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D Quotes

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All D Quotes

“Despite the inherent risks of climbing, I still love to climb and I never plan to give it up just because I’m a mother. However, I am much more selective about the risks I take. …One of the biggest challenges of motherhood has to do with juggling my time between work, climbing, and the daily responsibilities of raising a child. But whatever climbs and travels I might have missed during the formative years of my son’s life are small sacrifices compared to the love and richness Owen brings, and hopefully will contribute to others as part of the future generation.”

“Despite the insanity of using whether you would want to have a beer with someone as a legitimate reason for voting for or against them, I always felt that is indicative of a massive problem in politics: It matters as much what your personality is as how smart you are or how good you are at your job. That is a huge, huge problem. A lot of people who are very smart or very good at their jobs are not people I would want to ever have a beer with - but I would want them making massive policy decisions with huge implications for the future of the planet.”

“Despite the intensity of the moment, I felt no fear, and when I looked down, I knew why. Lisa had grabbed my hand in hers, and locked her eyes on me, stoic, in that moment of terror; eyes filled with neither panic nor worry, but beautiful acquiescence, as a silent apology passed between us. It filled me with love and peace as our friendship flashed before my eyes, and then everything went dark, and silent.”

“Despite the international scientific community's consensus on climate change, a small number of critics continue to deny that climate change exists or that humans are causing it. Widely known as climate change "skeptics" or "deniers," these individuals are generally not climate scientists and do not debate the science with the climate scientists.”

“Despite the Internet 's origin in the late 1960s as a government sponsored means of communication between the Department of Defense, private industry, and academia, it has been at its best and generated the greatest economic, social, and technological benefits since it was 'liberated' by the hordes of 'geeks' who were originally hired to run it by employers who were not themselves conversant with computers, and couldn't tell when their employees were exchanging official traffic or trading dirty jokes and recipes for marijuana brownies.”

“Despite the large number of mergers, and the growth in the absolute size of many corporations, the dominant tendency in the American economy at the beginning of [the 20th] century was toward growing competition. Competition was unacceptable...it was not the existence of monopoly that caused the federal government to intervene in the economy, but the lack of it.”

“Despite the long-term reduction in familial roles and functions, we believe that parents are still the world's greatest experts about the needs of their own children. Virtually any private or public program that supports parents, effectively supports children. This principle of supporting family vitality seems to us preferable to any policy that would have the state provide children directly with what it thinks they need.”

“Despite the many material comforts of modern life, anyone who has lived long enough knows that life's joys are at minimum balanced by its sorrows. Loved ones die, jobs are lost, houses flood, fields burn, hearts and bones get broken, able bodies grow old and ill. None of this is new. Humans have been struggling - and rejoicing- since time immemorial. To keep their footing while shouldering their burdens, our ancestors always turned to ritual. Ritual mobilized the psychologiacl resources necessary to withstand whatever life threw at us.”

“Despite the many material comforts of modern life, anyone who has lived long enough knows that life's joys are at minimum balanced by its sorrows. Loved ones die, jobs are lost, houses flood, fields burn, hearts and bones get broken, able bodies grow old and ill. None of this is new. Humans have been struggling - and rejoicing- since time immemorial. To keep their footing while shouldering their burdens, our ancestors always turned to ritual. Ritual mobilized the psychological resources necessary to withstand whatever life threw at us.”

“Despite the many occasions when its characters feel frustrated before the weight of circumstances, and despite blaming their feeling of impotence on daiva, 'fate', moral autonomy shines through in the epic. Because they have some freedom to choose they can be praised when they follow dharma or blamed when they follow adharma. At the moment of making a decision they become conscious of their freedom, and it is this perception of autonomy that gives them the ability to lead authentic moral lives.”

“Despite the massive intellectual feat that Marx's Capital represents, the Marxian contribution to economics can be readily summarized as virtually zero. Professional economics as it exists today reflects no indication that Karl Marx ever existed. This neither denies nor denigrates Capital as an intellectual achievement, and perhaps in its way the culmination of classical economics. But the development of modern economics had simply ignored Marx. Even economists who are Marxists typically utilize a set of analytical tools to which Marx contributed nothing, and have recourse to Marx only for ideological, political, or historical purposes. In professional economics, Capital was a detour into a blind alley, however historic it may be as the centerpiece of a worldwide political movement. What is said and done in its name is said and done largely by people who have never read through it, much less followed its labyrinthine reasoning from its arbitrary postulates to its empirically false conclusions. Instead, the massive volumes of Capital have become a quasi-magic touchstone—a source of assurance that somewhere and somehow a genius "proved" capitalism to be wrong and doomed, even if the specifics of this proof are unknown to those who take their certitude from it.”

“Despite the miracles of capitalism, it doesn't do well in popularity polls. One of the reasons is that capitalism is always evaluated against the non-existent, non-realizable utopias of socialism or communism. Any earthly system, when compared to a Utopia, will pale in comparison. But for the ordinary person, capitalism, with all of its warts, is superior to any system yet devised to deal with our everyday needs and desires.”

“Despite the modern dogma to the effect that women were a subject sex until the nineteenth century 'emancipated' them from history, women in history had demonstrated strong wills and purposes, had made assertions, and had directed or influenced all human destiny, including their own, since human life began.”

“Despite the multitude of extraordinary changes that have taken place in almost every area of life, jewellery is still used for pretty well the same purposes as it has always been. Primitive man is said to have worn a kind of ornamentation to enhance his sexual attraction as well as provide protection against all manner of disasters, from snakes to evil spirits. Cleopatra used jewels (with a particular fondness for emeralds) to seduce admirers and rivals not only on her body but in her home. They showed off her fabulous wealth and position. Julius Caesar ruled that only the highest born women could wear pearls, which were Rome’s most valued jewels. Not only does our jewellery mean something to each of us, but it also has meaning to those who view us. Jewellery has forever been a currency understood by all.”

“Despite the objection from his mother he had decided to visit a clinic with the woman. He knew, he would forever be obliged to her. He had found a job, but he could not keep it because of his addiction. He had no money. The woman paid the expenses. She introduced him to people who would understand his problem and help him deal with it. She made him join Sex Addicts Anonymous. She helped him deal with his urges. He had started to believe that sexual addiction was real. Suddenly, everything made sense. He was not a freak, he had a serious problem. He suffered from a disorder. He had the option to set things straight. He underwent Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, which he benefited from. A prostitute had set him free. - from story 109 of You Me & Stories”

“Despite the obvious emphasis of Scripture (in regard to suffering), we are bombarded by suggestions that the 'successful' Christian living takes place in the realm of constant victory, health, wholeness, and financial prosperity. In response to this we are not to pretend that suffering doesn’t exist or that it might be instantly cured. Such notions are the product of empty heads and closed Bibles.”

“Despite the odium and widespread condemnation of Donald J. Trump, 45th President of the United States of America, he passed with all the fanfare of a fart in a mesh sack. Medical examiners said it was a thrombotic stroke, likely exacerbated by obesity and high blood pressure. Some said cocaine and opioids had been found in his system, but these reports were never confirmed. Trump was dead, and now it was time to start glossing over his dismal legacy and perpetuating his vision, posthumously, for Making America Great Again...”

“Despite the passage of close to a million years since Homo erectus first sailed to Flores, however, what archaeology does not concede is that the human species could have developed and refined those early nautical skills to the extent of being able to cross a vast ocean like the Pacific or the Atlantic from one side to the other. In the case of the former, extensive transoceanic journeys are not believed to have been undertaken until about 3,500 years ago, during the so-called Polynesian expansion. And the mainstream historical view is that the Atlantic was not successfully navigated until 1492--the year in which, as the schoolyard mnemonic has it, "Columbus sailed the ocean blue." Indeed, the notion that long transoceanic voyages were a technological impossibility during the Stone Age remains one of the central structural elements of the dominant reference frame of archaeology--a reference frame that geneticists see no reason not to respect and deploy when interpreting their own data. Since that reference frame rules out, a priori, the option of a direct ocean crossing between Australasia and South America during the Paleolithic and instead is adamant that all settlement came via northeast Asia, geneticists tend to approach the data from that perspective.”

“Despite the personalization of life’s events, all people largely experience the same general transformative stages of life and eventually we all encounter a row of similar tragedies. We do not experience identical lives or exemplify replicable personalities. Every person is a receptacle whom is capable of experiencing the full gamut of the entire human condition. Our lives act as a period of apprenticeship, which we devote laboring to discover the truths that we can live by.”

“Despite the popular idea of anarchists as violent men, Anarchism is the one non-violent social philosophy.… The function of the Anarchist is two-fold. By daily courage in non-cooperation with the tyrannical forces of the State and the Church, he helps to tear down present society; the Anarchist by daily cooperation with his fellows in overcoming evil with good-will and solidarity builds toward the anarchistic commonwealth which is formed by voluntary action with the right of secession.”

“Despite the previously mentioned strategies, you may still find yourself having difficulties getting started on tasks. The sorts of tasks on which you continue to procrastinate are likely those for which you view even these small steps as being somewhat boring or painful, such as various chores, academic tasks (e.g., reading textbooks, writing assignments), or administrative tasks of adult life (e.g., dealing with taxes, finances). These and other tasks trigger negative thoughts and feelings for you that also interfere with follow-through, even on initial steps. A way to get started on these tasks is to define in strict, behavioral steps the smallest behaviors that are required to start the task. These initial behaviors may not involve actually completing the task, but they are necessary steps and help you to “touch” a task rather than keeping it at arm’s length. This approach is meant to help you break down tasks into their strict behavioral steps, akin to a recipe for cooking. You may say, “I do not know how to cook” or “I cannot do it.” However, once you follow the specific steps, including “get saucepan out of cupboard,” “fill with water,” etc., you are now engaged in the task rather than being cognitively, emotionally, and behaviorally removed from it. It is an interesting exercise to see how other tasks that are typically avoided can be broken down into steps, such as a phone call (“pick up phone receiver, enter the nine-digit phone number, wait for answer, converse in my native language . . .”) or going to the gym (“stand up, go to room and find workout clothes, put in gym bag, . . .”).”

“Despite the prominence that "magic bullets" and "wonder drugs" hold in the layman's mind, most of the really decisive battles in the war against infectious disease consisted of measures to eliminate disease organisms from the environment. An example from history concerns the great outbreak of cholera in London more than one hundred years ago. A London physician, John Snow, mapped occurrence of cases and found they originated in one area, all of whose inhabitants drew their water from one pump located on Broad Street. In a swift and decisive practice of preventative medicine, Dr. Snow removed the handle from the pump. The epidemic was thereby brought under control - not by a magic pill that killed the (then unknown) organism of cholera, but by eliminating the organism from the environment.”

“Despite the promises of utopian hedonism, many youth and middle-aged adults quickly enticed by these did not escape from their addictions easily, if at all. And, to the shock of their fans, the lives of Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jim Morrison and numerous other acid trippin' rock musicians also ended quickly like the closing blues beats from one of their most popular songs. Even Max Yasgur himself died just 19 months after the Woodstock Festival of a heart attack at the age of 53.”