“If somebody can create an absolute system of beliefs and rules of conduct that will guide a business man at eleven o'clock in the morning, a boy trying to select a career, a woman in an unhappy love affair--well then, surely no pragmatist will object. He insists only that philosophy shall come down to earth and be tried out there.” IfsMenTryingWellsPhilosophyEarthBeliefBoysCareersMorningObjectsAbsolutesAffairGuidesUnhappyClockSelectElevenLove AffairDown To EarthBusiness ManPragmatists Book:Drift and Mastery: An Attempt to Diagnose the Current Unrest Source: Drift and Mastery: An Attempt to Diagnose the Current Unrest
“In fact we do not try to picture the afterlife, nor is it our selves in our nervous tics and optical flecks that we wish to perpetuate; it is the self as the window on the world that we can't bear to thinkof shutting. My mind when I was a boy of ten or eleven sent up its silent scream at the thought of future aeons -- at the thought of the cosmic party going on without me. The yearning for an afterlife is the opposite of selfish: it is love and praise of the world that we are privileged, in this complex interval of light, to witness and experience.” WorldTryingMindSelfFactsLightWishPartyBoysBearsTenWindowOppositesPraiseSilentComplexesSelfishNervousWitnessScreamCosmicAfterlifeYearningPrivilegedElevenIntervalsTics Author:John Updike
“What eleven- to thirteen-year-old boys fear is passivity of any kind. When they do act passively we can be fairly certain that it is an act of aggression designed to torment a parent or teacher. . . . Mischief at best, violence at worst is the boy's proclamation of masculinity.” YearsKindCertainParentBoysTeacherViolenceWorstAggressionMasculinityTormentElevenMischiefThirteenPassivityProclamationThirteen Year Olds Book:Adolescence: The Farewell to Childhood Source: Adolescence: The Farewell to Childhood