More Quotes

I periodically post my most recently collected quotes (over the past 3 months). I just love collecting quotes, because there's a novel in every sentence--it's high-impact reading. I collect these from many sources, though more than a few of the following were presented to me by The Quotations Page, which I use as my homepage. Enjoy! "I will permit no man to narrow and degrade my soul by making me hate him." Booker T. Washington "If you cut yourself in half and both sides lived, which side would be you?" Anonymous on Reddit.com “Think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize half of them are stupider than that” George Carlin "If a thing isn't worth saying, you sing it. " Pierre Beaumarchais (1732 - 1799) "Everything that irritates us about others can lead us to an understanding of ourselves." Carl Jung (1875 - 1961) "Freedom is just Chaos, with better lighting." Alan Dean Foster, "To the Vanishing Point" "To see what is in front of one's nose needs a constant struggle." George Orwell “I haven’t failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” Thomas Edison, on asked how it felt to fail 10,000 times before he figured out the light bulb. "It is a curious thing... that every creed promises a paradise which will be absolutely uninhabitable for anyone of civilized taste." Evelyn Waugh (1903 - 1966)

Complexity is the problem. Moving it from hardware to software, or vice versa, doesn’t help. Simplicity is the only answer. There was a product many years ago called the Canon Cat. It was a simple, dedicated word processor; done very nicely in Forth. Didn’t succeed commercially. But then, most products don’t. I despair. Technology, and our very civilization, will get more and more complex until it collapses. There is no opposing pressure to limit this growth. No environmental group saying: Count the parts in a hybrid car to judge its efficiency or reliability or maintainability.
-Charles Moore, who is a pioneer software developer. The 'Forth' language he invented is still in use today, particularly by NASA "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it." Upton Sinclair "We hit Iraq because we could. That's the real truth." Thomas Friedman "Man is ready to die for an idea, provided that idea is not quite clear to him." Paul Eldridge

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New edition of Darwin’s Origin with a Creationist Intro

While watching this video, try counting Kirk Cameron's lies. Just incredible. What does it tell you when someone is so utterly insecure about his own arguments that he lies about his opponent's positions? Richard Dawkins has a post on this new wacko edition of Darwin's Origin, and a suggestion that concerned citizens go pick one up and chop out and throw away the 50-page intro.

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Brand Obama–now with more awards!

Barack Obama's presidential campaign has again won a major advertising award. A month before winning the presidency, he won Advertising Age's annual "Marketer of the Year" for 2008. Now, his campaign manager, David Plouffe, has won Brandweek's "Marketer of the Year" for 2009. What better commentary on the state of contemporary American society could there be? Our president is a master marketer, or more precisely, employs a team of master marketers. In a society that is dedicated to worshiping at the altar of consumerism, perhaps it's unsurprising that this is the case, but it still is shocking to me. Once I began researching for this article, I really was surprised at the extent to which "Brand Obama" has penetrated our national consciousness. His logo and posters have become iconic. His slogan, "Yes we can" is everywhere-- it's also a marketer's dream. It's devoid of any clarity or substance, and yet it makes you feel good, possibly empowered. "Just do it", anyone? Actually, his campaign beat out the Nike campaign (and even Apple!) for top honors. You can go to mybarackobama.com and sign for immediate updates from Facebook, Myspace, Youtube, Flickr, Twitter, and several other web 2.0 services. You can get Obama on your mobile phone by texting "hope" to 62262-- it's just as easy as voting for the next American Idol! The media is relentlessly focused on what Michelle Obama is wearing next, and there is at least one blog offering daily updates on her clothing choices ("Follow the fashion of Mrs. O.:What and Whom she's wearing"). For those who are tuned-in, you can even do Ecstasy tablets shaped like Obama. One wonders where does politics end and the cult of personality begin?

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That OTHER guy: Alfred Russel Wallace

Darwin gets the lion's share of the acclaim, even though both Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace co-announced the discovery of natural selection to the Linnean Society in 1858. Thing are changing, and it's now time for Mr. Wallace to get a bit more of the stage. This, according to an in-depth article on Alfred Russel Wallace called "The Man Who Wasn't Darwin," in the December, 2008 edition of National Geographic. Reading the article I leaned that Wallace was by no means a one-trick pony. Rather:

[Wallace's] writings, on subjects from evolutionary theory and social justice to life on Mars, are coming back into print or turning up on the Web. He is recognized among science historians as a founder of evolutionary biogeog­raphy (the study of which species live where, and why), as a pioneer of island biogeography in particular (from which the science of conserva­tion biology grew), as an early theorist on adaptive mimicry, and as a prescient voice on behalf of what we now call biodiversity. That is, he's a towering figure in the transition from old-fashioned natural history to modern biology. During his years afield Wallace was also a prolific collector, a ruthless harvester of natural wonders; his insect and bird specimens added richly to museum holdings and the discipline of taxonomy. Still, most people who know of Alfred Russel Wallace know him only as Charles Darwin's secret sharer, the man who co-discovered the theory of evolution by natural selection but failed to get an equal share of the credit. Wallace's story is complicated, heroic, and perplexing.

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