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Astonishing Quotes

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Astonishing Quotes

“The uniformity of the earth's life, more astonishing than its diversity, is accountable by the high probability that we derived, originally, from some single cell, fertilized in a bolt of lightning as the earth cooled. It is from the progeny of this parent cell that we take our looks; we still share genes around, and the resemblance of the enzymes of grasses to those of whales is a family resemblance.”

LifeScienceEvolutionDiversityBiologyChemistryGenesAstonishingUniformityOrigin Of LifeCommon AncestorUniversal Common Ancestor
Book:The Lives of a Cell: Notes of a Biology Watcher
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“Xaden studies me with an intensity that makes me sway towards him. 'You are astonishing.' He shakes his head. 'I couldn't do that for weeks.' 'Guess I have a superior teacher.' The emotion swelling through me is more than joy. It's euphoria that has me grinning like a fool. I'm finally not only good at something, but astonishing.”

AmazedVioletAstonishingFourth WingViolet SorrengailRebecca YarrosXaden RiorsonXadenEuphoriaStudying
Book:Fourth Wing
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“I abandoned the extraterrestria l hypothesis in 1967 when my own field investigations disclosed an astonishing overlap between psychic phenomena and UFOs ... The objects and apparitions do not necessarily originate on another planet and may not even exist as permanent constructions of matter. It is more likely that we see what we want to see and interpret such visions according to our contemporary beliefs.”

WantMayMatterBeliefMy OwnVisionFieldsObjectsPlanetsContemporaryPermanentAbandonedConstructionInvestigationPsychicsHypothesisAstonishingUfoApparitions
Author:John A. Keel
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“Can a one judge sitting somewhere in a trial court issue an order that says nobody in the world is allowed to have, to use, to improve or to develop software for playing multimedia content without the permission of the manufacturers of the content themselves? .. This is an astonishing development in the course of our understanding of what we call the copyright bargain, the relationship between authors' rights, publishers' leverages and consumers' needs.”

WorldNeedsUseOrderCoursesUnderstandingIssuesRightsJudgingDevelopmentSittingCourtTrialsConsumersContentmentSoftwarePermissionPublishersAstonishingBargainsCopyrightContentionMultimedia
Author:Eben Moglen
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“A magical portal opened inside my mind and conducted me into an astonishing world. [...] Before this moment I had divined but had never known with such positiveness that the world is extremely large and that suffering and toil are the companions and fellow warriors not only of Cretan, but of every man. [...] That by means of poetry all this suffering and effort could be transformed into dream; no matter how much of the ephemeral existed, poetry could immortalize it by turning it into song.”

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Author:Nikos Kazantzakis
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“Childhood is the world of miracle or of magic: it is as if creation rose luminously out of the night, all new and fresh and astonishing. Childhood is over the moment things are no longer astonishing. When the world gives you a feeling of "déjà vu," when you are used to existence, you become an adult.”

IfsWorldInspirationalGivingChildrenMomentsFeelingsUsedNightExistenceMagicChildhoodCreationAdultsMiracleRoseAstonishingMagic Of Childhood
Author:Eugene Ionesco
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“I'd like to understand why it seems normal to look at astonishing achievements made by unapproachably ambitious, luminously pious, strangely obsessed artists, and toss them off with a few wry comments.”

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Book:Pictures and Tears: A History of People Who Have Cried in Front of Paintings
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“When I was very little, say five or six, I became aware of the fact that people wrote books. Before that, I thought that God wrote books. I thought a book was a manifestation of nature, like a tree. When my mother explained it, I kept after her: What are you saying? What do you mean? I couldn't believe it. It was astonishing. It was like--here's the man who makes all the trees. Then I wanted to be a writer, because, I suppose, it seemed the closest thing to being God.”

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Author:Fran Lebowitz
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“When we look at the pay of men and women who do work equal hours, two discoveries are quite astonishing: --When women and men work less than 40 hours a week, the women earn more than the men; --When men and women work more than 40, the men earn more than the women.”

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Book:Why Men Earn More: The Startling Truth Behind the Pay Gap--and what Women Can Do about it
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“The ability of nonintelligent people to understand the most complicated mechanisms and to use them has always been to me a cause of astonishment: their inability to understand simple questions is even more astonishing. The general acceptance of simple ideas is difficult and rare, and yet it is only when simple, fundamental, ideas have been accepted that further progress becomes possible on a higher level.”

PeopleHas BeensIdeasUseCausesDifficultSimpleAbilityLevelsProgressAcceptanceHigherFundamentalsComplicatedAcceptedMechanismInabilityAstonishingHigher LevelAstonishmentSimple Ideas
Book:A History of Science: Ancient Science Through the Golden Age of Greece
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“Without doubt, matter is unlimited in extent, and, in this sense, infinite; and the forces of Nature mould it into an innumerable number of worlds. Would it be at all astonishing if, from the universal dice-box, out of an innumberable number of throws, there should be thrown out one world infinitely perfect? Nay, does not the calculus of probabilities prove to us that one such world out of an infinite number, must be produced of necessity?”

IfsWorldShouldDoeMatterForcePerfectNumbersDoubtProveUniversalInfiniteBoxesThrownUnlimitedProbabilityAstonishingDiceCalculusMouldForces Of Nature
Author:William Batchelder Greene
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“It's a great historical joke that when the Spanish met the Aztecs, it was a blind date made in serve-you-right heaven. At the time, they were the two most unpleasant cultures in the entire world, and richly deserved each other. Still, the story of how stout Cortes blustered, bullied and bludgeoned his way to collapsing an entire empire with a handful of contagious hoodlums is astonishing.”

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Author:A. A. Gill
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“Sven's actual results on the park were not quite good enough to make him a hero, and not quite bad enough to get him the sack, so he left the gentlemen of the press with something of a void. And they abhor a void. Soon the discovery that Sven was in fact a hammer-man of legendary proportions filled the void, until the media came to realise that Sven was that rare thing, a man whose astonishing success with women somehow didn't make him more interesting.”

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Author:Declan Lynch
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“... over two hundred women, apparently at their own request, were sealed as wives to Joseph Smith after his death in special temple ceremonies. Moreover, a great many distinguished women in history, including several Catholic saints, were also sealed to Joseph Smith in Utah. I saw these astonishing lists in the Latter-day Saint Genealogical Archives in Salt Lake City in 1944.”

TwoCitiesSawsWifeSpecialHundredCatholicIncludingSaintListsGreat MenLakesLatterTemplesSaltCeremonyDistinguishedAstonishingRequestPolygamyArchivesLatter DaysCatholic SaintUtahLatter Day SaintsWomen In HistoryJoseph SmithSalt Lake City
Author:Fawn M. Brodie
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“The diversity of life on Earth, generally, is astonishing. But despite those large numbers, it's also important to recognize that every species, one way or another, is vulnerable to extinction. And in our time on Earth... our impact on the diversity of life has been profound.”

WayHas BeensImportantEarthNumbersDiversityImpactProfoundSpeciesDespiteVulnerableOne WayOur TimeExtinctionAstonishingLarge NumbersTime On EarthDiversity Of LifeOur Time On Earth
Author:Sylvia Earle
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“What astonishing changes a few years are capable of producing! I am told that even respectable characters speak of a monarchical form of government without horror. From thinking proceeds speaking, thence to acting is often but a single step. But how irrevocable and tremendous! What a triumph for the advocates of despotism to find that we are incapable of governing ourselves, and that systems founded on the basis of equal liberty are merely ideal and falacious! Would to God that wise measures may be taken in time to avert the consequences we have but too much reason to apprehend.”

ThinkingYearsMayReasonCharacterGovernmentFormSpeakActingLibertyStepsTakenToo MuchWiseHorrorEqualCapableConsequenceIdealsBasesTriumphIncapableAstonishingRespectableGoverningDespotismForms Of GovernmentIrrevocableAvertSingle Step
Author:George Washington
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“Conscience is the voice of the soul, the passions are the voice of the body. Is it astonishing that often these two languages contradict each other, and then to which must we listen? Too often reason deceives us; we have only too much acquired the right of refusing to listen to it; but conscience never deceives us; it is the true guide of man; it is to man what instinct is to the body; which follows it, obeys nature, and never is afraid of going astray.”

MenTwoSoulReasonBodyPassionLanguageVoiceToo MuchConscienceInstinctGuidesDeceivingAstonishing
Author:Jean-Jacques Rousseau
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“When that devil's bullet lodged itself inside the body of Martin Luther King, he had already begun an astonishing mobilization of poor, Black, white, latino Americans who had nothing to lose. They would challenge our government to eliminate exploitative, merciless, and war-mongering policies, nationwide, or else "tie up the country" through "means of civil disobedience." Dr. King intended to organize those legions into "coercive direct actions" that would make of Babylon a dysfunctional behemoth begging for relief. Is it any wonder he was killed?”

MeanWarCountryBodyGovernmentActionBlackLosesChallengesWhitePoorWonderPolicyKingsDevilDirectTiesReliefBulletsDrsOrganizeLutherAstonishingLatinoDisobedienceBeggingCivil DisobedienceNothing To LoseLegionBlack WhiteBabylonDirect ActionMobilizationBehemoth
Author:June Jordan
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“Should you happen to notice that another person is extremely tall or overweight, eats too much or declines convivial drinks, has red hair or goes about in a wheelchair, ought to get married or ought not to be pregnant -- see if you can refrain from bringing these astonishing observations to that person's attention.”

IfsShouldPersonsHappensAttentionToo MuchHairOughtDrinkMarriedRedObservationTallDeclinePregnantAstonishingRefrainOverweightWheelchairsRed Hair
Author:Judith Martin
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“It is very difficult in quarreling to be certain in either one what the other one is remembering. It is very often astonishing to each one quarreling to find out what the other one was remembering for quarreling. Mostly in quarreling not any one is finding out what the other one is remembering for quarreling, what the other one is remembering from quarreling.”

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Book:GERTRUDE STEIN Ultimate Collection: Novels, Short Stories, Poetry, Plays, Memoirs & Essays: Three Lives, Tender Buttons, Geography and Plays, Matisse, Picasso and Gertrude Stein, The Making of Americans, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas…
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“it is a surprising thing that the largest city in the world should have a population as gentle and pleasant and intimate and considerate and comforting as a little bit of a place where everybody knows everybody and everything, but astonishing or not it is perfectly true and the inhabitants of New York are just like that, and they are like that and this thing is a delightful, natural and gentle and sweet and comforting thing.”

KnowsWorldShouldLittlesBitsNaturalCitiesNew YorkSweetLittle BitShould HavePopulationGentleIntimatePleasantSurprisingDelightfulComfortingAstonishingConsiderateCities In The WorldSurprising Things
Book:How Writing Is Written
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