A Collective Hunch

Reality is nothing but a collective hunch.

-- Mary Jean "Lily" Tomlin (1939 -), American actress, comedian, writer, and producer since the late 1960s, speaking as Trudy in The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe (1985), written by Tomlin's spouse Jane Wagner

I Am Grateful

I have managed to conceal my madness fairly effectively, and as far as I know it hasn't hurt anybody badly, for which I am grateful.

-- William Saroyan (1908 - 1981), Armenian American author, My Heart's in the Highlands (1939)

Dissatisfied Unless

You can't satisfy everybody; especially if there are those who will be dissatisfied unless not everybody is satisfied.

-- Robert Nozick (1938 - 2002), American libertarian philosopher, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (1974) Ch. 10 : A Framework for Utopia; The Framework as Utopian Common Ground, p. 320

What Sides

If you wish to know someone, you need only observe that on which he bestows his care, and what sides of his own nature he cultivates.

-- John Kessel (1950 -), American author of science fiction and fantasy, Events Preceding the Helvetican Renaissance (2009) in Gardner Dozois & Jonathan Strahan (eds.) The New Space Opera 2, p. 93

Risk

Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing. 

-- Warren Edward Buffett (30 August 1930 -), American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist, currently chairman and CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, "The Three Essential Warren Buffett Quotes To Live By" forbes.com (20 April 2014)

Ignorance In Action

Nothing is more frightful than to see ignorance in action.

-- Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 - 22 March 1832), German novelist, dramatist, poet, and philosopher, Maxims and Reflections (1833) Maxim 542, translation by Elisabeth Stopp

Teaching By Examples

I have read somewhere or other -- in Dionysius of Halicarnassus, I think -- that history is philosophy teaching by examples.

-- Henry St John, 1st Viscount Bolingbroke (1678 - 1751), English statesman and philosopher, On the Study and Use of History, letter 2; in fact this relates to a third-century AD treatise on rhetoric, wrongly attributed to Dionysius of Halicarnassus, which says (xi. 2): "The contact with manners then is education; and this Thucydides appears to assert when he says history is philosophy learned from examples".  The line is not found in Thucydides

Restraint

Of all manifestations of power, restraint impresses men the most.

-- Frank Byron Jevons (1858 - 1936), English polymath, academic and administrator of Durham University, A History of Greek Literature: From the Earliest Period to the Death of Demosthenes (1886) pp. 340

A Little Bit Short

This was the last week in office for me because of a horrible, horrible election where I got many millions more votes than I did the first time, but didn’t quite make it, just a little bit short.  Just a little bit short.

-- Former president Donald Trump, speaking to reporters at the southern border about a chart showing weekly migrant encounters, and apparently acknowledging for the first time that he lost the 2020 election, despite his past insistence that the election was stolen (22 August 2024)

Demarcation

The nation that will insist on drawing a broad line of demarcation between the fighting man and the thinking man is liable to find its fighting done by fools and its thinking done by cowards.

-- Sir William Francis Butler (1838 - 1910), Irish 19th-century British Army officer, writer, and adventurer, in Charles George Gordon (1889), p. 85

Affirmative Action

[Kamala Harris] understands that most of us will never be afforded the grace of failing forward, we will never benefit from the affirmative action of generational wealth.  If we bankrupt the business or choke in a crisis, we do not get a second, third or fourth chance.  If things do not go our way, we do not have the luxury of whining or cheating others to get further ahead.  No.  We don't get to change the rules so we always win.  If we see a mountain in front of us, we don't expect there to be an escalator waiting to take us to the top.  No.  We put our heads down.  We get to work.  In America, we do something.

-- Former First Lady Michelle Obama speaking at the Democratic National Convention, 20 August 2024

A Ghost In The Machine

Consciousness is unquantifiable, a ghost in the machine, barely considered real at all, though in a sense this flickering mosaic of awareness is the only true reality that we can ever know.

-- Alan Moore (1953 -), British writer, most famous for his influential work in comic-books and graphic novels, "What Is Reality?" London Weekend Television (27 July 1998) 

Recognition Of Illusion

If you can recognize illusion as illusion, it dissolves.  The recognition of illusion is also its ending.  Its survival depends on your mistaking it for reality. 

-- Eckhart Tolle (1948 -), German / Canadian spiritual teacher, motivational speaker, and writer, in A New Earth: Awakening to Your Life's Purpose, (2005)

Theory And Practice

If you find that you're spending almost all your time on theory, start turning some attention to practical things; it will improve your theories.  If you find that you're spending almost all your time on practice, start turning some attention to theoretical things; it will improve your practice.

-- Donald Knuth (1938 -), American computer scientist, Professor Emeritus at Stanford University, and winner of the 1974 Turing Award, quoted in: Arturo Gonzalez-Gutierrez (2007) Minimum-length Corridors: Complexity and Approximations. p. 99

You Cannot Have One

If you do not think about the future, you cannot have one.

-- John Galsworthy OM (1867 - 1933), English novelist and playwright, 1932 Nobel Laureate in Literature, Swan Song (1928) Pt. II, Ch. 6

Untidy

The beginnings and endings of all human undertakings are untidy, the building of a house, the writing of a novel, the demolition of a bridge, and, eminently, the finish of a voyage.

-- John Galsworthy OM (1867 - 1933), English novelist and playwright, 1932 Nobel Laureate in Literature, One More River (1933) Chapter 1

Most Effective

The most effective debugging tool is still careful thought, coupled with judiciously placed print statements.

-- Brian Kernighan (1 January 1942 -), computer scientist who worked at the Bell Labs and contributed to the design of the pioneering AWK and AMPL programming languages, most well-known for his co-authorship, with Dennis Ritchie, of the first book on the C programming language, "Unix for Beginners" (1979)

Universal Good

The ultimate notion of right is that which tends to the universal good; and when one's acting in a certain manner has this tendency, he has a right thus to act.

-- Francis Hutcheson (8 August 1694 - 8 August 1746), Irish philosopher, A System of Moral Philosophy (1755) Book II, Ch. III, § VII

Acutely Aware

I am acutely aware that you have not elected me as your President by your ballots, and so I ask you to confirm me as your President with your prayers.  And I hope that such prayers will also be the first of many ...  If you have not chosen me by secret ballot, neither have I gained office by any secret promises.  I have not campaigned either for the Presidency or the Vice Presidency.  I have not subscribed to any partisan platform.  I am indebted to no man, and only to one woman -- my dear wife, Betty -- as I begin this very difficult job ...  

My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over ...  Our Constitution works; our great Republic is a government of laws and not of men.  Here the people rule.  But there is a higher Power, by whatever name we honor him, who ordains not only righteousness but love, not only justice but mercy.

-- President Gerald Ford, in a speech immediately after taking the presidential oath (9 August 1974)

Nixon Resignation

In all the decisions I have made in my public life, I have always tried to do what was best for the Nation. Throughout the long and difficult period of Watergate, I have felt it was my duty to persevere, to make every possible effort to complete the term of office to which you elected me. ...

I have never been a quitter. To leave office before my term is completed is abhorrent to every instinct in my body. But as President, I must put the interest of America first.

America needs a full-time President and a full-time Congress, particularly at this time with problems we face at home and abroad.

To continue to fight through the months ahead for my personal vindication would almost totally absorb the time and attention of both the President and the Congress in a period when our entire focus should be on the great issues of peace abroad and prosperity without inflation at home.

Therefore, I shall resign the Presidency effective at noon tomorrow. Vice President Ford will be sworn in as President at that hour in this office. ...

To have served in this office is to have felt a very personal sense of kinship with each and every American. In leaving it, I do so with this prayer: May God's grace be with you in all the days ahead.

-- President Richard Nixon, in a speech announcing his intention to resign the presidency the following day due to the Watergate scandal, 8 August 1974

Doing Nothing

To tell the truth, the only thing more exhausting than doing something is doing nothing at all.

-- Jack Laurence Chalker (1944 - 2005), American science fiction author, Midnight at the Well of Souls (1977) Chapter 2, "Another Part of the Field" (pp. 25-26)

A Task Becomes A Duty

A task becomes a duty from the moment you suspect it to be an essential part of that integrity which alone entitles a man to assume responsibility.

-- Dag Hammarskjöld (1905 - 1961), Swedish diplomat, second United Nations Secretary-General, and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, Markings (1964)

Monopoly

After having carefully considered and weighed the witness testimony and evidence, the court reaches the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly.  It has violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act.

-- Judge Amit P. Mehta of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia in his ruling in United States of America v Google LLC (5 August 2024)

Missing Sky

Late Wednesday / early Thursday I sat by the side of my cat Sky while she let slip this mortal coil.  She was my fluffy kitty, fluffa girl, and fluffleupagus.  She was a long-haired cat that matches google images of "ragdoll cat".  

She came from the cat lady's house as a kitten about 16 years ago, brought home by my #3 & #4 daughters who were in high school at the time.  They named her Shi'Thead (pronounced shuh theed), which did not stick.  When my #4 daughter moved out she took Sky with her, but Sky objected and ended up back at the house.  In a very complicated circle of activity, she also was given to a family friend, dropped off at the Humane Society, and recovered by me before going up for adoption.

She was the biggest cat in the house, and got along with everyone.  If you held her, she would wrap her arms around your neck for a hug.  She is already missed.

W00t! Katie Ledecky

I'm proud of the time.  I just really wanted to put up a time that I could be really proud of and happy with.  I kind of let my mind wander during the race, thinking of all of the people that have trained with me, kind of like saying their names in my head and thinking about them.  

-- Katie Ledecky (17 March 1997 –), American competitive swimmer, when asked what she was most proud of in her 1500M race in which Ledecky won the gold medal for the 2nd time, setting a new Olympic record by 5 seconds, and beating the silver medalist by 10.3 seconds, tying the all-time record for most Olympic medals by an American woman (she broke that record later in the day with Gold in the 4x200)

Principles Of Olympism

In the name of the athletes.
In the name of all judges.
In the name of all the coaches and officials.

We promise to take part in these Olympic Games, respecting and abiding by the rules and in the spirit of fair play, inclusion and equality.  Together we stand in solidarity and commit ourselves to sport without doping, without cheating, without any form of discrimination.  We do this for the honour of our teams, in respect for the Fundamental Principles of Olympism, and to make the world a better place through sport.

-- Unified Olympic Oath (since 2021), sworn by athletes, judges, and coaches at the Olympic Games

Adulting

We're all children.  We invent the adult facade and don it and try to keep the buttons and the medals polished.  We're all trying to give such a good imitation of being an adult that the real adults in the world won't catch on.

-- John Dann MacDonald (1916 - 1986), American writer of novels and short stories, most famous for his series of detective novels featuring protagonist Travis McGee, A Tan and Sandy Silence (1972)

No Inevitability

There is absolutely no inevitability, so long as there is a willingness to contemplate what is happening. 

-- Alfred North Whitehead, OM (1861 - 1947), English mathematician and philosopher, as attributed by Marshall McLuhan in a chapter sub-heading in The Medium is the Massage (1967)

All Powerful

I had done this all by myself.  No one had performed the magic for me.  I and the shapes were alone together, revealing themselves in a silently respectful dialogue.  Since I could bare lines into living reality, I was all powerful.  I could read.

-- Alberto Manguel (1948 -), Canadian Argentine-born writer, translator, and editor, A History of Reading (1996) The Last Page, p. 6

Wait

Wait, thou child of hope, for Time shall teach thee all things.

-- Martin Farquhar Tupper (1810 - 1880), English writer and poet, Proverbial Philosophy (1838-1849) Of Good in Things Evil

In Your Hands

My fellow Americans, I'm speaking to you tonight from behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office.

I revere this office, but I love my country more.  It's been the honor of my life to serve as your president.  But in the defense of democracy, which is at stake, I think it's more important than any title.  I draw strength and find joy in working for the American people.  But this sacred task of perfecting our union is not about me, it's about you.  Your families, your futures.

History is in your hands.  The power's in your hands.  The idea of America lies in your hands.

-- President Joe Biden, in a speech on ending his run for re-election, 24 July 2024

Even Hotter

The results from the Copernicus Climate Change Service show the planet's average temperature on July 21 was 17.09 degrees Celsius (62.76 degrees Fahrenheit) -- breaking a record set only last year.  The historic day comes on the heels of 13 straight months of unprecedented temperatures and the hottest year scientists have ever seen.

"We are in truly uncharted territory," Copernicus director Carlo Buontempo said in a statement. "And as the climate keeps warming, we are bound to see records being broken in future months and years."

-- Sarah Kaplan, Sunday was the hottest day ever recorded on Earth, scientists say, in The Washington Post 23 July 2024

[When I clicked through to the data, I noted that the next day (Monday) was even hotter, at 17.15 degrees Celsius]

It Has Been My Intention

My Fellow Americans,

Over the past three and a half years, we have made great progress as a Nation.

Today, America has the strongest economy in the world. We've made historic investments in rebuilding our Nation, in lowering prescription drug costs for seniors, and in expanding affordable health care to a record number of Americans.  America has never been better positioned to lead than we are today.

It has been the greatest honor of my life to serve as your President.  And while it has been my intention to seek reelection, I believe it is in the best interest of my party and the country for me to stand down and to focus solely on fulfilling my duties as President for the remainder of my term.

For now, let me express my deepest gratitude to all those who have worked so hard to see me reelected.  I want to thank Vice President Kamala Harris for being an extraordinary partner in all this work.  And let me express my heartfelt appreciation to the American people for the faith and trust you have placed in me.

-- Portions of a letter posted to social media by President Joe Biden announcing that he would no longer seek reelection, 21 July 2024

Not With A Bang

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 an update to a system file that brings the blue screen of death to every machine around the world.

-- Grady Booch (27 February 1955 -), American software engineer, best known for developing the Unified Modeling Language (UML), recognized internationally for his innovative work in software architecture, software engineering, and collaborative development environments, posting on Twitter as @Grady_Booch, in reference to today's CrowdStrike outage that disrupted businesses globally, 19 July 2024

Everyone Believes

Everyone believes very easily whatever they fear or desire.

-- Jean de La Fontaine (1621 - 1695), French fabulist and the most widely read French poet of the 17th century, as quoted in Subcontact : Slap the Face of Fear and Wake Up Your Subconscious‎ (2001) by Dian Benson, p. 149

Deluded Deluders

The most successful tempters and thus the most dangerous are the deluded deluders.

-- Georg Christoph Lichtenberg (1742 - 1799), German scientist, satirist, and philosopher, Aphorisms (1765-1799) Notebook F (1776-1779), Item F 120

6 Rules

1. Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print.

2. Never use a long word where a short one will do.

3. If it is possible to cut a word out, always cut it out.

4. Never use the passive where you can use the active.

5. Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent.

6. Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

-- George Orwell (1903 - 1950), pen name of British novelist, essayist, and journalist Eric Arthur Blair, 6 rules for writers, from his essay "Politics and the English Language" (1946)

Exhilarating

Nothing in life is so exhilarating as to be shot at without result.

-- Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (1874-1965), British politician and statesman, The Story of the Malakand Field Force: An Episode of Frontier War (1898), Chapter X

A Bridge

Look, I view myself as a bridge, not as anything else.  There's an entire generation of leaders you saw stand behind me.  They are the future of this country.

-- Presidential Candidate Joe Biden speaking to Democratic leaders in California, 9 March 2020

A National Tragedy

Mr. Trump has shown a character unworthy of the responsibilities of the presidency.  He has demonstrated an utter lack of respect for the Constitution, the rule of law and the American people.  Instead of a cogent vision for the country’s future, Mr. Trump is animated by a thirst for political power: to use the levers of government to advance his interests, satisfy his impulses and exact retribution against those who he thinks have wronged him.

He is, quite simply, unfit to lead. ...

It is a national tragedy that the Republicans have failed to have a similar debate about the manifest moral and temperamental unfitness of their standard-bearer, instead setting aside their longstanding values, closing ranks and choosing to overlook what those who worked most closely with the former president have described as his systematic dishonesty, corruption, cruelty and incompetence. ...

When someone fails so many foundational tests, you don’t give him the most important job in the world.

-- The editorial board of the New York Times (11 July 2024)

A Curious Thing

The past is a curious thing.  It's with you all the time.  I suppose an hour never passes without your thinking of things that happened ten or twenty years ago, and yet most of the time it's got no reality, it's just a set of facts that you've learned, like a lot of stuff in a history book.  Then some chance sight or sound or smell, especially smell, sets you going, and the past doesn't merely come back to you, you're actually in the past.

-- George Orwell (1903 - 1950), pen name of British novelist, essayist, and journalist Eric Arthur Blair, Coming Up for Air, Part I, Ch. 4 (1939)

Analyze

You cannot analyze data you don't collect.

-- Don Appleman, while working for NovaNET a few decades ago, and occasionally since, on the subject of how much data (usually on work done and throughput) should be collected by software

Inconceivable

It is inconceivable that something is lost forever.

-- Shuruppag, Instructions of Shuruppag (3rd millennium BCE)

The Crowd

If it has to choose who is to be crucified, the crowd will always save Barabbas.      

-- Jean Cocteau (1889 - 1963), French poet, novelist, painter, and filmmaker, Le Coq et l’Arlequin (1918)

Harmony And Affection

Let us, then, fellow-citizens, unite with one heart and one mind.  Let us restore to social intercourse that harmony and affection without which liberty and even life itself are but dreary things.

-- Thomas Jefferson (1743 - 1826), third president of the United States (1801-1809), First Inaugural Address (4 March 1801)

Unsettled Overnight

What has once been settled by a precedent will not be unsettled overnight, for certainty and uniformity are gains not lightly sacrificed.  Above all is this true when honest men have shaped their conduct on the faith of the pronouncement.

-- Benjamin Cardozo (1870 - 1938), long-time Justice of the Court of Appeals of New York; he was appointed to the Supreme Court of the United States in 1932, The Paradoxes of Legal Science (1928)

We Believe, Yet

We believe that all men are created equal.  Yet many are denied equal treatment.  We believe that all men have certain unalienable rights.  Yet many Americans do not enjoy those rights.  We believe that all men are entitled to the blessings of liberty.  Yet millions are being deprived of those blessings -- not because of their own failures, but because of the color of their skin.

-- President Lyndon B. Johnson in a statement made upon signing the Civil Rights Act, 60 years ago today (2 July 1964) h/t The Washington Post

Immune, Immune, Immune

Today’s decision to grant former Presidents criminal immunity reshapes the institution of the Presidency.  It makes a mockery of the principle, foundational to our Constitution and system of Government, that no man is above the law.  Relying on little more than its own misguided wisdom about the need for “bold and unhesitating action” by the President, the Court gives former President Trump all the immunity he asked for and more.  Because our Constitution does not shield a former President from answering for criminal and treasonous acts, I dissent.

Looking beyond the fate of this particular prosecution, the long-term consequences of today’s decision are stark. The Court effectively creates a law-free zone around the President, upsetting the status quo that has existed since the Founding. This new official-acts immunity now “lies about like a loaded weapon” for any President that wishes to place his own interests, his own political survival, or his own financial gain, above the interests of the Nation. The President of the United States is the most powerful person in the country, and possibly the world. When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune. Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today. Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done. The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law.

Never in the history of our Republic has a President had reason to believe that he would be immune from criminal prosecution if he used the trappings of his office to violate the criminal law. Moving forward, however, all former Presidents will be cloaked in such immunity. If the occupant of that office misuses official power for personal gain, the criminal law that the rest of us must abide will not provide a backstop. 

With fear for our democracy, I dissent.

-- Supreme Court Associate Justice Sonia Sotomayor, joined by Justice Kagan and Justice Jackson, dissenting in Donald J Trump v United States, in which the majority held that former presidents are immune from prosecution for most acts taken while in office