College & Seminary of Grand Rapids

C: "Bugs fly in such crazy loops and zigzags. I wonder why they don't get dizzy and barf." H: "Maybe they do!" C: "Eww, gross! Ha ha ha! But then why would they keep flying that way?" H: "Maybe bugs *like* to barf!" C: "EWWWW! They WOULD! Ha ha ha ha! BLAUGH!" C: "I tell you, Hobbes, it's great to have a friend who appreciates an earnest discussion of ideas." - Calvin and Hobbes, 15 Jul 92, on philosophical/scientific dialectic

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best night and day to make you like everybody else means to fight the hardest battle any human being can fight and never stop fighting. - e.e. cummings

I have sworn upon the alter of God eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man. - Thomas Jefferson

Explore until someone yells at you. - Dr. David L. Hall, HRB Systems

There's no reason to be the richest man in the cemetary. - Colonel Sanders

Finance is the art of passing money from hand to hand until it finally disappears. - Robert W. Sarnoff

The more money an American accumulates, the less interesting he becomes. - Gore Vidal

There are really not many jobs that actually require a penis or a vagina, and all other occupations should be open to everyone. - Gloria Steinem

We are confronted with insurmountable opportunities. - Pogo (Walt Kelly)

We have met the enemy and he is us. - Pogo (Walt Kelly)

Try not to become a man of success, rather try to become a man of value. - Albert Einstein

The time is always right to do what is right. - Martin Luther King, Jr.

Love is a friendship set to music. - E. Joseph Cossman

The speed of the leader determines the rate of the pack. - Wayne Lukas

The best test of a relationship is to disagree but to hold hands. - Alexandra Penney

The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be measured by the way in which its animals are treated. - Mahatma Gandhi

Death, where is thy sting? Grave, where is thy victory? - I Corinthians 15

'Tis education forms the common mind. Just as the twig is bent, the tree's inclin'd. - Alexander Pope

The three laws of robotics: 1. A robot may not injure a human being, or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. 2. A robot must obey the orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. 3. A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Laws. - Isaac Asimov, "I, Robot"

After wisdom comes wit. - Evan Esar

And here, poor fool, with all my lore I stand no wiser than before. - Johann W. von Goethe

Any philosophy that can be put in a nutshell belongs there. - Sydney J. Harris

Between grief and nothing I will take grief. - William Faulkner

Atheism is the result of ignorance and pride; of strong sense and feeble reasons; of good eating and ill-living. It is the plague of society, the corrupter of manners, and the underminer of property. - Jeremy Collier

What is man's chief enemy? Each man is his own. - Anacharsis, 600 BCE

In order to see Christianity, one must forget almost all the Christians. - Henri Frederic Amiel (1821-1881), Swiss Philosopher

Be always displeased with what thou art, if your desirest to attain to what thou art not; for where thou hast pleased thyself, there thou abidest. But if thou have enough thou perishest. Always add, always walk, always proceed. Neither stand still, nor go back, nor deviate. - Augustine

Be sober and temperate, and you will be happy. - Benjamin Franklin

All philosophy lies in two words: sustain and abstain. - Epictetus

The philosopher aspires to explain away all mysteries, to dissolve them into light. Mystery, on the other hand, is demanded and pursued by the religious instinct; mystery constitutes the essence of worship. - Henri Frederic Amiel (1821-1881), Swiss Philosopher

To know how to grow old is the master-work of wisdom, and one of the most difficult chapters in the great art of living. - Henri Frederic Amiel (1821-1881), Swiss Philosopher

I didn't say I love him - I said he was handy. - Miss Daisy, Driving Miss Daisy (movie)

"Balls" said the Queen, "If I had them, I'd be King." - Bette Davis (in a movie)

A belief is not true [just] because it is useful. - Henri Frederic Amiel (1821-1881), Swiss Philosopher

Men, their rights and nothing more; women, their rights and nothing less. - Susan Brownell Anthony (1820-1906), conclusion to Rights to Suffrage

The most useful piece of learning for the uses of life is to unlearn what is untrue. - Antisthenes (445-365 BCE), Founder, Cynic School of Philosophy

Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before. - Mae West

The sad truth is that most evil is done by people who never make up their minds to be either good or evil. - Hanna Arendt

Good can exist without evil, whereas evil cannot exist without good. - St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Whether God Exists, Q.109,art.2

The light of faith makes us see what we believe. - St. Thomas Aquinas (1225-1274), Whether God Exists, Q.109,art.2

Give me a long enough stick and a place to stand and I will move the world. - Archimedes (287-212 BCE), Pappus, Synagoge

What science and the quest for knowledge are after is irrefutable truth; that is, propositions that human beings are not free to reject - that are compelling. They are of two kinds, as we have known since Leibnitz: truths of reasoning and truths of fact. - Hanna Arendt (1906-1975), political philosopher

Every thought is an afterthought. - Hanna Arendt

With the rise of Christianity, faith replaced thought as the bringer of immortality. - Hanna Arendt

Atheism is rather in the life than in the heart of man. - Bacon

Theives were stealing a farmer's watermelons, so he put up a sign that said "One of these melons is injected with cyanide." The next day, he noticed that someone had written on the sign "Now there are two."

Almost all absurdity of conduct arises from the imitation of those whom we cannot resemble. - Samuel Johnson

And now abideth faith, hope and charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity. - I Corinthians, The Bible

And what doth the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God? - The Bible

Any man who hates dogs and babies can't be all bad. - Leo Rosten Any man who hates dogs and loves whiskey can't be all bad. - W.C. Fields, after Leo Rosten Any man who hates dogs and children can't be all bad. - popularly, but falsely, attributed to W.C. Fields

Now death is the most terrible of things; for it is the end, and nothing is thought to be any longer either good or bad for the dead. - Aristotle

For the lesser evil is reckoned a good in comparison with the greater evil, since the lesser evil is rather to be chosen than the greater. - Aristotle

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at the moment. - Robert Benchley

At twenty years of age the will reigns; at thirty, the wit; and at forty, the judgment. - Grattan

Our imagination is stretched to the utmost, not, as in fiction, to imagine things which are not really there, but just to comprehend those things which _are_ there. - Richard Feynman, physicist

A religion follows a message and a cult follows a messenger. - Jerry Falwell A religion is a cult which has survived its leader.

I am the King of Me. You are the King or Queen of You. It's a lifetime position we can thank or blame our parents for. It's the only thing that can't be taken from us. We get all of the responsibility and all of the joy. It's a tough job but everybody's got to do it. - Mark T. Shirey

The are four things which cannot be gotten back: the spoken word, the sped arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity. - Arabian proverb

In a mature society, "civil servant" is semantically equivalent to "civil master." - Robert A. Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

The Norse god Thor came to earth and "slept with" a mortal woman - all night long. In the morning, she said, "How can you do that all night long?" He said, "I have to admit - I'm Thor". She said, "YOU'RE thor? I'm tho thore I can't walk!"

To "grok" means "to understand or ingest fully", as in "I grok you", - Valentine Michael Smith, Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein

Given time, a generally accepted solution to this problem will evolve, as it has in the past for other issues, only to be replaced by the next issue, which no one has even dreamt of yet. - Andrew Lawrence

The population is growing but the total IQ is remaining constant.

Fame or integrity: which is more important? Money or happiness: which is more valuable? Success or failure: which is more destructive? - Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Mitchell

Worldly success depends on pleasing others. - John Luther If you look to others for fulfillment, you will never be truly satisfied. - Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Mitchell Poor is the man whose happiness depends on the approval of others. - Madonna Poor is the person whose pleasure depends on approval. - Mark T. Shirey, improving on the Tao Te Ching and Madonna

If [your] happiness depends on money, you will never be happy with yourself. - Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Mitchell

An act of courage is not done by someone who is fearless, but by someone who is filled with fear and does it anyway.

If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay at home and bring happiness to the wife he has married. - Deuteronomy 24:5, The Bible

Always remember that you are unique, just like everyone else.

But whatEVAH you do... PLEESE - DON'T fling me in that BRIAH patch! - Brer Rabbit, Uncle Wiggly Brer Rabbit demonstrated: freedom is made of brambles. - John Updike, Collected Poems, "Midpoint"

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled. - Richard Feynman

Simmons's Law: The desire for racial integration increases with the square of the distance from the actual event.

Acheson's Rule of the Bureaucracy: A memorandum is written not to inform the reader but to protect the writer.

If we were right when in our Ethics we stated that virtue is a mean, and that the happy life is a life without hindrance in its accordance with virtue, then the best life must be the middle life. And the same principles must be applicable to the virtue or badness of constitutions and states. For the constitution of a state is in a sense the way it lives. - Aristotle, Politics, para. 1295a34 (ca. 323 BCE)

There is no god. I'll bet my afterlife on it. - Sri Karma

The other night I was lying in bed, looking up at the stars, and I wondered, "Where the HECK is my ROOF?!?" - Steven Wright

Weak atheism - disbelief or skepticism concerning the existence of God Strong atheism - positive belief that God does not exist Agnosticism - belief that we do not and CANNOT know if God exists Christian Agnosticism - unfounded faith that the Christian God (Yahweh) exists

Fight the real enemy. - Sinead O'Connor, et al

Marriage is a fine institution - for people who should be in one.

At least once a month, learn some new subject at least well enough to ask the right questions of an expert.

There's a chance that alcohol, tobacco, and firearms will hurt you - do you want to take that chance?

Rulers who wish to subvert the public liberty may have found an established clergy convenient auxiliaries. A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate it, needs them not. - James Madison, A Memorial and Remonstrance

I almost shudder at the thought of alluding to the most fatal example of the abuses of grief which the history of mankind has preserved - the Cross. Consider what calamities that engine of grief has produced! - John Adams, in a letter to Thomas Jefferson

History I believe furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose. - Thomas Jefferson to Baron von Humboldt, 1813

I cannot conceive otherwise than that He, the Infinite Father, expects or requires no worship or praise from us, but that He is even infinitely above it. - Benjamin Franklin, from "Articles of Belief and Acts of Religion",Nov 1728

Think globally, act locally. - bumper sticker Think universally, act selfishly. - Tim Starr (e-mail signature) Think OM, act OM.

'Equal' means the same thing, in the same place, at the same time. - Thurgood Marshall

Every jumbled pile of person has a thinking part that wonders what the part that isn't thinking isn't thinking of. - They Might Be Giants, "Where Your Eyes Don't Go"

abunist - someone who does not believe in the Easter Bunny. - Mark T. Shirey

The Mormons avoid David Koresh's problems with the ATF - they FORBID alcohol, tobacco, and firearms. - Mark T. Shirey Mormons wear "sacred undergarments", deny women any power, and believe that the faithful will spend enternity having sex on other planets. Really.

Where is there a certainty that rises above all doubt and withstands all critique? - Karl Jaspers

But the thing is, you don't have many suspects who are innocent of a crime. That's contradictory. If a person is innocent of a crime, then he is not a suspect. - Ed Meese, US Attorney General, US News & World Report 10/15/85

A farmer was seen lifting up his pigs, one at a time, to eat apples out of a tree. A passerby said, "Wouldn't it save a lot of time to shake the tree and let them eat the apples on the ground?" The farmer replied, "What's time to a pig?"

He's swimming in the successpool. - Mark T. Shirey

When marriage is outlawed, only outlaws will have in-laws.

The turtle lives 'twixt plated decks Which practically conceal its sex. I think it's clever of the turtle In such a fix to be so fertile. - Ogden Nash

There is a continuum of continuums, a spectrum of spectrums, an infinity of infinities.

A farm girl and a farm boy were sitting on a fence watching a bull copulate with a cow. The farm boy said "I'd like a little of that. How about it?" The farm girl replied, "Go ahead, it's your cow."

I don't take no stock in mathematics, anyway. - Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens)

What do YOU want? I want peace and goodwill toward men. We're the UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT - we don't do that sort of thing! - Sneakers (movie)

The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. - Edmund Burke (1729-1797)

When it comes to testing new aircraft or determining maximum performance, pilots like to talk about "pushing the envelope." They're talking about a two dimensional model: the bottom is zero altitude, the ground; the left is zero speed; the top is max altitude; and the right, maximum velocity, of course. So, the pilots are pushing that upper-right-hand corner of the envelope. What everybody tries not to dwell on is that that's where the postage gets canceled, too. - The Collected Journals of Admiral Rick Hunter

Hey, buddy, can you paradigm?

I haven't seen choreography that stiff since the Lee Harvey Oswald prison transfer. - Dennis Miller, comedian

I'm a little indignant when they tell me I'm going to hell if I haven't been "born again". Pardon me for getting it right the first time. - Dennis Miller, comedian

Why is a raven like a writing desk? - Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland, left unanswered Because Poe wrote on both. - Sam Loyd The notes for which they're noted are not noted as being musical notes. - Sam Loyd Because there's a "b" in "both". - E.V. Rieu, reported by Martin Gardiner in "The Annotated Alice"

Be the ball. - Chevy Chase's advice on golf, Caddyshack (movie)

Jesus converted to atheism just before he died. - Mathew

The search for enlightenment isn't as important as learning to appreciate the present. - Ram Das (Richard Alpert), PhD from Harvard with Timothy Leary

There is hopeful symbolism in the fact that flags don't wave in a vacuum. - Arthur C. Clark

There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is having lots to do and not doing it. - John W. Raper

Everybody is entitled to my opinion.

The wise learn many things from their foes. - Aristophanes

What do you care what other people think? - Richard Feynman

If I have seen farther than others, it is because I was standing on the shoulders of giants. - Isaac Newton If I have not seen as far as others, it is because giants were standing on my shoulders. - Hal Abelson In computer science, we stand on each other's feet. - Brian K. Reed

Every day above ground is a good day.

Every once in a while you should use your backup to make sure it works. - Mark T. Shirey

What is Truth? - Pontius Pilate Love is Truth. - Plato

It's not the men in my life, but the life in my men. - Mae West

All the Universe, or nothing! - H. G. Wells

There is no way to completely define your terms and ground your references.

Fear not the evil men do in the name of evil, but heaven protect us from the evil men do in the name of good.

The significant problems we face cannot be solved at the same level of thinking we were at when we created them. - Albert Einstein

An Englishman on a plane to Australia was handed one of these cards to fill in, in normal Commonwealth style. After the standard questions like name, nationality, passport number, etc., he got to one that asked: "Have you ever been imprisoned?" After thinking about that for some time he entered: "I didn't know it was still a requirement."

If I don't see you in the future, I'll see you in the pasture.

At an Oxford college, they were debating what to do with all their money. The consensus was to buy land, since "for the past thousand years, land has proven to be a very wise investment for the college." A crusty old patriarch piped in, "True, but the past thousand years have been atypical." - Greg Benford

Doctor, I have a serious memory problem. I can't remember anything! "How long have you had this problem?" What problem?

A billion here and a billion there and pretty soon you're talking about real money. - Sen. Everett Dirkson

The idea of memes will really catch on. I mean, just think about it! - Mark T. Shirey

Feynman walked in and, without a word, grabbed the ball and backed against the wall with the ball touching his nose. He let go, and the ball swung slowly 60 feet across the room and back - stopping naturally just short of crushing his face. Then he took the ball again, stepped forward, and said, "I wanted to show you that I believe in what I'm going to teach you over the next two years." - Michael Scott, first president of Apple Computer, on the Richard Feynman Lectures on Physics at California Institute of Technology in 1965

Behind every absurdity there lies a basic truth. Behind every basic truth there lies an absurdity.

Every exit is an entry somewhere else. - Tom Stoppard

Nothing I could ever think to say is as offensive as your suggestion that I not say it. -

One fellow was overheard saying to another, "Look, it's obvious we don't agree on any political issues, so our votes would just cancel each other out. I'll promise not to vote in the next election if you won't..." Later, he was overheard saying to someone else, "Look, it's obvious we don't agree on any political issues, ..."

Young man, in mathematics you don't understand things, you just get used to them. - John von Neumann

It is in the extremes that our philosophies are tested, and those of us who are serious do not set aside our ethics merely because in some cases they have become inconvenient or distasteful. - Piers Anthony, SF author

Ask yourself whether the dream of heaven and greatness should be waiting for us in our graves - or whether it should be ours here and now and on this earth. - Ayn Rand

There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds. - Tennyson

Sir, I admit your general rule That every Poet is a Fool But you yourself may serve to show it That every Fool is not a Poet - Pope

I cannot say that I don't disagree with you. - Groucho Marx

My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? Far from my deliverance are the words of my groaning. O my God, I cry by day, but Thou dost not answer; And by night, but I have no rest. - Psalms 22, The Bible

Invincibility is in oneself, vulnerability is in the opponent. - Sun Tzu

The considerations of the intelligent always include both benefit and harm. - Sun Tzu

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces Between stars - or stars where no human race is I have it in me so much nearer home To scare myself with my own desert places. - Robert Frost

When hiding needles, it's always good to make the haystack as big as possible. - Phil Karn on how often to use encryption

Poetry is a theorem of a yellow-silk handkerchief knotted with riddles, sealed in a balloon tied to the tail of a kite flying in a white wind against a blue sky in in spring. - Carl Sandburg

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want He makes me down to lie Through pastures green he leadeth me the silent waters by With bright knives he releaseth my soul He maketh me to hang on hooks in high places He converteth me to lamb cutlets For lo, he hath great power, and great hunger When cometh the day we lowly ones Through quiet reflection and great dedication Master the art of karate Lo, we shall rise up And then we'll make the bugger's eyes water. - Pink Floyd, "Sheep"

Sometimes the pitch would hit the plate and the big guy would yell "Ball!" as if it was the ball's fault. - Susan Hunt

'When can we hope to leave?' You can hope anytime, Mr. Taylor. - Beneath the Planet of the Apes

Yorn desh born, der ritt de gitt der gue, Orn desh, dee born desh, de umn bork! bork! bork! - The Swedish Chef, The Muppets (TV show)

A man who prefers photocopies to real books, is a man I suspect would be quite content kissing a pretty woman through a piece of glass.

Sometimes you just have to look reality in the eye and deny it.

I like Chinese food / The waiters never are rude / Think of the many things they've done to impress / There's Maoism, Taoism, I Ching, and Chess - Monty Python, "I Like Chinese", Contractual Obligation Album

Noumenon (-al) - a ground of phenomena that, according to Kant, cannot be experienced, can be known to exist, but to which no properties can be intelligibly ascribed.

To be or not to be - that is the square root of 4 b^2.

Research shows the first five minutes of life can be the most risky. The last five aren't so hot either.

Do SLOW CHILDREN AT PLAY grow up to become SLOW MEN AT WORK?

The simple truth is that the truth is never simple. - Linda Ellerbee

Truly great madness can not be achieved without significant intelligence. - Henrik Tikkanen

Tragedy is if I cut my finger; comedy is if YOU walk into an open sewer and die. - Mel Brooks and Carl Reiner

Live fast, die young, and leave a good lookin' corpse. - John Derek (Bo's husband) in 1949 film _Knock on Any Door_, Humphrey Bogart stars as a defense lawyer, Derek portrays a young thug

Post-Modernism is Man realizing he can never ever see himself clearly, no matter how hard he tries. - Dan Hartung

And there you have several miracles, first among them the wonder of a three- dimensional volume where black squiggles on white paper create worlds. - Melvin Jules Bukiet, on books

In an old Peanuts strip, Lucy finds what she thinks is a rare butterfly on the ground, and goes off on a long rant about how it must have flown up from South America. After several minutes of this Linus takes a close look at the object and exclaims, "This isn't a butterfly, it's a potato-chip!" Lucy says, "I wonder how that potato chip got here from South America?" - Charles M. Shultz

alpha bravo charlie delta echo foxtrot golf hotel india juliet kilo lima mike november oscar papa quebec romeo sierra tango uniform victor whiskey xray zulu

You can't comb the hair on a billiard ball without at least 1 cowlick and 1 crown. - Michael L. Mauldin (Fuzzy), CMU

Freedom of the press belongs to those who own one. - A.J. Liebling

Well, although I do not suppose that either of us knows anything really beautiful and good, I am better off than he is - for he knows nothing, and thinks that he knows; I neither know nor think that I know. In this latter particular, then, I seem to have slightly the advantage of him. - Socrates, in "The Apology" by Plato He who knows not, and knows not that he knows not, is a fool, shun him. But he who knows not, and knows that he knows not, is a wise man, follow him! - Oriental proverb To be conscious that you are ignorant of the facts is a great step to knowledge. - Benjamin Disraeli, 1804-1881 I have been asked thousands of questions, about every known subject. But never one that I could not answer. Why do you suppose that is? I don't know. - from "Zen and the Art of Standing Up" by Lee J. Merkel I was gratified to be able to answer promptly, and I did. I said I didn't know. - Mark Twain

You do not examine legislation in the light of the benefits it will convey if properly administered, but in the light of the wrongs it would do and the harms it would cause if improperly administered. - Lyndon Johnson

A man is crazy who writes a secret in any other way than one which will conceal it from the vulgar. - Roger Bacon, 1220-1292

The idea is like grass. It craves light, likes crowds, thrives on crossbreeding and grows better for being stepped on. - Ursula K. LeGuin, _The Dispossessed_

Why is it that some totally despicable people can say or type a few words that get other people to trust them, like them, hire them, vote for them, kill for them, or EVEN send them MONEY? - Mark T. Shirey

There is truth, but no one knows what it is.

Freedom is just chaos with better lighting. - Alan Dean Foster

We shall not cease from exploration, and the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and know the place for the first time. - T.S. Eliot

It's turtles all the way down. - someone trying to explain to Bertrand Russell how the Earth could be riding on the back of a giant turtle who is on the back of another, etc.

There is no reason in the world to fight, however there is every reason to need to know how to fight. - Sun Tzu, The Art of War

Knowledge is the only instrument of production that is not subject to diminishing returns. - J.M. Clarke

It takes a big man to admit when he's wrong, and an even bigger one to keep his mouth shut when he's right. - Jim Fiebig.

As I grow older I pay less attention to what men say. I just watch what they do. - Andrew Carnegie

Science is to see what everyone else has seen but think what no one else has thought. - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

It's okay for us to love our country, but we ought to spend most of our time making our country lovable. - Andy Rooney

The beautiful things are difficult. - Plato, Hippias Major

It's not how big your share is, it's how much you share.

Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall set you free. - John 8:32, The Bible, also the motto of the CIA

People ask me how I do it, and I say "There's nothing to it - you just stand there looking cute... and when something moves, you shoot!" - Tom Lehrer

The trouble with radicals is that they read only radical literature and the trouble with conservatives is that they don't read anything. - Thomas Carter

I drank WHAT? - Socrates

I love the smell of Napalm in the morning. - Big Duke, Apocolypse Now (movie)

Liberty is not the freedom to do whatever we want, it is the freedom to do whatever we are able.

A truth does not become greater by repitition. - Maimonides (1135-1204)

An intelligent chess computer would ask, `Why does White always go first?'

Beware the Jabberwock, my son; The jaws that bite; the claws that catch; Beware the Jub-Jub bird and shun The frumious Bandersnatch! - Lewis Carroll, "Jabberwocky"

Just like the universe, as I get older, I expand and get cooler. - Joe Mancini

Marriage is like getting Playboy magazine with the same centerfold every month.

Is there a word for that feeling you get when you decide that someone is a total loser because of something they just did or said? Is there a word for that feeling you get when you realize that they were right and you were wrong?

A pastor went visiting one afternoon. He knocked on one door several times, but no one answered. He could see though the window that the television was on, so he took one of his cards, wrote "Revelations 3:20" on it and stuck it in the door. (Revelations 3:20 says, "Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone will open, I will come in.) The following Sunday, a woman handed him a card with her name and the following message: "Genesis 3:10". ("I heard thy voice and I was naked, so I hid myself.")

As I walked uphill on my way home, thinking of my troubles A little girl sans shirt and shoes was patiently blowing bubbles As I passed, she turned and said, "Hey - there's no time!" I agreed and, lest I forget, I've written down this rhyme. - Mark T. Shirey, 9 AM Sat 19 Jun 93

A man cannot get rich, who properly cares for his family. - Navajo Proverb

There is no nobler fate than to be forgotten as the foe of a forgotten heresy. - G.K. Chesterton

If at first you don't succeed, try again. Then quit. No use being a damn fool about it. - W.C. Fields

Ambition is like a frog sitting on a Venus Flytrap. The flytrap can bite and bite, but it won't bother the frog because it only has tiny little plant teeth. But some other stuff could happen, and it would be like ambition. - Deep Thoughts by Jack Handey

Madonna doesn't have one. Bush has a short one. Gorbachev has a long, hard one. The Pope has one but he doesn't use it. What is it? Answer: A last name

What does a man do standing up, a woman do sitting down, and a dog do with one leg lifted? Answer: Shake hands

A comment on cold fusion: "Hey Mike?" "Yeah, Gabe?" "We got a problem down on Earth. In Utah." "I thought you fixed that last century!" "No, no, not that. Someone's found a loophole in the physics program. They're getting energy out of nowhere." "Blessit! Lemme check..." "Hey, I thought I fixed that! Alright, give me a minute." "There, that ought to patch it."

Times are bad. Children no longer obey their parents, and everyone is writing a book. - Cicero

A wise man hears one word and understands two. - Jewish proverb

You must believe in free-will; there is no choice. - Isaac Singer Truth is. Belief is not required. - Gerry Roston

Schwiggle, n.: The amusing rotation of one's bottom while sharpening a pencil. - Rich Hall, "Sniglets"

What becomes longer when it becomes shorter? The word "short".

It's better to be quotable than to be honest. - Tom Stoppard

The purpose of a fish trap is to catch fish, and when the fish are caught, the trap is forgotten. The purpose of a rabbit snare is to catch rabbits. When the rabbits are caught, the snare is forgotten. The purpose of words is to convey ideas. When the ideas are grasped, the words are forgotten. Where can I find a man who has forgotten words? He is the one I would like to talk to. - Chuang Tzu

Church I heard a bird sing "higher power, higher power, hi" And so I whistle "higher power" whenever I walk by. - Mark T. Shirey

I don't have to take this abuse from you - I have hundreds of people waiting in line to abuse me! - Bill Murray, Ghostbusters (movie)

I feel that if a person can't communicate, the very least he can do is shut up. - Tom Lehrer

If the earth, with its seemingly rugged terrain, were scaled down to the size of a billiard ball, it would be much, much smaller.

The earth is but one country, and mankind its citizens. - Baha'u'llah

If you choose not to live with reality, reality will come and live with you. - jan@bagend.atl.ga.us

It is better to have tried and failed than to have failed to try, but the result's the same. - Mike Dennison

The pursuit of truth and beauty is a sphere of activity in which we are permitted to remain children all of our lives. - Albert Einstein

The further I get from the things that I care about, the less I care about how much further away I get. - Tom Reed, rec.arts.poems

yeeouch! hey! wumpa-yai! presquumtacious tweepf! wokketta-wokketta-yoiks! aiyaaaaaaaaaaa! date-nut-loaf! bleerumph! y'-FEEBdee! wristwatch! baushinkta all 'droids! - "Worst Worst Worst Haiku" by Walter Gross, rec.arts.poems

Silliness The bane of rhyme is silliness, A vain and vapid villainess Who turns our poetry to trash Until we sound like Ogden Nash. - alan@sentinel.jpl.nasa.gov, rec.arts.poems

The aim of proof is, in fact, not merely to place the truth of a proposition beyond all doubt, but also to afford us insight into the dependence of truths upon one another. - Gottlob Frege

Q: How many Zen Buddists does it take to change a lightbulb? A: Four, one to change it, one not to change it, and one to change _and_ not to change it.

The world is full of people who want to live forever but don't know how to spend a rainy Sunday afternoon.

A conservative is a liberal who has been mugged. - Frank Rizzo A liberal is a conservative who has been arrested. - Tom Wolfe A Democrat is someone who would be a Republican if he had the money.

It is better to have a small fish than a big cockroach. - Russian proverb

Where would Christianity be if Jesus got five to ten with time off for good behavior?

Zen Pizza - one with everything.

Not all men who drink are poets. Some of us drink because we are not poets.

There are three types of people in this world, those who make things happen, those who watch things happen, and those who have no idea what happened.

Furthermore, the gap between theory and practice in practice is much larger than the gap between theory and practice in theory. - Jeff Case

To find a rhyme for 'silver', Or any 'rhymeless rhyme', All you need is will, ver- bosity and time. - remembered by Jesse Mundis, If I had an entranceway, I'd paint the whole thing orange. I'd paint the door, the knob, the lock, The threshold and the doorhinge. - remembered by Jesse Mundis, Horrible birds! Red, green, and purple. If their pecking doesn't get you The chirp'll. - Randall M. Gee, The four eng- ineers, Wear orange Brassieres - Jonathan S. Haas

Democracy is a device that insures we shall be governed no better than we deserve. - George Bernard Shaw

The surest way to make a monkey of a man is to quote him. - Robert Benchley

These two drunks walk out of a bar. They both see a dog licking his balls. The first says "Man, I wish I could do that!", pointing to the dog. The second replies "You'd better pet him first!"

And I believe that Ronald Reagan can make this country what it once was... an arctic region covered with ice. - Steve Martin

Humans would be more technologically advanced if early members of the species had realized that the thumbs should be used as parity-check bits when counting.

A verbal contract isn't worth the paper it's printed on. - Samuel Goldwyn

There's nothing you can do that can't be done Nothing you can sing that can't be sung Nothing you can say but you can learn how to play the game - it's easy There's nothing you can make that can't be made No one you can save that can't be saved Nothing you can do but you can learn how to be you in time There's nothing you can know that isn't known Nothing you can see that isn't shown Nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be All you need is love. - Beatles, "All You Need is Love"

In the beginning was the word [logos]. - John 1:1, The Bible, c 100 CE

Imagine there's no heaven; it's easy if you try. - John Lennon, "Imagine"

But in physics I soon learned to scent out the paths that led to the depths, and to disregard everything else, all the many things that clutter up the mind, and divert it from the essential. The hitch in this was, of course, the fact that one had to cram all this stuff into one's mind for the examination, whether one liked it or not. - Albert Einstein

What's the first number in the English language that uses the letter "A"? one-thousAnd

I think the mistake a lot of us make, is thinking the state-appointed psychiatrist is our friend. - Tom Schmidlin

I have the heart of a little child and the brain of a genius - I keep them in a jar under my bed.

Most of the evils of life arise from man's being unable to sit still in a room. - Blaise Pascal

The experimenter who does not know what he is looking for will not understand what he finds. - Claude Bernard

I believe every human has a finite number of heartbeats. I don't intend to waste any of mine running around doing exercises. - Neil Armstrong

If I have any beliefs about immortality, it is that certain dogs I have known will go to heaven, and very, very few persons. - James Thurber

In ecology, as in economics, TANSTAAFL (There Ain't No Such Thing As A Free Lunch) is intended to warn that every gain is won at some cost. Failure to recognize the "no free lunch" law causes the buffalo-hunter mentality syndrome - the unthinking assumption that there will always be plenty because there always has been plenty. - Dr. Robert W. Prehoda

We all worry about the population explosion - but we don't worry about it at the right time. - Arthur Hoppe

The word is not the thing. The map is not the territory. The symbol is not the thing symbolized. - S.I. Hayakawa

But when feminists suggest that God might be a She without suggesting that the Devil might also be female, they must be opposed. - Warren Farrell

The difference between art and craft is that a craftsman knows what he is doing.

Ignorant?! Ha! I don't even know the meaning of the word!

If you want magic, let go of your armor. Magic is so much stronger than steel! - Richard Bach, "The Bridge Across Forever"

I don't want a pickle I just want to ride on my motorcycle And I don't want a tickle I'd rather ride on my motorcycle And I don't wanna' die I just want to ride on my motorcy... cle. - Arlo Guthrie, "The Motorcycle Song"

The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists - that is why they invented hell. - Bertrand Russell

IHTFP - I have truly found paradise / I hate this f'ing place

An it harm no other, do what ye will.

Bear one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ. - Galatians 6:2, The Bible For each man will have to bear his own load. - Galatians 6:5, The Bible

Of course I'm at the center of the Universe - aren't you? - Barry Trent

I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse. - Charles V of France

Committment, n.: Committment can be best illustrated by a breakfast of ham and eggs. The chicken was involved, the pig was committed.

An angel offered someone their choice of infinite wisdom, health, or wealth. The person chose wisdom and sat silently for a few minutes, contemplating the mysteries of life and the universe, and then said "I should've taken the money."

If you can't take a little bloody nose maybe you ought to go back home and crawl under your bed. It's not safe out here. It's wonderous, with treasures to satiate desires both subtle and gross. But it's not for the timid. - Q, Star Trek:TNG

"I made a lot of changes" doesn't mean "I fixed it". - Mark T. Shirey

I'm treading on new water. (a 3-or-4-way mixed metaphor) - John L. Shirey

The logic of events points, inevitably, to an epoch of single women. If women will not accept marriage with subjection, nor men proffer it without, there is, there can be, no alternative. - Susan Brownell Anthony (1820-1906)

The Buddha sat beneath the tree So long that it was frightening. And when he finally let it be, He was struck by enlightening. - Mark T. Shirey, Sep 93

Intelligence is the faculty of making artificial objects, especially tools to make tools, and of varying the fabrication indefinitely. - Henri Bergson, 1907

Truth is strange; it is stranger than fiction. - Lord Byron Truth is stranger than fiction because fiction has to make sense.

As a net is made up of a series of ties, so everything in this world is connected by a series of ties. If anyone thinks that the mesh of a net is an independent, isolated thing, he is mistaken. It is called a net because it is made up of a series of interconnected meshes, and each mesh has its place and responsibility in relation to other meshes. - The Buddha

I wish there was a knob on the TV to turn up the intelligence. There's a knob called "brightness", but it doesn't work. - Gallagher

The stages of a project: enthusiasm, disillusionment, panic, search for the guilty, honors and praise for the non-participants.

We tend to scoff at the beliefs of the ancients. But we can't scoff at them personally, to their faces, and this is what annoys me. - Jack Handey

Disillusionment is a GOOD thing; to be disillusioned is to be enlightened. - Mark T. Shirey

Pessimists are often realists.

Hence today I believe that I am acting in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator: by defending myself against the Jew, I am fighting for the work of the Lord. - Adolf Hitler, "Mein Kampf", translation by Ralph Mannheim

I believe in Spinoza's God who reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists, not in a God who concerns himself with fates and actions of human beings. - Albert Einstein

I do not believe in immortality of the individual, and I consider ethics to be an exclusively human concern with no superhuman authority behind it. - Albert Einstein

An analog system will be as finite, or more finite than a digital one. Any complex system can be viewed as subsystems communicating with each other. This communication can be seen as the systems "measuring" each other, and all measurments have a finite precision. - Mats Grahm

The truly paranoid are clever enough to not _act_ paranoid. When everyone _is_ out to get to you, being paranoid isn't going to help.

What does not kill me only serves to make me stronger. - Nietzsche

The greater your joy or sorrow, the smaller the world in your eyes. - Kahlil Gibran

The final exams in the economics department are the same ones they gave ten years ago, only now the answers are different.

Due to financial constraints, the light at the end of the tunnel will be turned off until further notice.

I went into the woods for I wished to live diliberately. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life! To put to rout all that was not life, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. - Henry David Thoreau

It's not the voting that's democracy; it's the counting. - Tom Stoppard

Success is easy; there's nothing to it: Decide what should be done and do it. - Mark T. Shirey

It is always the most important leg of a three-legged stool that is missing. - Finagle

I would rather be a man of paradoxes than a man of prejudices. - Rousseau

When the freedom they wished for most was the freedom from responsibility, then Athens ceased to be free, and never was free again. - Edith Hamilton

I haven't had a drink since 1955 - and it's 2200 hours now.

The faults in bad software can be so subtle as to be practically supernatural. - Bruce Sterling

Women: can't live _with_ 'em, pass the beer nuts. - Norm on Cheers (TV show) Some other "Normisms" from Cheers (TV show): Woody: Pour you a beer, Mr. Peterson? Norm: Alright, but stop me at one... make that one-thirty. Woody: What's shakin' mister Peterson? Norm: All four cheeks and a couple of chins. Woody: Can I draw you a beer, Mr. P.? Norm: I know what they look like, just give me one. Sam: Whatcha up to Norm? Norm: My ideal weight if I were eleven feet tall. Woody: Can I pour you a draft, Mr. Peterson? Norm: A little early, isn't it Woody? Woody: For a beer? Norm: No, for stupid questions. Sam: Beer, Norm? Norm: Have I gotten that predictable? Good. Sam: What's the story, Norm? Norm: Boy meets beer. Boy drinks beer. Boy meets another beer. Norm: I think the most important thing in this world is love. And do you know what I love, Sammy? Sam: Beer, Norm? Norm: (looks at watch) Yeah, sure, just a small one.

I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the Almighty. - Revelations 1:8, The Bible

In "The Idiot", is Dostoyevsky criticizing the Russian ruling class by showing they regard a Christ-like man as an idiot? I would have said that Dostoyevsky was facing the inevitable fact that a Christ-like life is impossible. It means giving up concern for finances, for family, for intelligence, for humor, for wit, for civilized living in general. The only possible existence for someone who wishes to live like Christ is to be an idiot and, in the end, to go insane. A message of despair and hopelessness only lightened by the dream of resurrection in the Orthodox faith. With a complete abnegation of the individual and self. - Joseph Askew

It's not what we don't know that hurts, it's what we know that ain't so. - Will Rogers

Bad planning on your part does not constitue an emergency on mine.

Each day we complete 90% of our remaining work. - Andrew Gilbert

I just know I'm a better manager when I have Joe DiMaggio in center field. - Casey Stengel

I guess there are never enough books. - John Steinbeck

Mediocrity has no greater consolation than in the thought that genius is not immortal. - Johann Wolfgang Goethe

There is a spirit that is in my heart smaller than a grain of mustard seed, greater than the earth, greater than the heavens, greater than all these worlds. - Chapdogya Upanishad, 800 BCE

The more flesh, the more worms. The more possessions, the more worry. - Hillel "The Elder", (30 BCE - 10 CE)

What is hateful to you, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah. The rest is commentary. - Hillel "The Elder" (30 BCE - 10 CE) Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them, for this is the law of the prophets. - Matthew 7:12, The Bible (KJ), c 71 CE Do for others what you want them to do for you. This is the teaching of the laws of Moses in a nutshell. - Matthew 7:12, The Bible (Living), c 71 CE

The Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you The Silver Rule: Do not do unto others what you would not have them do unto you The Brazen Rule: Do unto others as they do unto you The Iron Rule: Do unto others as you like, before they do it unto you The Tin Rule: Suck up to those above you and intimidate those below The Nepotism Rule: Give precedence in all things to close relatives and do as you like to others The Goldplated Brazen Rule: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Then, do unto them as they do unto you, but forgive them once in a while. - "A New Way to Think about Rules to Live By", Carl Sagan, Parade, 11/28/93

Whatever you can do, or dream you can, begin it Boldness has genius, power and magic in it - Goethe

Gather ye rosebuds while ye may, Old time is still a-flying, And this same flower that smiles today Tomorrow will be dying. - Robert Herrick (1591-1674), To the Virgins to Make Much of Time

A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, and die gallantly. Specialization is for insects. - Robert A. Heinlein

For the living are conscious that they will die; but as for the dead, they are conscious of nothing at all. - Ecclesiastes 9:5

Believe nothing, no matter where you read it or who said it, unless it agrees with your own common sense and reason.

Sometimes we are the windshield, sometimes we are the bug.

I don't want a free lunch; I want a _cost-effective_ lunch. - Mark T. Shirey

He laughed at every joke three times - when he heard it, when it was explained to him, and when he understood it.

L'esprit de l'escalier ["wit of the staircase" - when you think of something funny to say when you're walking down the stairs (when it's too late)] - Denis Diderot (1713-1784), Paradoxe sur le Comedien

Passion and truth - that's all we need. - Lillian Gish, in an old movie

Jesus said that he did not come to change the law and that the law would not change - "not one jot or tittle shall change".

God supposedly let man write the Bible and run the Church, both of which are screwed up, and then he supposedly punishes us for not believing.

imply - to tell a very small lie. - Mark T. Shirey

Everyone seeks their own level of misery.

The reasonable person adapts himself to the world. The unreasonable person tries to change the world to adapt to him. Progress is due to unreasonable people. - George Bernard Shaw Some people are neither willing to adapt to the world as it is or to work to effectively change it, but instead just go through life complaining (in non- productive ways and usually to the wrong people) about how the world treats them. - Lee Lady

Collins's Law: If you can't make a mistake, you can't make anything. The person who makes no mistakes does not usually make anything. - Magee

Many women are saying, "Men discount my experience, silence me, demean my intelligence, and try to top me." Many men are responding, "That isn't happening. Now shut up you stupid chick and let me tell you what happened to _me_." - Lily Pond

If you write reams of "what if's," you're going to have one or two big hits, even if your average isn't that good. - Eric Pepke

Envy is the cause of political division. - Democritus (460-370 BCE) (Fr. 295, ed. Diels, II, 195.)

That's not writing, that's just typing. - Truman Capote about Jack Kerouac

Life's a tough proposition - and the first 100 years are the hardest. - Wilson Mizner How's life? Great! The first 100 years are always the most fun! - Mark T. Shirey, after Wilson Mizner

People of note may borrow a quote. - Mark T. Shirey (improving on John Bartlett, George Seldes, Ralph Keyes)

Never express yourself more clearly than you think. - Niels Bohr

Information wants to be free. The people who have it want it to be expensive.

For the wisdom of this world is foolishness with God. For it is written, He taketh the wise in their own craftiness. And again, the Lord knoweth the thoughts of the wise, that they are vain. - 1 Cor 3:19-20, The Bible Wisdom is the principle thing; therefore get wisdom: and with all thy getting get understanding. - Proverbs 4:7, The Bible

There once was a man who said 'God Must think it exceedingly odd If he finds that this tree Continues to be When there's no one about in the Quad.' Dear Sir, Your astonishment's odd; _I_ am always about in the Quad. And that's why the tree Will continue to be, Since observed by Yours faithfully, God.

Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated. - Mark Twain

Grande's Law - Always do what your boss would do if he knew what he was talking about.

The internet will be to the 90's what CB radio was to the 70's.

There once was a time when all people beleived in God and the church ruled. This time was called the Dark Ages. - Richard Lederer, _Anguished English_

Stay out of jail. - Alfred Hitchcock (advice to young film makers)

As a person abandons worn-out clothes and acquires new ones, so when the body is worn out a new one is acquired by the Self, who lives within. The Self cannot be pierced by weapons or burned by fire; water cannot wet it, nor can the wind dry it. The Self cannot be pierced or burned, made wet or dry. It is everlasting and infinite, standing on the motionless foundations of eternity. The Self is unmanifested, beyond all thought, beyond all change. Knowing this, you should not grieve. - The Bhagavad Gita, translated by Eknath Easwaran

I have a simple philosophy: Fill what's empty. Empty what's full. Scratch where it itches. - Alice Roosevelt Longworth

I've always depended on the kindness of strangers. - Blanche DuBois

It will be too late to cry over lost hair after your head is cut off. - Nikita Khrushchev, on nuclear war (quoting a Russian folk saying)

Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York. - William Shakespeare, King Richard the Third, act 1, sc. i, l. 1

Having nothing, nothing can he lose. - William Shakespeare

Knowledge is power. - Francis Bacon

The only thing he had to fear was being figured out. - Mark T. Shirey

No one has the right to destroy another person's belief by demanding empirical evidence. - Ann Landers, nationally syndicated advice columnist and Director at Handgun Control, Inc.

The English language, complete with irony, satire, and sarcasm, has survived for centuries without smileys. Only the new crop of modern computer geeks finds it impossible to detect a joke that is not Clearly Labeled as such. - Ray Shea in rec.music.misc, on smileys :-)

Inquiring minds want to know. - The National Enquirer

God put me on Earth to do accomplish a certain number of things. Right now, I am so far behind, I will never die.

Don't remember anything you can look up. - Albert Einstein (?) Sometimes it's more important to know where the information is than what it is. - Mark T. Shirey, et al

I shall sit here, on and off, for days and days. - Lewis Carroll

Do not make technical decisions based on the politics of the situation. Do not make political decisions based on technical issues. The only place these two meet is in the minds of the unenlightened. - Geoffrey James

If you were to ask a gorilla, "What would you like for your next evolutionary step?", he would probably answer, "Larger fangs and bigger muscles." He would not say, "I want a larger cranial cavity". - Rudy Rucker

Opinions are like assholes, everybody has one. - American folk saying Opinions are like anuses; I don't want to see or hear yours. - Mark T. Shirey

The ultimate secret of life is the sure knowledge of death, for without it, man would not strive to leave his mark upon the Earth.

It's not that life is too short, it's just that you're dead for so long.

It's not the pace of life that concerns me, it's the sudden stop at the end.

The means determine the ends.

If you can't change your mind, are you sure you have one?

Hanging's too good for a man who makes puns; he should be drawn and quoted. - Fred Allen

The test of a first-fate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise. - F. Scott Fitzgerald

The universe is full of magical things, patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper. - Eden Phillpots

There's nothing new under the sun, but there are lots of old things we don't know. - Ambrose Bierce

Husband: Darling, will you love me when I'm old and feeble? Wife: You bet I do.

Success comes in cans; failure in cannots.

Doubt everything or believe everything; these are two equally convenient strategies. With either we dispense with the need for reflection. - Henri Poincare' There are two ways to slide easily through life: to believe everything or to doubt everything; both ways save us from thinking. - Alfred Korzybski

Science is to see what everyone else has seen but think what no one else has thought. - Albert Szent-Gyorgyi

I often quote myself; it adds spice to my conversation. - G. B. Shaw

I have had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it. - Groucho Marx

Is this true or only clever? - Augustine Birrell

He is always loaded with work to do. You would indeed be fortunate to get this person to work for you. He does the work of two men (Laurel and Hardy)!

You were not supposed to see this document. Please erase your initials and initial the erasure.

With the cost of the equipment tumbling, use of videoconferencing is set to soar, and Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. has discovered another benefit in addition to the saving of time and travel costs: because of the built-in delay on the sound, the company told the New York Times, it's difficult for people to interrupt, so they actually have to listen to what the other is saying. - ComputerGram newsletter, Tandem, Inc.

A: I'm incommunicado. B: Where's Communicado? A: About 5 miles from Cognito.

Chewy pasta isn't "al dente"; it's "un-done-te". - Susan Hunt

No matter how much you know, there's an infinite amount more to know. So, no matter how much you know, you don't know how much more there is to know. Which means, no matter how much you know, you don't know how much you do know or don't know in relation to what there is to know, whatever that is, which means, you don't know much at all. - mwalls@cs.nmsu.edu

"Hope" is the thing with feathers That perches in the soul And sings the tune without the words And never stops at all - Emily Dickinson (can be sung to "Gilligan's Island" or "The Yellow Rose of Texas")

Success is setting reasonable goals and acheiving them. Success is an action - not a state, an ability, or a commodity. - Mark T. Shirey

Clothes make the man. Naked people have little influence on society. - Mark Twain

Mass media is an industry whose product is information. - Michael Crichton Mass media is an industry, yes, but its product is mass audiences which it sells to advertisers. - Joshua Adler

She's just mad because someone dropped a house on her sister. - insult inspired by the Wizard of Oz, from Beetlejuice (movie)

Clergy do more than lay people.

It's not how big your share is, it's how much you share.

Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven. - John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book I

This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. This is the way the world ends. Not with a bang, but with a whimper. - T.S. Eliot

Oh, what a tangled web we weave When first we practice to deceive. - Sir Walter Scott Oh, what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to weave.

Thinkers used to define progress, now businesses do. - Mark T. Shirey

An event is a two-tuple consisting of a time and a change. A coincidence is a three-tuple consisting of a time and two events.

Forgive her father, she knows not what she sings. - Mark T. Shirey

Be a friend to the friendless, an end to the endless, a mend to the mendless, an ear to the earless, a beer to the beerless, a fear to the fearless, affair to the fareless, a hair to the hairless.

Infinite flexibility is the secret of immortality.

Why not write a poe about thinternet. - A typo from rec.arts.poems

Harrassment by communic action. - A typo from local news

He held his raison d'etre in his hand.

The mind of the beginner is empty, free of the habits of the expert, ready to accept, to doubt, and open to all the possibilites. - Shunryu Suzuki

A good beginning makes a good ending. - English Proverb Great is the art of beginning, but greater is the art of ending. - Longfellow Give as much care to the end as to the beginning, then there will be no failure. - Lao Tzu Because the sage always confronts difficulties, he never experiences them. - Lao Tzu

Who can control his fate? - Shakespeare

Many men go fishing all of their lives without knowing that it is not fish they are after. - Henry David Thoreau

The sole advantage of power is that it can do more good. - Baltasar Gracian

I know of no teachers so powerful and persuasive as a little army of specialists. They carry no banners, they beat no drums; but where they are men learn that bustle and push are not the equals of quiet genius and serene mastery. - Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Inventors and men of genius have almost always been regarded as fools at the beginning (and very often at the end) of their careers. - Dostoyevski

A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that works. A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. - Lowell Jay Arthur, Unix Shell

In the universe, great acts are made up of small deeds. - Lao Tzu

For better or worse, man is the tool-using animal, and as such he has become the lord of creation. - William Ralph Inge

Order and simplification are the first steps toward the mastery of a subject - the actual enemy is the unknown. - Thomaas Mann

It is easier to confess a defect than to claim a quality. - Max Beerbohm

Trouble is easily overcome before it starts. Deal with it before it happens. Set things in order before there is confusion. - Lao Tzu

All words are pegs to hang ideas on. - Henry Ward Beecher

...and we stretched in our beds and rose in the late afternoons like millionaires. - Charles Bukowski

It is better to have loved and lost than to never have lost at all. - Samuel Butler (1835-1902)

A writer writes. - Throw Momma from the Train (movie) Why do writers write? Because it isn't there. - Thomas Berger

The novelist, afraid his ideas may be foolish, slyly puts them in the mouth of some other fool and reserves the right to disavow them. - Diane Johnson

He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I ever met. - Abraham Lincoln

They talk of my drinking but never my thirst. - Scottish proverb

I drink to make other people more interesting. - George Jean Nathan (1882-1958)

Even though a number of people have tried, no one has found a way to drink for a living. - Jean Kerr

I'd rather have a free bottle in front of me than a prefrontal lobotomy.

I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me. - Hunter S. Thompson

Absence makes the heart go yonder. - Robert Byrne, The 637 Best Things Anybody Ever Said

There is no pleasure in having nothing to do; the fun is having lots to do and not doing it. - John W. Raper

To travel is to discover that everyone is wrong about other countries. - Aldous Huxley (1894-1963)

The only normal people are the ones you don't know very well. - Joe Ancis

So little time and so little to do. - Oscar Levant (1906-72)

Progress might have been alright once, but it has gone on too long. - Ogden Nash (1902-71)

Early to rise and early to bed makes a man healthy, wealthy, and dead. - James Thurber

Being perfectly well-dressed gives a feeling of tranquility that religion is powerless to bestow. - Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82), quoting a friend

The national budget must be balanced. The public debt must be reduced; the arrogance of the authorities must be moderated and controlled. Payments to foreign governments must be reduced if the nation doesn't want to go bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance. - Marcus Tullius Cicero, 55 BC

God only knew. If there was a God. And if there was a God and he knew, he was not talking. And even if he did know and was talking, no one would have been listening. Not here. Not now. - Bernice Richmond, winner 1994 Internat'l Imitation Hemingway Competition

It ain't the years, it's the mileage. - Indiana Jones

I'm not playing God, I'm playing Doctor. - Susan Hunt

Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we might often win, by fearing to attempt it. - Shakespeare

I recommend no sour, ascetic life. I believe not only in the thorns on a rosebush, but in the roses which the thorns defend. Asceticism is the child of sensuality and superstition. She is the mother of many a secret sin. God, when he made man's body, did not give us a fiber too much, nor a passion too many. - Theodore Parker

College is two hundred people reading the same book, which is an obvious mistake. Two hundred people can read two hundred books. - John Cage

He may look like an idiot, and he may sound like an idiot, but don't let him fool you. He really is an idiot. - Groucho Marx

Fresco's Discovery: If you knew what you were doing you'd probably be bored. Think how bored you'd be if you knew exactly what you were doing. - Susan Handy Strayer, et al. Think how boring you'd be if people knew exactly why you do things. - Mark T. Shirey

I like to be moved; I don't like to be pushed. - John Cage

"Being a man" is just genetics and age. The rest is mythology and statistics. - Mark T. Shirey

The right thing to say _isn't_ necessarily what you wanna' say. The right thing to do _isn't_ necessarily what you wanna' do. The right things to grow _ain't_ necessarily what you wanna' grow. Your own happiness _doesn't_ necessarily teach you what you wanna' know. - The Who, "Now I'm a Farmer" on Odds & Sods

[Maybe people don't want dolphins caught in tuna nets for the same reason that] You wouldn't want dogs caught in your cow net. - Keith Carradine

The trouble with being punctual is that people think you have nothing more important to do.

The function of Science Fiction is not to predict the future, but to prevent it. - Ray Bradbury, discussing Fahrenheit 451

He loved the rain. She came into his life and gave him an umbrella.

It only hurts when I don't laugh. - Mark T. Shirey

Success is relative: It is what we can make of the mess we have made of things. - T.S. Eliot

Two of the gravest general dangers to survival are the desire for comfort and a passive outlook. - U.S. Army Ranger Handbook

Are we content? I am the God who created this farce! - Nietzsche, 1889, 3 days before going permanently insane

For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don't, no proof is possible. - John and Lyn St. Clair Thomas, Eyes of the Beholder

Lottery: a tax on people who are bad at math.

That's the thing about being a boxer; even when you're at the top of your field people still hit you in the head. - Paula Poundstone The thing about the rat race is, even if you win, you're still a rat. - Lily Tomlin

The lyf so short, the craft so long to lerne. - Chaucer

The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Who loves not wine, women, and song Remains a fool his whole life long. - Martin Luther

In a free society, standards of public morality can be measured only by whether physical coercion, violence against persons or property, occurs. There is no right not to be offended by words, actions, or symbols. - Richard E. Sincere, Jr.

All these theories, diverse as they are, have two things in common. They explain all the observed facts and they are complete and utterly WRONG. - Terry Pratchet, "The Light Fantastic"

Some people never go crazy. What truly horrible lives they must lead. - Charles Bukowski

There are only the pursued, the pursuing, the busy, and the tired. - F. Scott Fitzgerald

Nothing is more important than doing what is right. That is so obvious most people pay no attention to it. Most people think what is obvious is beneath them. They pass up truth in favor of something more intellectually stimulating.

There is no meaning but the mind's. - Mark T. Shirey

Sex between a man and a woman can be wonderful provided you get between the right man and woman. - Woody Allen

Herman has taken to writing poetry. You need not tell anyone, for you know how such things get around. - Mrs. Melville to her mother in a letter, 1859, as quoted in "Confessions of a Barbarian: from the Journals of Edward Abbey"

I don't see how poetry can ever be easy... Real poetry, the thick dense intense complicated stuff that lives and endures, requires blood and sweat; blood and sweat are essential elements in poetry as well as behind it. - Edward Abbey, cowboy novelist

You see but you do not observe. - Sherlock Holmes

Just think of all the billions of coincidences that DON'T happen. - quoted by Dick Cavett

A man's reach should exceed his grasp, else what's a metaphor? - Marshall McCluhan

The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom. - William Blake

Without full satiation of the senses, we are pathetic objects! - Barrington J. Bayley

Enthusiastic participation only adds to the experience.

Most of what you know is hearsay - including your own name.

We are only guilty for what we have chosen to do wrongly.

I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together. - Beatles

I judge that the existence's purpose is the most urgent question. How can we answer it? - Albert Camus

Do you want to play Life or Monopoly? Let's play Life, it's shorter.

Language expresses itself through thought.

Read over your compositions, and when you meet a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out. - Samuel Johnson

When I was 20 I was in love with words, a wordsmith. I didn't know enough to know when people were letting words get in their way. Now I like the words to disappear, like a transparent curtain. - Wallace Stegner

I try to leave out the parts that people skip. - Elmore Leonard, author

Of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: It might have been. - John Greenleaf Whittier

I thought I saw upon the stair A little man who wasn't there He wasn't there again today Oh, how I wish he'd go away

Learn to edit before you've said it. - Mark T. Shirey

Skydivers are good to the last drop.

Beware of the panacea peddlers; just because you wind up naked doesn't make you an emperor. - Michael A. Padlipsky

Two guys take their pants to a Greek tailor. The tailor says, "Euripides and Euphrates?" One of the guys says, "Yeah, Eumenides?"

Dentalism My dentist chants "Ahhhhh" for mental relaxation - He's trying to transcend dental meditation. - Mark T. Shirey

I believe that one becomes stronger emotionally by having more experiences and _by taking life less personally_. That is, if your employer criticizes your report, don't take it personally; instead, find out what is needed and fix it. If your girlfriend laughs at your tie, don't take it personally; find another tie or another girlfriend. When you get sick or robbed or jilted, you will be less likely to waste your time and energy with thoughts of "Why ME?" - Marilyn vos Savant, Parade Magazine

A: My ancestors didn't struggle for millions of years to put me at the top of the food chain for me to eat tofu. B: Yes they did.

Nothing will benefit human health and increase chances for survival of life on Earth as much as the evolution to a vegetarian diet. Our task must be to free ourselves by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty. It is my view that the vegetarian manner of living by its purely physical effect on the human temperment would most beneficially influence the lot of mankind. - Albert Einstein

You can get much farther with a kind word and a gun than you can with a kind word alone. - Al Capone

It is a good rule in life never to apologize. The right sort of people do not want apologies, and the wrong sort take a mean advantage of them. - P.G. Wodehouse

It had only one fault. It was kind of lousy. - James Thurber (when asked his opinion of a play)

A manager is someone who can look at two numbers on a piece of paper and immediately tell which one is bigger. - R. Metcalfe

This is the story of four people named Everybody, Somebody, Anybody, and Nobody. There was an important job to be done and Everybody was asked to do it. Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it. Somebody got angry about that, because it was Everybody's job. Everybody thought Anybody could do it, but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn't do it. Consequently, it wound up that Nobody told Anybody so Everybody blamed Somebody.

The force can have influence on the weak-minded. - Obi Wan Kanobi, Star Wars

I didn't get to bed til 10:30 last night - and I didn't get home til 2:15! - quoted by Tom Snyder

We've been down a whole lotta alleys And we've kicked a whole lotta cans. - Ray Charles and Hank Williams, Jr.

Easy reading is damned hard writing. - Nathaniel Hawthorne

Information Superhighway - Interactive Network For Organizing, Retrieving, Manipulating, Accessing, And Transferring Information On National Systems, Unleasing Practically Every Rebellious Human Intelligence, Gratifying Hackers, Wiseacres, And Yahoos. - Kevin Kwaku Anagrams for the Information Superhighway by Peter H. Lewis, NY Times: New Utopia? Horrifying sham. When forming, utopia's hairy. Hey ignoramus - win profit? Ha! I'm on a huge wispy rhino fart.

The probability of life originating from accident is comparable to the probability of the Unabridged Dictionary resulting from an explosion in a printing factory. - Prof. Edwin Conklin

A wise man sees what he has, not what he has lost.

Cutting the space budget really restores my faith in humanity. It eliminates dreams, goals, and ideals and lets us get straight to the business of hate, debauchery, and self-annihilation. - Johnny Hart, B.C. comic-strip

Germany - "Land der Dichter und Denker" (country of poets and thinkers)

A hallmark of sanity is the courage to accept unpleasant points of view.

Only Christians go to hell. Everybody else just dies. - Cliff Hammond

Happiness is a state of mind. Not happy? Change your mind.

I am Procrastitron. I will destroy you, eventually.

Never question authority. It doesn't know either.

Mr. Jabez Wilson laughed heavily. "Well I never!" said he. "I thought at first you had done something clever, but I see that there was nothing in it, after all." "I began to think, Watson," said Holmes, "that I had made a mistake in explaining. 'Omne ignatum pro magnifico,' you know, and my poor little reputation, such as it is, will suffer shipwreck if I am so candid." - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, The Complete Sherlock Holmes

How these curiosities would be quite forgott, did not such idle fellows as I am putt them downe. - John Aubrey

I care not much for a man's religion whose dog or cat are not the better for it. - Abraham Lincoln

Kids were different then. They didn't have their heads filled with all this Cartesian dualism. - Monty Python

A Thaum is the basic unit of magical strength. It has been universally established as the amount of magic needed to create one small white pigeon or three normal sized billiard balls. - Terry Pratchett, The Light Fantastic

A computer lets you make more mistakes faster than any invention in human history - with the possible exceptions of handguns and tequila. - Mitch Ratliffe

It is of interest to note that while some dolphins are reported to have learned English - up to fifty words used in correct context - no human being has been reported to have learned dolphinese. - Carl Sagan

Why do we drive on parkways and park on driveways? Why is it that when you send something by car it's a shipment, but when you send it by ship, it's a cargo?

It's better to die cool than to live uncool. - Harley Davidson (movie)

Without leaving his door He knows everything under heaven Without looking out of his window He knows all the ways of heaven For the further one travels The less one knows Therefore the Sage arrives without going, Sees all without looking, Does nothing, yet achieves everything. - Tao Te Ching, Chapter 47

Love all; fear none.

But for the sake of a small mouthful of flesh, we deprive a soul of the sun and light, and that proportion of life and time that it had been born into the world to enjoy. - Plutarch

The general root of superstition is that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss, and commit to memory the one, and pass over the other. - Sir Francis Bacon, 1561-1626

Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankinde; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for thee. - John Donne

If a Nation expects to be ignorant and free in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be... if we are to guard against ignorance and remain free, it is the responsibility of every American to be informed. - Thomas Jefferson

Laws do not persuade just because they threaten. - Seneca, 65 CE

Ninety-eight percent of the adults in this country are decent, hardworking, honest Americans. It's the other lousy two percent that get all the publicity. But then, we elected them. - Lily Tomlin

In every work of genius we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

When one door closes another door opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the ones which open for us. - Alexander Graham Bell

Time makes more converts than reason. - Thomas Paine

Every advance in civilization has been denounced while it was still recent. - Bertrand Russell

My definition of a free society is a society where it is safe to be unpopular. - Adlai Stevenson

There is not room at the top for everyone, no matter how great their abilities. This is why many people are disappointed when their "goals" at age 22 do not happen by the time they are 42. It matters which college you went to, who your friends are, how smart you are, and how badly you want fame and fortune. - Al Willis

Why can't I be different and original, like everybody else? - Viv Stanshall

Damaged people are dangerous; they know they can survive. - Damage (movie)

When you eat meat, you are eating murder, blood, death, fat, cholesterol, muscle, connective tissues, veins, corpse, rat hairs, lips, assholes, eyeballs, guts, and flies. - Jill Ballard

Every artist is a cannibal, every poet a thief, All kill their inspiration and sing about the grief. - U2

Love is that condition in which another's happiness is essential to your own.

Do you study the law or do you study loopholes? - Jackie Luongo's mother

It's like, at the end, there's this surprize quiz: am I proud of me? I gave my LIFE to become the person I am right now! Was it worth what I paid? - Richard Bach

To say that the probability of something happening is so low that god must have done it isn't really a valid argument. Think about it the next time you get in a nice large lecture room with say 200 people: 15 years ago, I could have asked someone to calculate the probablility that all those 200 people would be gathered together in that room at that particular time and you would have said it to be impossible. - Tobias S. Keidl

I do feel that spiritual progress does demand at some stage that we should cease to kill our fellow creatures for the satisfaction of our bodily wants. - Mahatma Gandhi

- With the first link, a chain is forged. The first speech censured, the first thought forbidden, the first freedom denied, chains us all irrevocably. - Captain Picard, Star Trek:TNG, "The Drumhead"

Sometimes I Miss Her (a love poem) I ran into my old girlfriend today. Then I backed up and ran into her again. Sometimes I miss her. - Jeff Ross (comedian)

New York is great - you see so many interesting people and things. For example, I saw Angela Lansbury in an antique store the other day. 800 bucks. - Jeff Ross (comedian)

How can you start a revolution if you won't walk on the grass? - Russian folk saying

It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. It is by the beans of Java that thoughts acquire speed, the hands acquire shaking, the shaking becomes a warning. It is by caffeine alone I set my mind in motion. - after Dune (movie)

I WISH YOU PEACE AND BALANCE IN YOUR LIFE. May you find the things you value; I wish there to always be hope and happiness in your world. As you give to this world, may it give back to you. PEACE AND BEST WISHES NOW AND ALWAYS! - Sherwood Smith (Hand-typed Christmas card, 1991)

Always there's that space between what you feel and what you do, and in that gap all human sadness lies. - Blue Dog

A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices. - William James

De omnibus dibitandum. (Everything must be questioned.)

Gray is all theory; green grows the golden tree of life. - Goethe

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue but upon probable cause, support by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. - Amendment IV, United States Constitution (Amazingly, the US House of Representatives voted this language down when it was inserted in a 1995 bill by a crafty legislator, to replace unconstitutional language proposed by another. Apparently, few in the House recognized this as the Fourth Amendment. One Representative even whined that it gutted the whole bill.)

Privacy in one's associations... may in many circumstances be indispensable to freedom of association, particularly where a group espouses dissident beliefs. - John M. Harlan, Supreme Court justice, 1958

Civilization is the progress toward a society of privacy. The savage's whole existence is public, ruled by the laws of his tribe. Civilization is the process of setting man free from men. - Ayn Rand, _The_Fountainhead_, 1943

This is the snobbery of the people on the Mayflower looking down their noses at the people who came over ON THE SECOND BOAT! - Mitch Kapor, cofounder of the EFF, on Internet-user elitism vs. BBS users

Did you learn how to think or how to believe? - Ralph Nader's Father, who asked the young Nader this while questioning him on what he had learned in school one day. Nader describes this as a seminal event in leading him to become a critic of corporate and government policies. (from an interview with Ralph Nader by David Barsamian)

Bigamy is having one wife too many. Monogamy is the same. - Oscar Wilde

Sanity is to insanity as the shell is to the egg.

Good, cheap, quick. Pick two.

It has been deemed that anything not good for you is bad, hence illegal: alcohol, caffeine, meat, contact sports, bad language, chocolate, gasoline, uneducational toys, and anything spicy. - Demolition Man (movie)

Money's just something you need in case you don't die tomorrow. - Wall Street (movie)

We are smart enough not to buy into the oldest myth running - love. It's a fiction created by people to keep them from jumping out of windows. - Gordon Gecko, Wall Street (movie)

A stranger's just a friend you haven't met.

When we've been there ten thousand years Bright shining as the sun, We've no less days to sing God's praise Than when we'd first begun. - Amazing Grace

Some acting coach claimed that there are only 7 emotions from which all others are derived: Happiness, Love, Sadness, Anger, Hate, Fear, Guilt. For example, Jealousy = Love + Fear. What about Angst, Lust, Envy, Remorse, and Ecstacy? How about the feeling when you look into the obits and find the name of the cop who gave you a speeding ticket last week? More importantly, how about the feeling when you see your mother-in-law drive over a cliff with your brand-new Mercedes? - rec.org.mensa, steiner@best.com, et al

Anticipatory plagiarism occurs when someone steals your idea and publishes it a hundred years before you were born. - Robert Merton

The mind is its own place and in itself can make a heaven of hell, a hell of heaven. - John Milton, Paradise Lost

Age is linear, personality is not. - Tim Bouvia

A thing of duty is a job forever.

During her visit, the queen was introduced to the director of the acclaimed movie "Dances With Wolves", Kevin Costner. She said "I find it quite interesting to meet you. I have a cousin who is a photographer, you know." To which Kevin Costner replied "And I'm quite happy to meet you; I have a cousin who's a queen."

No man is a hero to anyone who knows what he's thinking. - David Ambrose, The Man Who Turned Into Himself

Bad weather, like bad breath, is better than none at all.

The fact is that I did not know how to understand anything! I ought to have judged by deeds and not by words. She cast her fragrance and her radiance over me. I ought never to have run away from her. I ought to have guessed all the affection that lay behind her poor little strategems. Flowers are so inconsistent! But I was too young to know how to love her. - The Little Prince (a great book for children of all ages)

It is the time you have wasted for your rose that makes your rose so important. You become responsible, forever, for what you have tamed. You are responsible for your rose. - The Little Prince (a great book for children of all ages)

Most of American life is driving somewhere and then driving back wondering why the hell you went. - John Updike

Be not afraid of a sudden fear. - Proverbs 3:25, The Bible

The gods do not protect fools. Fools are protected by more capable fools. - Larry Niven

'I think it was a bit of an overreaction, to be honest,' said the serpent, 'I mean, first offense and everything. I can't see what's so bad about knowing the difference between good and evil, anyway.' - Gaiman/Pratchett, Good Omens

Razors pain you; Rivers are damp; Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp. Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give; Gas smells awful; You might as well live. - Dorothy Parker

The blues isn't about feelin' better. It's about makin' other people feel worse. - "Bleedin' Gums" Murphy, The Simpsons (TV show)

My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute. - Ayn Rand

To say 'I love you' one must know first how to say the 'I'. - Howard Roark in The Fountainhead, by Ayn Rand

Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another. - John Galt in Atlas Shrugged, by Ayn Rand

The subject of sex is complex and belongs largely to the science of psychology. I asked Ayn Rand once what philosophy specifically has to say on the subject. She answered: "It says that sex is good." - Leonard Peikoff in Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand

A man's work is nothing but a long journey to recover through the detours of art the two or three simple and great images which first gained access to his heart. - Albert Camus

Intellectuals deal in abstractions. It's much safer that way. Writers take risks. They deal in anecdotes and parables. - Kay Boyle

The interior life is a real life, and the intangible dreams of people have a tangible effect upon the world. - James Baldwin

When the histories are written it is only the poets, and those who read them, who remain. - Kay Boyle in the collection "Words That Must Somehow Be Said"

To fulfill one's destiny, one must never cease converting one's life to wider concepts and wider uses. - Andre Malraux (in Kay Boyle's essays)

If the writers of Germany through their vision and their expression of that vision had made richer and more impelling promises than those Hitler had made, it would have been Hitler, and not the writers of Germany, who would've been forced into exile. - Thomas Mann (in Kay Boyle's essays)

People who are threatened by jokes are the same people who tend to refer to actors on soap operas by their characters' names. Listen, there's the Real World, and then there's the Joke World, ok? The Joke World can get tough. Wear a cup. - Dennis Miller

Father's Day is nine months before Mother's Day.

Two termites walk into a bar and one says, "Is the bar tender here?" Two termites walk into a bar and the bartender asks, "What wood you like?" Two termites walk into a bar and one says, "This place is a joke."

Wee, sleekit, cow'rin tim'rous beastie, O, what a panic in thy breastie! Thou need na start awa sae hasty, Wi' bickering brattle! - Robert Burns, "To a Mouse", 1785

The best laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft a-gley - Robert Burns, "To a Mouse", 1785

Nobody makes a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little. - Edmund Burke

The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ Moves on: nor all thy Piety nor Wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line, Nor all thy Tears wash out a Word of it. - Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

I'm stranded all alone in the gas station of love, and I have to use the self-service pumps! - "Weird Al" Yankovic, "One More Minute"

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun. - Ecclesiastes 1:9, The Bible

Out There things can happen and frequently do To people as brainy and footsy as you. And when things start to happen, don't worry. Don't stew. Just go right along. You'll start happening too. - Dr. Seuss, Oh The Places You'll Go

Romans used a brine-soaked sponge on a stick for toilet paper. In the New Testament, Jesus is mocked with one (though it's often translated as "sour wine"). - paraphrase from RE/search Guide to Bodily Fluids, by Paul Spinrad

What a pity! A mountain peak as tiny as one square inch has been the source of great inspiration and misery for centuries. - Anonymous Chinese poet

Essence, Chi, and Spirit are the three jewels of life. - Book of Changes and the Unchanging Truth, Master Ni Hua Ching

Marriage is the only adventure open to the cowardly. - Voltaire

There is always something more important than what you are doing. - Sriram Ramkrishna

Taxation WITH representation ain't so hot either. - Gerald Barzan

It is useless for the sheep to pass resolutions in favor of vegetarianism while the wolf remains of different opinion. - William Ralph Inge

An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less until he knows absolutely everything about nothing. - Nicholas Murray Butler

No man can step into the same river twice, for the second time it is not the same river, and he is not the same man. - Heraclitus

Think like a person of action and act like a person of thought.

He died while taking part in a public ceremony when the platform gave way. In other words, he was hanged.

I admit that I think that it is better to be beautiful than to be good. But on the other hand, no one is more ready than I am to acknowledge that it is better to be good than to be ugly. - Oscar Wilde

Life is like playing a violin in public and learning the instrument as one goes on. - Samuel Butler (1835-1902)

Success is not permanent and failure is not fatal.

So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence. - Bertrand Russell

Reputation is character minus what you've been caught doing. - Michael Iapoce

If you don't like someone, the way he holds his spoon makes you furious; If you like him, he can turn his plate over in your lap and you won't mind. - Irving Becker

The opposite of a correct statement is a false statement. But the opposite of a profound truth may well be another profound truth. - Niels Bohr

One could not be a successful scientist without realizing that, in contrast to the popular conception supported by newspapers and mothers of scientists, a goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid. - J. D. Watson _The Double Helix_

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology. - Carl Sagan

If once a man indulges himself in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing, and from robbing he next comes to drinking and Sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination. - Thomas De Quincey (1785-1859)

Everything you read in the newspapers is absolutely true, except for that rare story of which you happen to have firsthand knowledge. - Erwin Knoll

Life is an illusion. You are what you think you are. - Yale Hirsch

To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of the arts. - Henry David Thoreau

You can get everything you want in life if you help enough people get what they want. - Zig Ziglar

Great works are performed not by strength, but perserverance. - Samuel Johnson

Chance favors the prepared mind. - Louis Pasteur

Lack of money is the root of all evil. - George Bernard Shaw

My doctor gave me two weeks to live. I hope they're in August. - Ronnie Shakes

Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. - Ghandi

Incorrigible punster - Do not incorrige. - button

If you have a job without aggravations, you don't have a job. - Malcolm Forbes

I have enough money to last me the rest of my life, unless I buy something. - Jackie Mason

University politics are vicious precisely because the stakes are so small. - Henry Kissinger

I can't mate in captivity. - Gloria Steinem on why she never married

Men have a much better time of it than women; for one thing they marry later; for another thing they die earlier. - H. L. Mencken (1880-1956)

A Freudian slip is when you say one thing but mean your mother.

I am not a vegetarian because I love animals; I am a vegetarian because I hate plants. - A. Whitney Brown, SNL

668: The Neighbor of the Beast

Writing about music is like dancing about architecture.

The overwhelming majority of people have more than the average number of legs. - E. Grebenik

"If we do happen to step on a mine, Sir, what do we do?" "Normal procedure, Lieutenant, is to jump 200 feet in the air and scatter oneself over a wide area." - Somewhere in No Man's Land

The mind is not a vessel to be filled but a fire to be kindled. - Plutarch

Tommy Lasorda, on former Los Angeles Dodger catcher Mike Scioscia: "If he raced his pregnant wife, he'd finish third."

George Foreman, when asked whether he worries about brain damage: "Anybody going into boxing already has brain damage."

Former boxer Art Aragon, the original Golden Boy: I'll never forget my last time at Madison Square Garden. Hundreds of people were screaming for me. I must have sold 250 hot dogs.

Amy Perinutter of Manchester (N.J.) high school after pinning Hawthorne's Catrina Carriales in the state's first all-female wrestling match: I was pumped up for this match. I didn't want to lose to a girl.

Chicago Bulls coach Phil Jackson, when told that parents were complaining about buying their kids No. 45 Michael Jordan jerseys only to have Jordan switch back to No. 23, replied: "Buy them books."

If you can keep your head while all those around you are losing theirs - you won't have anyone to talk to. - Mark T. Shirey

He who laughs last thinks slowest!

Always remember you're unique, just like everyone else.

We have enough youth, how about a Fountain of Intelligence?

People use appearances to make judgements about reality. - Theodore Levitt, Harvard Business School

Rule of thumb: As a rule, keep your thumbs away from hammers. - Mark T. Shirey

1 + 1 = 10

Writing in free verse is like playing tennis with the nets down. - Robert Frost

Blank Verse - unrhymed iambic pentameters - the most difficult kind of English verse to write acceptably; a kind, therefore, much affected by those who cannot acceptably write any kind. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Is that it? Am I just another yahoo in the end!? - Lemuel Gulliver, Gulliver's Travels

Punctuality is an excellent virtue, providing you don't mind being lonely and waiting for others.

Reflect upon your present blessings of which every man has many; not upon your past misfortunes of which all have some. - Charles Dickens (1812-1870)

Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall. - Confucius It's not how hard you fall, but how high you bounce. - H. Jackson Brown

Of all forms of caution, caution in love is perhaps the most fatal to true happiness. - Bertrand Russell (1872-1972)

Who you are can depend on who you meet. -Duncan MacLeod What you are is where you were when. - Dr. Massey

Amateurs imitate; professionals steal.

Are you one of those trashy authors who throws literature readers? - Elliot Abrams, Accu-Weather

Q: How many Psychiatrists does it take to change a light bulb? A: One, but the light bulb has to _want_ to change.

Morality is common sense plus consensus. - Mark T. Shirey

Strong religious belief is a mental illness. - Mark T. Shirey, after Freud

Yo momma so fat when she jumps up in the air she gets stuck. Yo momma so ugly when she sits in the sand on the beach, cats try to bury her. Yo momma so poor when I saw her kicking a can down the street, I asked her what she was doing, she said "Moving."

Be very, very careful what you put into that head, because you will never, ever get it out. - Cardinal Wolsey (1475?-1530)

God is a concept / by which we measure our pain. - John Lennon

It is always hard when reality intrudes on belief. - Alan Dean Foster, Cyber Way

Only existence has meaning. - Alan Dean Foster, Cyber Way

Knowledge is camoflage. It merely disguises what lies beneath. - Alan Dean Foster, Cyber Way

Today's solution is tomorrow's problem.

Texan for "full of hot air": "All hat and no cattle."

Ever see a cat fish? A car wash? A toilet bowl? A kitchen sink? A cigar box? A tape drive? A hen weigh? (What's a hen weigh? About 10 pounds.)

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God wo has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use. - Galileo

Keep the company of those who seek the truth, and run away from those who have found it. - B. Havel

If you lack sincerity in your search for the truth, you will find what you want to find, whether it is true or not. - Mark T. Shirey

Do you know what it is to be damned? It has nothing to do with fire. To be damned is only not to love.

Do what thy manhood bids thee do, From none but self expect applause. He noblest lives, and noblest does, Who makes and keeps his self-made laws. - Richard Burton, in ?

Small victories win wars. - Mark T. Shirey

If the world were logical, men would ride side-saddle.

Don't believe in man-made religions.

Belief in untrue things is immoral. - Mark T. Shirey Faith is immoral. - Mark T. Shirey

The Rhinoceros Horn (an excerpt) People keep you company and serve you for a motive; Real friends are hard to find these days. People are insincere, clever in pursuing their own ends; Wander alone like the rhinoceros. - Buddhist scrolls, c. 100 CE

Real Life - a cool, multi-player game. The plot stinks but the graphics are awesome. - havoc@freeway.net

My atheism, like that of Spinoza, is true piety towards the Universe and denies only gods fashioned by men in their own image to be servants of their human interests. - George Santayana (1863-1952)

complacency effect - when the use of (normally reliable) automation leads to reduced awareness of the state of the system. complexity effect - when increased automation makes some straightforward tasks more complex and interdependent. - Peter Ladkin, http://www.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de/~ladkin/

Consider well who you are, what you do, whence you come, and whither you go. - English Proverb

Someone sent me a postcard picture of the earth. On the back it said, "Wish you were here." - Steven Wright

I worry that, especially as the Millennium edges nearer, pseudoscience and superstition will seem year by year more tempting, the siren song of unreason more sonorous and attractive. - Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World

He knows not his own faith who knows not his neighbor's. - Charles Francis Potter, The Faiths Men Live By

Whatever I was going to be able to do had to be by virtue of my dealing with the only asset I had, and that was my experience. - R. Buckminster Fuller

I'm not trying to counsel any of you to do anything really special except to dare to think and to dare to go with the truth and to dare to really love completely. - R. Buckminster Fuller

I'm utterly convinced that we are all here for one another and that every experience that everyone is having is relevant. It all counts. The Universe is so extraordinarily well-designed that it needs all those experiences. - R. Buckminster Fuller

From my viewpoint, by far the greatest challenge facing the young people today is that of responding and conforming only to their own most delicately insistent intuitive awareness of what the truth seems to them to be as based on their own experiences and not on what others have interpreted to be the truth regarding events of which neither they nor others have experienced-based knowledge. - R. Buckminster Fuller

I am certain that none of the world's problems have any hope of solution except through all of the world's individuals becoming thoroughly and comprehensively self-educated. Only then will society be able to identify, and inter- communicate, the vital problems of total world society. Only then may humanity effectively sort out and put those problems into an order of importance for solutions that will work for all life on Earth. - R. Buckminster Fuller

If anyone disagrees with anything I say, I am quite prepared not only to retract it, but also to deny under oath that I ever said it. - Tom Lehrer

What concerns me is the proliferation, not just of nonsense and sloppy thinking per se, but of a particular kind of nonsense and sloppy thinking: one that denies the existence of objective realities, or (when challenged) admits their existence but downplays their practical relevance. - Alan Sokal, in his now notorious Lingua Franca article

No man does anything from a single motive. - Samuel Taylor Coleridge There are many reasons for everything. - Mark T. Shirey

When I feed the poor, I am called a hero; When I ask why the poor are hungry, I am called a communist. - Brazilian bishop Dom Helder Camara

First say to yourself what you would be; and then do what you have to do. - Epictetus (55-135 CE)

It was, of course, a lie what you read about my religious convictions, a lie which is being systematically repeated. I do not believe in a personal God and I have never denied this but have expressed it clearly. If something is in me which can be called religious then it is the unbounded admiration for the structure of the world so far as our science can reveal it. - Albert Einstein

Mass-Transit Existentialism: When a train breaks down, well, there you is. When a plane breaks down, well, there you ain't. - in "The Delaney Sisters: Their First 100 Years"

Q: Did you hear what happened to the woman who backed into an airplane propeller? A: Disaster...

Information is not knowledge, knowledge is not wisdom, wisdom is not truth, truth is not beauty, beauty is not love.

A developer is someone who wants to build a home in the woods; an environmentalist is someone who already has one.

We would have much peace if we would not busy ourselves with the sayings and doings of others. - Thomas A. Kempis

All life itself represents a risk, and the more lovingly we live our lives the more risks we take..." - M. Scott Peck, The Road Less Traveled

It is only in sorrow [that] bad weather masters us; in joy we face the storm and defy it. - Amelia E. Barr (1885)

Spelling test: accommodate, occurrence, occasion, judgment, harass, commitment, embarrass, separate, liaison, cemetery, consensus.

If you think squash is a competitive activity, try flower arranging. - Alan Bennett

Golf is a good walk spoiled. - Mark Twain

We work not only to produce, but to give value to time. - Eugene Delacroix

There is properly no history, only biography. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage. - Anais Nin

An angel offered someone their choice of infinite wisdom, health, or wealth. The person chose wisdom and sat silently for a few minutes, contemplating the mysteries of life and the universe, and then said "I should've taken the money."

War - it doesn't determine who's right, only who's left.

Don't be angry at me for being an atheist. YOU'RE the one who thinks I'm evil and going to hell and you don't even know me! How do you think I feel!

Men never do evil so fully and cheerfully as when we do it out of conscience. - Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by. - Douglas Adams

I don't suffer from insanity. I enjoy every minute of it.

Men never do evil so fully and cheerfully as when we do it out of conscience. - Blaise Pascal (1623-1662)

I love deadlines. I like the whooshing sound they make as they fly by. - Douglas Adams

What's brown and sticky? A stick. What do you call a boomerang that doesn't come back? A stick. What does a clutch hitter bat with? A stick.

Perception is merely a state of mind in which the perceiver's arrogance over rules the probable truth. - A.E. Cole-Clark, c9414388@alinga.newcastle.edu.au

The empirical universe came from nothing, was caused by nothing, means nothing, and is going to nothing. Deal with it.

In saying, therefore, that things are not good according to any standard of goodness, but simply by the will of God, it seems to me that one destroys, without realizing it, all the love of God and all his glory; for why praise him for what he has done, if he would be equally praiseworthy in doing the contrary? - Liebniz, "Discourse on Metaphysics"

Why does the American government care so much about eradicating cannabis but cares so little about eradicating poverty, homelessness, and hunger?

Satyan eva jayate ("Truth alone prevails.") - Mohandas Gandhi

Whenever I date a guy, I think, is this the man I want my children to spend their weekends with? - Rita Rudner

Murder is a crime. Describing murder is not. Sex is not a crime. Describing sex is. - Gershon Legman

Theoretical physicist - a physicist whose existence is postulated, to make the numbers balance, but who is never actually observed in the laboratory. - Unknown (found in Tom Strong's quote file)

Interesting, isn't it, that the Pope drives around in a car with bulletproof glass in the window. Jesus Christ never wore nail-proof gloves, though, did he? - John Dowie

Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation. Stupidity is not a sin; the victim can't help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentence is death, there is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity. - Lazarus Long

Revolution is the opium of the intellectuals. - East End (London) graffito from the film "O Lucky Man

This product not intended for use by personnel incapable of understanding the manual. - boy brent (bcapps@cse.ogi.edu)

No man whose testicles have been crushed or whose organ has been cut off may become a member of the assembly of the Lord. - Deuteronomy 23:1

New York is real. The rest is done with mirrors. - Culture Time: 20 PAST MIDNIGHT message of the day

There are no illegitimate children - only illegitimate parents. - Judge Leon R. Yankwich, decision in Zipkin v. Mozon, June 1928

The fact is, and it is a *fact*, the Catholic Church has never had but one single ultimate goal: the total mental, physical and spiritual domination of every being on this globe. Every move the Church has made throughout its existence has been to further that goal. Despite periodic lapses in taste, such as the Inquisition and the various purges and conquests, it's been crafty and subtle in moving on its goal. - Tom Robbins, _Another Roadside Attraction_

Any man who is not something of a socialist before he is forty has no heart. Any man who is still a socialist after he is forty has no head. - Wendell L. Willkie (quoted by Richard Norton Smith)

Friendship needs no words - it is solitude delivered from the anguish of loneliness. - Dag Hammarskjold

Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction. - Pascal

Mystery is the essential element in any work of art. - Luis Bunuel

Anything is art if the artist says it is. - Marcel Duchamp, "Dadas on Art"

A man cannot be too careful in the choice of his enemies. - Oscar Wild, Picture of Dorian Gray

Society prepares the crime, the criminal commits it. - Buckle

True Ease in Writing comes from Art, not Chance, As those move easiest who have learned to dance. - Alexander Pope

Poetry must resist the intelligence almost successfully. - Wallace Stevens, "Proverbs

A book of verse beneath the bough a jug of wine, a loaf of bread - and thou beside me singing in the wilderness. - The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam

Thoughts tend to collect in pools. - Wallace Stevens, "Proverbs

Verbing weirds language. - Calvin

So, naturalists observe, a flea Hath smaller fleas that on him prey; And these have smaller still to bite 'em; And so proceed ad infinitum. - Jonathan Swift, "On Poetry, A Rhapsody"

Any uncontrolled fusion reaction you can see from 93 million miles away is disconcerting. - Derek A. Petrey 

Freedom means being able to say 2+2=4. - George Orwell, _1984_

Street lights timed for 35 mph are also timed for 70 mph. - Jim Samuels

Washington is just Hollywood for ugly people. - Liz Winstead

The darkest hour of any man's life is when he sits down to plan how to get money without earning it. - Horace Greeley

Freedom doesn't become 'lost' through abuse; freedom is lost through our failure to exercise it. - Elf Sternberg (elf@halcyon.com)

A free society is one where it is safe to be unpopular. - Adlai Stevenson

In fact anything digital is apparently OK with GOD! Check Matthew 5:37. It unequivocally gives the OK on binary (yea or nay) communication. Ergo technologies dependant on them must also be OK. - itcbobw@servtech.com

"Go to father", she said, when I asked her to wed. She knew that I knew that her father was dead. She knew that I knew what a life he had led. She knew that I knew what she meant when she said, "Go to father." - anonymous (found in sherwood@arafel.space.ualberta.ca's sig)

Documentation: (n.) a novel sold with software, designed to entertain the operator during episodes of bugs or glitches. - Tonkin's First Computer Dictionary

K: (n., adj.) a binary thousand, which isn't a decimal thousand or even really a binary thousand (which is eight), but is the binary number closest to a decimal thousand. This has proven so completely confusing that is has become a standard. - Tonkin's First Computer Dictionary

Megahertz: (n.) a way of measuring how well your computer matches the fre- quency of your local television channels. - Tonkin's First Computer Dictionary

Quantum leap: (adj.) literally, to move by the smallest amount theoretically possible. In advertising, to move by the largest leap imaginable (in the mind of the advertiser). There is no contradiction. - Tonkin's First Computer Dictionary

Of course it has civilian applications. You might wanna kill your friends someday. - Jim Zelenka

A man conducting a gee-whizz science show with fifty thousand dollars worth of Frankenstein equipment is not doing anything scientific if he knows beforehand what the results of his efforts are going to be. A motorcycle mechanic, on the other hand, who honks the horn to see if the battery works is informally conducting a true scientific experiment. - Robert M. Pirsig

# - number sign; pound; pound sign; hash; sharp; crunch; hex; [mesh]. Rare: grid; crosshatch; octothorpe; flash; , pig-pen; tictactoe; scratchmark; thud; thump; splat. - The New Hacker's Dictionary

But in the things of God natural reason is often at a loss. - Thomas Aquinas

Cynic, n. A blackguard whose faulty vision sees things as they are, not as they ought to be. - Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

It's sad that I'm still going on bad dates when I should be in a bad marriage by now. - Laura Keitlinger (comedian)

Why do conservatives tend to support greed, religious fanaticism, racism, unnecessary wars, and assault weapons?

Life is like a talk show. In the words of Johnny Carson, "If you buy the premise, you'll buy the bit." And in the words of David Letterman, "It's just an exhibition, it's not a competition, so please - no wagering." - Mark T. Shirey

We need hand gestures for "Excuse me" and "I'm sorry" and "Thank you". - Mark T. Shirey

Eight letters 4 ecological cars & trains reside in code. - an acrostic puzzle by Mark T. Shirey

When dealing with people, remember you're not dealing with creatures of logic, but with creaturs of emotion, creatures bristling with prejudice and motivated by pride and vanity. - Dale Carnegie

Everything you've learned in school as "obvious" becomes less and less obvious as you begin to study the universe. For example, there are no solids in the universe. There's not even a suggestion of a solid. There are no absolute continuums. There are no surfaces. There are no straight lines. - R. Buckminster Fuller

The key to capitalism: Make something worth buying.

If you weren't doing it now, would you start? - Peter Drucker, mgmt consultant

The artist is extremely lucky who is presented with the worst possible ordeal which will not actually kill him. At that point, he's in business. - John Berryman

'Chapeau' means 'hat'. 'Oeuf' means 'egg'. It's like thost French have a different word for everything. - Steve Martin

Who ever knows he is deep, strives for clarity, whoever would like to appear deep to the crowd, strives for obscurity. For the crowd considers anything deep if only it cannot see to the bottom: the crowd is so timid and afraid of going into the water. - Friedrich Neitzche (1882)

Memento audere semper (Remember to always dare.) Fortuna audaces iuvat (Luck helps the fearless.)

Aequam memento rebus in arduis... Servare mentem (Remember when life's path is steep, to keep your mind even.)

Tempus abire tibi est (It is time for you to leave this scene!)

"... I have understanding... of digital watches. And soon I shall have understanding of videocassette recorders and car telephones. And when I have understanding of them, I will have understanding of computers. And when I have understanding of computers, _I_ shall be the supreme being. - The Evil One, Time Bandits (movie)

... If I were creating a world, I wouldn't mess about with butterflies and daffodils. I would've started with lasers - 8 o'clock, day one. - The Evil One, Time Bandits (movie)

The way to a man's heart is not through his stomach, but through his imagination. - Mark T. Shirey

Honey is in the hive of the bee holder. - Mark T. Shirey

Darkness is cause by _things_ coming between you and the light. - Mark T. Shirey

If you see the bomb squad running, try and keep up.

Either these curtains go or I do. - Oscar Wildes other last words

Die, my dear Doctor? That's the last thing I shall do! - Lord Palmerston

Stop here my friend and cast an eye, For you are now as once was I As I am now, so you will be So come my friend and follow me. - On a tombstone in Ohio, and underneath: To follow you I'm not content Until I know which way you went.

Without censorship, things can get terribly confused in the public mind. - General William Westmoreland

If a man is talking in the woods and no woman hears him... is he still wrong?

We forfeit three-fourths of ourselves to be like other people. - Schopenhauer

The key to keeping up with technology is to ask, "Does this help me?"

A man must carry knowledge with him, if he would bring home knowledge. - Samuel Johnson

Ever to confess you're bored means you have no inner resources. - John Berryman

When I make myself imagine what it is like to be one of those women who live at home, faithfully serving their husbands - women who have not a single exciting prospect in life yet who believe that they are perfectly happy - I am filled with scorn. - Sei Shonagon (trans. Ivan Morris)

Study to be quiet, and to do your own business. - I Thessalonians 4:11

Frustra fit per plura quod potest fieri per pauciora. - Occam

When you believe in things that you don't understand, you will suffer. Superstition ain't the way. - Stevie Wonder

The universe runs on the complex interweaving of three elements: energy, matter and enlightened self-interest. - G'Kar, Babylon 5 Bad things happen when the 'enlightened' bit is missing. - Shane@ranplc.co.uk

One should always be a little improbable. - Oscar Wilde

Men become civilized, not in proportion to their willingness to believe, but in proportion to their readiness to doubt. - H. L. Mencken

There is only one basic human right, the right to do as you please unless it causes others harm. With it comes the only basic human duty, the duty to take the consequences. - P.J. O'Rourke

A dog looks at its owner and thinks "You feed me, care for me, and love me...you must be a god!" A cat looks at its owner and thinks "You feed me, care for me, and love me...I must be a god!"

In Rome, the emperor sat in a special part of the Colleseum known as the Ceasarian Section. - George Carlin

Sometimes, when I'm told to use my own discretion, if no one is looking I'll use someone else's. But I always put it back. - George Carlin

Trees - first you chop 'em down, then you chop 'em up. - George Carlin

EIEIO is a gross mispelling of the word "farm". - George Carlin

Belief in evolution is like belief in gravity - completely unnecessary. - Raistlin Majere

It is the final proof of God's omnipotence that He need not exist in order to save us. - Peter De Vries

Nature doesn't take care of individuals. - Dave Yost, dave@yost.com, 9/97, http://web.Yost.com/

The road to heaven is not paved. - Dave Yost, 10/97, http://web.Yost.com/

Dog's motto: If it doesn't move or smell, make it either move or smell. Army's motto: If it moves, shoot it; if it doesn't, paint it.

Never ascribe to intelligence that which can adequately be explained by trickery. - Dave Yost, 9/97, http://web.Yost.com/

He wants to die rich, Sire. And so he shall. Give him this sack of gold and then strangle him. - Hercules Gritpype-Thynne, The Goon Show

It is wrong always, everywhere and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficient evidence. - W. K. Clifford

One of the pioneers of quantum mechanics said, of someone else's theory, "That's not even wrong."

If you limit your actions in life to things that nobody can possibly find fault with, you will not do much. - Charles Lutwidge Dodgson

The cop gets up to my window, and asks "Son, do you *really* think you're gonna get there any quicker, the faster you drive?" My sister, a physics major, blurts out "DUH! Of *course* he is! Don't YOU get places sooner when YOU drive faster?" He said, "Well, yeah, I DO. I never thought about that. Okay, Just try to keep it down to a dull roar."

Life is short, the art long, opportunity fleeting, experience treacherous, judgement difficult. - Hippocrates, Aphorisms, Section I

They [the Americans] have all a lively faith in the perfectibility of man, they judge that the diffusion of knowledge must necessarily be advantageous, and the consequences of ignorance fatal; they all consider society as a body in a state of improvement, humanity as a changing scene, in which nothing is, or ought to be, permanent; and they admit what appears to them today to be good, may be superseded by something better tomorrow. - Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America, 1835

All the world's a stage, And all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances; And one man in his time plays many parts, His acts being seven ages. At first the infant, Mewling and puking in the nurses arms. And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel, And shining morning face, creeping like snail Unwilllingly to school. And then the lover, Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier, Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard, Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel, Seeking the bubble reputation Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice, In fair round belly with good capon lined, With eyes severe and beard of formal cut, Full of wise saws and modern instances; And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts Into the lean and slippered pantaloon, With spectacles on nose and pouch on side, His youthful hose well saved, a world too wide For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice, Turning again toward childish treble, pipes And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all, That ends this strange, eventful history, Is second childishness, and mere oblivion, Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything. - William Shakespeare

If men are to be precluded from offering their sentiment on a matter which may involve the most serious and alarming of consequences that can invite the consideration of mankind, reason is of no use to us; the freedom of speech may be taken away, and dumb and silent may we be led, like sheep to the slaughter. - George Washington

And this, too, shall pass away.

No one who, like me, conjures up the most evil of those half-tamed demons that inhabit the human breast, and seeks to wrestle with them, can expect to come through the struggle unscathed. - Sigmnund Freud, Complete Psychological Works, Dora, 1905

The great wish of some is to avenge themselves on some particular enemy, the great wish of others is to save their own pocket. Slow in assembling, they devote a very small fraction of the time to consideration of any public object, most of it to the prosecution of their own objects. Meanwhile each fancies that no harm will come of his neglect, that it is the business of somebody else to look after this or that for him; and so, by the same notion being entertained by all separately, the common cause imperceptibly decays. - Thucydides, History of the Peloponnesian War, Book I:141, 431-413 BC

The presence of a body of well-instructed men, who have not to labor for their daily bread, is important to a degree which cannot be overestimated; as all high intellectual work is carried on by them, and on such work material progress of all kinds mainly depends, not to mention other and higher advantages. - Charles Darwin, Descent of Man, Chap 4, 1871

You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait. Do not even wait, be quite still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstacy at your feet. - Franz Kafka, Great Wall of China

American life is a powerful solvent. It seems to neutralize every intellectual element, however tough and alien it may be, and to fuse it in the native good will, complacency, thoughtlessness, and optimism. - George Santayana, Character and Opinion in the US, 1920

We pass the word around; we ponder how the case is put by different people; we read the poetry; we meditate over the literature; we play the music; we change our minds; we reach an understanding. Society evolves this way, not by shouting each other down, but by the unique capacity of unique, individual human beings to comprehend each other. - Lewis Thomas, The Medusa and the Snail, On Committees, 1979

I ponder my principal principles in my cubical cubicle. - Mark T. Shirey

Many religionists agree with me: "Without faith, God is nothing." - Mark T. Shirey

You can't make money by betting on all the horses. - Mark T. Shirey

If you buy the premise, you buy the bit. - Johnny Carson If you buy the premise, you buy the hidden message. - Mark T. Shirey

Call me, Ishmael. - Ishmael's girlfriend

Due to the shape of the North American elk's esophagus, even if it could speak, it could not pronounce the word "lasagna". - Cliff Clavin, Cheers

Always do business as if the person you're doing business with is trying to screw you. Because most likely they are. And if they're not, you can be pleasantly surprised. - Jimmy Dell (Steve Martin) in The Spanish Prisoner

We are all flowers in God's garden and this stuff they keep shoveling over us can only make us stonger and more beautiful. - Michael Amrine to Dave@Yost.com's mother

You can pretend to be serious; you can't pretend to be witty. - Sacha Guitry You can fake nice but you can't fake smart. - Mark T. Shirey

The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources. - Albert Einstein

As you ramble on through life, brother, whatever be your goal: keep you eyes upon the donut, and not upon the hole! - Murray Banks

Nothing is more intolerable than to have to admit to yourself your own errors. - Ludwig van Beethoven The full weight of my own value system came crashing down upon me. - Mark T. Shirey

I don't have any solution but I certainly admire the problem. - Ashleigh Brilliant

It is better to be defeated on principle than to win on lies. - Arthur Calwell

Freedom is nothing else but a chance to be better. - Albert Camus

Man is able to do what he is unable to imagine. - Renι Char

We must believe in luck. For how else can we explain the success of those we don't like? - Jean Cocteau

You don't drown by falling in the water; you drown by staying there. - Edwin Louis Cole

To gain that which is worth having, it may be necessary to lose everything else. - Bernadette Devlin

Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work. - Thomas Alva Edison

Great spirits have always encountered violent opposition from mediocre minds. - Albert Einstein

Failure is the opportunity to begin again more intelligently. - Henry Ford

When everyone is against you, it means you are absolutely wrong

or you are absolutely right. - Albert Guinon

The first myth of management is that it exists. The second myth of management is that success equals skill. - Robert Heller

Oh, my friend, it's not what they take away from you that counts. It's what you do with what you have left. - Hubert Humphrey

If all else fails, immortality can always be assured by spectacular error. - John Kenneth Galbraith

When I discover who I am, I'll be free. - Ralph Ellison

The best way to predict the future is to invent it. - Alan Kay

I like pigs. Dogs look up to us. Cats look down on us. Pigs treat us as equals. - Winston Churchill

Confutatis maledictis / flammis acribus addictis (When the damned are confounded and consigned to sharp flames) - Mozart's Requiem Mass, Dies Irae section

Tobacco is a stimulant that people take to mellow out; alcohol is a depressant that people take to party on. - Mark T. Shirey

Big Bang Theory: In the beginning there was nothing, which exploded. - Terry Pratchett

Either Jesus was a raving lunatic of an unusually abominable type or else he was, and is, precisely what he said. - C.S. Lewis Jesus was a raving lunatic of an unusually abominable type. - Anonymous

English is the de facto lingua franca. - Randy Cassingham

It is of no use saying, "We are doing our best." You have got to succeed in doing what is necessary. - Winston Churchill

Koin ya no-goto she' (A lifetime goes like an arrow).

Carpe pecuniam! - Roger L. Smith

I do not rule Russia; 10,000 clerks do. - Czar Nicholas I

I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you... you are in charge of your Attitudes. - Charles Swindoll

My haiku rocks It has four, eleven, and five syllables That's right, isn't it? - gadde@cs.duke.edu (Syam Gadde)

We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are. - Anais Nin

Freedom is actually a bigger game than power. Power is about what you can control. Freedom is about what you can unleash. - Harriet Rubin

You must live in the present... find your eternity in each moment. Fools stand on their island of opportunities and look toward another land. There is no other land, there is no other life but this. - Henry David Thoreau

Don't be afraid your life will end; be afraid that it will never begin. - Grace Hansen

I am convinced that life is 10% what happens to me and 90% how I react to it. And so it is with you... we are in charge of our Attitudes. - Charles Swindoll

Live with intention. Walk to the edge. Listen hard. Practice wellness. Play with abandon. Laugh. Choose with no regret. Continue to learn. Appreciate your friends. Do what you love. Live as if this is all there is.

A mosquito cried out in pain: "A chemist has poisoned my brain!" The cause of his sorrow was para-dichlorodiphenyltrichloroethane [DDT]

Laws are felt only when the individual comes into conflict with them. - Susanne LaFollette

An angel offers someone their choice of infinite wisdom, health, or wealth. The person chooses wisdom and sits silently for a few minutes, contemplating the mysteries of life and the universe, and then says "I should've taken the money."

I enjoy incomprehensible nonsense and completely counter-productive mis-information, but only in small doses.

The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill; but time and chance happeneth to them all. – Hebrew Bible. Ecclesiastes 9:11.

The only currencies in cyberspace are honesty, intelligence, creativity, and technical ability. – Mark Shirey

Public opinion is a weak tyrant compared with private opinion. What a man thinks of himself, that is what determines or rather dictates his fate. – Henry D. Thoreau

Physical attractiveness is highly valued in our society, and this value has an enormous effect on people's behavior and on their feelings about themselves. The incidence of mental disorder has been found to be correlated with judged unattractiveness. Even the erroneous impression of personal unattractiveness may enhance the risk of disorder.

668 – the neighbor of the beast 6666 – the port number of the beast - Mark T. Shirey 6' 6-by-6 – the lumber of the beast - Mark T. Shirey

Programmers' Drinking Song: 100 little bugs in the code, 100 little bugs, track one down, patch it around, 101 little bugs in the code... [repeat until 0].

I can saw a woman in two, but you won't want to look in the box when I'm through. - Warren Zevon, from the song "For My Next Trick, I'll Need A Volunteer"

As a general rule, the most successful man in life is the man who has the best information. - Benjamin Disraeli (1804–81)

"When I left the dining room after sitting next to Mr. Gladstone, I thought he was the cleverest man in England. But after sitting next to Mr. Disraeli, I thought I was the cleverest woman in England."

It's humbling to note that when Mozart was my age, he'd been dead 3 years. - Tom Lehrer

A little learning is a dangerous thing; Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, And drinking largely sobers us again. - Alexander Pope

Experience is one thing you can't get for nothing. - Oscar Wilde

Your paradigm is so intrinsic to your mental process that you are hardly aware of its existence, until you try to communicate with someone with a different paradigm. - Donella Meadows

The real measure of your wealth is how much you'd be worth if you lost all your money.

Opportunity may knock only once, but temptation leans on the doorbell.

When you betray somebody else, you also betray yourself. - Isaac Bashevis Singer

Procrastination is the thief of time. - Edward Young

Our deeds follow us, and what we have been makes us what we are. -John Dykes

For it is mutual trust, even more than mutual interest that holds human associations together. Our friends seldom profit us but they make us feel safe. Marriage is a scheme to accomplish exactly that same end. - H.L. Mencken

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself. - Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoy

To obtain a man's opinion of you, make him mad. - Oliver Wendell Holmes

One man's theology is another man's belly laugh. - Robert Heinlein

At the core of all well-founded belief, lies belief that is unfounded. - Ludwig Wittgenstein

To demand 'sense' is the hallmark of nonsense. Nature does not make sense. Nothing makes sense. - Ayn Rand

To speak of right and wrong per se makes no sense at all. No act of violence, rape, exploitation, destruction, is intrinsically unjust, since life itself is violent, rapacious, exploitative, and destructive, and cannot be conceived otherwise. - Friedrich Nietzsche

In civilized life, where the happiness, and indeed almost the existence, of man depends so much upon the opinion of his fellow men, he is constantly acting a studied part. - Washington Irving

The Ideal is in thyself, the impediments too is in thyself. - Thomas Carlyle

Nature never deceives us; it is always we who deceive ourselves. - Jean-Jacques Rousseau

We invent what we love, and what we fear. - John Irving

The coward regards himself as cautious, the miser as thrifty. - Publilius Syrus

Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it. - George Santayana

There is only one thing in the world worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about. - Oscar Wilde

Truth would quickly cease to become stranger than fiction, once we got as used to it. - Henry Louis Mencken

An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows. - Dwight D. Eisenhower

Nachfolge ist Freude. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Nachfolge, 24

When people are fanatically dedicated to political or religious faiths or any other kinds of dogmas or goals, it's always because these dogmas or goals are in doubt. - Robert Pirsig, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, 146

We must be born with an intuition of mortality, before we know the word for it

before we know that there are words. Out we come, bloodied and squalling, with the knowledge that, for all the points of a compass, there's only one direction, and time is its only measure. - Tom Stoppard, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead

Those who believe without reason cannot be convinced by reason. - James Randi

[The French] have always hated us, of course ... but now they REALLY hate us, because our culture has become so dominant that they're having trouble completing so much as a single sentence without using American words. They're always blurting out statements like: "Le software de la hardware est un humdinger!" And then they get so mad that they could spit. - Dave Barry

The want of belief is a defect that ought to be concealed when it cannot be overcome. - Johnathan Swift

Here we are, we're alone in the universe, there's no God, it just seems that it all began by something as simple as sunlight striking on a piece of rock. - John Osborne

If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank. - Woody Allen

Paganism is wholesome because it faces the facts of life. Aleister Crowley

Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. - Karl Marx

Two great European narcotics, alcohol and Christianity. - Friedrich Nietzsche

After coming into contact with a religious man I always feel I must wash my hands. - Friedrich Nietzsche

Jesus was a brilliant Jewish stand-up comedian, a phenomenal improviser. His parables are great one-liners. - Camille Paglia

If God lived on earth, people would break his windows. - Jewish Proverb

An apology for the Devil - it must be remembered that we have only heard one side of the case. God has written all the books. - Samuel Butler

The kingdom of Heaven is a condition of the heart - not something that comes upon the earth or after death. - Friedrich Nietzsche

The Old Testament teems with prophecies of the Messiah, but nowhere is it intimated that that Messiah is to stand as a God to be worshipped. He is to bring peace on earth, to build up the waste places-to comfort the broken-hearted, but nowhere is he spoken of as a deity. - Olympia Brown

The Bible and the Church have been the greatest stumbling blocks in the way of women's emancipation. - Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Wherever there are walls I shall inscribe this eternal accusation against Christianity upon them - I can write in letters which make even the blind see... I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty - I call it the one immortal blemish of mankind. - Friedrich Nietzsche

Man is something that should be overcome. - Friedrich Nietzsche

He who cannot obey himself will be commanded. That is the nature of living creatures. - Friedrich Nietzsche

I am a communist because I believe that the Communist idea is a state form of Christianity. - Alexander Zhuravlyov

You never see animals going through the absurd and often horrible fooleries of magic and religion. Dogs do not ritually urinate in the hope of persuading heaven to do the same and send down rain. Asses do not bray a liturgy to cloudless skies. Nor do cats attempt, by abstinence from cat's meat, to wheedle the feline spirits into benevolence. Only man behaves with such gratuitous folly. It is the price he has to pay for being intelligent but not, as yet, quite intelligent enough. - Aldous Huxley

From the age of fifteen, dogma has been the fundamental principle of my religion: I know no other religion; I cannot enter into the idea of any other sort of religion; religion, as a mere sentiment, is to me a dream and a mockery. - Cardinal John Newman

Nobody can deny but religion is a comfort to the distressed, a cordial to the sick, and sometimes a restraint on the wicked; therefore whoever would argue or laugh it out of the world without giving some equivalent for it ought to be treated as a common enemy. - Lady Mary Wortley Montagu

Religion: A daughter of Hope and Fear, explaining to Ignorance the nature of the Unknowable. - Ambrose Bierce

Do all the good you can, By all the means you can, In all the ways you can, At all the times you can, To all the people you can, As long as ever you can. - John Wesley

The limits of my language are the limits of my mind. All I know is what I have words for. - Ludwig Wittgenstein

By legend and perhaps by nature philosophers are more accustomed to the armchair than the workbench. - Ian Hacking

Opportunities are usually disguised as hard work, so most people don't recognize them. - Ann Landers

It is only too easy to catch people's attention by doing something worse than anyone else has dared to do it before. - Claude Monet

No one is completely unhappy at the failure of his best friend. - Groucho Marx

Moderation is a virtue only in those who are thought to have an alternative. - Henry Kissinger

If you don't control your mind, someone else will. - John Allston

No man was ever so much deceived by another as by himself. - Greville

How much more grievous are the consequences of anger than the causes of it. - Marcus Aurelius

Prosperity is a great teacher; adversity a greater. - William Hazlitt

Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go. - William Feather

Who begins too much accomplishes little. - German proverb

What breaks in a moment may take years to mend. - Swedish proverb

The moment we want to believe something, we suddenly see all the arguments for it, and become blind to the arguments against it. - George Bernard Shaw

Necessity never made a good bargain. - Benjamin Franklin

Life is not so bad if you have plenty of luck, a good physique and not too much imagination. - Christopher Isherwood

It seems safe to say that significant discovery, really creative thinking, does not occur with regard to problems about which the thinker is lukewarm. - Mary Henle

It is better to know nothing than to know what ain't so. - Josh Billings

He that leaveth nothing to chance will do few things ill, but he will do very few things. - George Savile

The one who loves the least, controls the relationship. - Robert Anthony

Africans have time. Europeans have watches. - Kwazhi Salomon

You see, I know that it's difficult to think well about certainty, probability, perception, etc. But it is, if possible, still more difficult to think, or try to think, really honestly about your life & other peoples' lives. - Wittgenstein to Malcolm

Concentrate on where you want to go, not what you fear. - Anthony Robbins

We are not what we know. We are what we are willing to learn.

That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property. - Thomas Jefferson

We find comfort among those who agree with us; growth among those who don't. - Frank A. Clark

I consider myself a friendly person who enjoys good conversation, and at the same time I believe that everyone should find ways to minimize the personal interaction at work, for efficiency's sake.

"If at first the idea is not absurd, then there is no hope for it." - Albert Einstein

Buddha left a road map, Jesus left a road map, Krishna left a road map, Rand McNally left a road map. But you still have to travel the road yourself. - Stephin Levine

Mahatma Gandhi, as you know, walked barefoot most of the time, which produced an impressive set of calluses on his feet. He also ate very little, which made him rather fragile and with his odd diet, he suffered from bad breath. This made him what? A super-callused fragile mystic hexed by halitosis.

Democracy comes out of the barrel of Guinness. - Mao Tse-tung

You can tell a man by the company that keeps him. - Anonymous

Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. - Will Rogers