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Function Quotes

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Function Quotes

“When scientists need to explain difficult points of theory, illustration by hypothetical example - rather than by total abstraction - works well (perhaps indispensably) as a rhetorical device. Such cases do not function as speculations in the pejorative sense - as silly stories that provide insight into complex mechanisms - but rather as idealized illustrations to exemplify a difficult point of theory. (Other fields, like philosophy and the law, use such conjectural cases as a standard device.”

NeedsWellsPhilosophyStoriesUseLawDifficultCasesExampleFieldsTheoryStandardsScientistFunctionComplexesInsightSillyDevicesMechanismAbstractionSpeculationIllustrationRhetoricalHypothetical
Book:Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms
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“Darwinian natural selection only yields adaptation to changing local environments, and better function in an immediate habitat might just as well be achieved by greater simplicity in form and behavior as by ever-increasing complexity.”

WellsMightFormNaturalEnvironmentGreaterBehaviorFunctionSimplicityLocalsComplexityYieldSelectionAdaptationNatural SelectionHabitatNatural Habitats
Book:Leonardo's Mountain of Clams and the Diet of Worms
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“Organisms [...] are directed and limited by their past. They must remain imperfect in their form and function, and to that extent unpredictable since they are not optimal machines. We cannot know their future with certainty, if only because a myriad of quirky functional shifts lie within the capacity of any feature, however well adapted to a present role.”

IfsKnowsWellsPastFormLyingRolesCapacityMachinesFunctionCertaintyFeaturesImperfectOrganismsUnpredictableAdaptedQuirkyOptimal
Book:Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes: Further Reflections in Natural History
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“The talker has found a hearer but not a listener; and though he may talk his very best for his own sake, you will find that his mental movements are erratic: they have no fixed centre and no definite object. His talk is like the water of a canal whose banks have given way, which rolls aimlessly hither and thither, without fulfilling any useful function, though it is the same water which was so helpful and serviceable, when it was confined within clearly marked limits by the restraining force of its earthy boundaries.”

WayMayFoundGivenForceWaterMovementObjectsListeningLimitsFunctionSakeBoundariesFixedHelpfulListenersFulfillingDefiniteCentreConfinedTalkersCanalsRestrainingErratic
Author:Charles Dickens
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“The woman is the man's glory, and she naturally delights in the praises which are assurances that she is fulfilling her function; and she gives herself to him who succeeds in convincing her that she, of all others, is best able to discharge it for him. A woman without this kind of "vanity" is a monster.”

MenGivingKindAbleWomenSucceedGloryFunctionPraiseDelightMonstersVanityFulfillingAssuranceConvincingDischarge
Book:The Rod, the Root and the Flower
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“During the last quarter of a century all the authority associated with the function of spiritual guidance ... has seeped down into the lowest publications. ... Between a poem by Valéry and an advertisement for a beauty cream promising a rich marriage to anyone who used it there was at no point a breach of continuity. So as a result of literature's spiritual usurpation a beauty cream advertisement possessed, in the eyes of little village girls, the authority that was formerly attached to the words of priests.”

LittlesEyeLastsSpiritualUsedGirlLiteratureResultsRichCenturyAuthorityFunctionGuidancePriestsVillageQuartersPossessedCreamLowestNo PointContinuityPublicationAdvertisementsBreachUsurpationSpiritual GuidanceQuarter Of A Century
Author:Simone Weil
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“Junk turns the user into a plant. Plants do not feel pain since pain has no function in a stationary organism. Junk is a pain killer. A plant has no libido in the human or animal sense. Junk replaces the sex drive. Seeding is the sex of the plant and the function of opium is to delay seeding. Perhaps the intense discomfort of withdrawal is the transition from plant back to animal, from a painless, sexless, timeless state back to sex and pain and time, from death back to life.”

FeelsHumansStatesPainTurnsSexAnimalFunctionPlantIntenseTransitionKillersUsersOrganismsTimelessDelayDiscomfortJunkWithdrawalOpiumStationaryPainlessLibidoSex Drive
Author:William S. Burroughs
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“We are, as a sex, infinitely superior to men, and if we were free and developed, healthy in body and mind, as we should be under natural conditions, our motherhood would be our glory. That function gives women such wisdom and power as no male can possess.”

IfsMenGivingShouldMindBodyWould BeSexNaturalConditionsHealthyGloryFunctionMalesMotherhoodSuperiorsMind And Body
Book:Elizabeth Cady Stanton as Revealed in Her Letters, Diary and Reminiscences
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“There are dons who care for the intellect and the imagination, and there are priests who care for the spirit; but broadly speaking the function of universities and churches alike is to trim and tame enthusiasm, to suppress curiosity, and, in short, to whittle immortal souls into serviceable props of the established order.”

SoulCareSpiritOrderImaginationChurchFunctionCuriosityUniversityIntellectEnthusiasmImmortalPriestsWho CaresPropsImmortal Soul
Book:The progress of a biographer
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“There isn't a single government agency that can't function. There's more money in this federal government, there's more money allocated than these people can possibly spend. They have to concoct asinine ways to spend it, like advertising for new food stamp users. I've gotten to the point, I'm just so righteously indignant and offended at the very idea that our government could ever run out of money when we've got a printing press, for crying out loud. Printed three and a half trillion dollars over seven years and flooded Wall Street with it.”

PeopleWayYearsIdeasGovernmentRunningThreeHalfStreetsCryWallFunctionPressesDollarsSevenAdvertisingLoudAgencyUsersMore MoneyFederal GovernmentStampsOffendedSeven YearsPrintedPrintingPrinting PressFood StampsIndignantGovernment Agencies
Author:Rush Limbaugh
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“The elegant study... is consistent with the themes of modern cognitive neuroscience . Every aspect of thought and emotion is rooted in brain structure and function, including many psychological disorders and, presumably, genius. The study confirms that the brain is a modular system comprising multiple intelligences, mostly nonverbal.”

EmotionBrainStudyModernGeniusAspectFunctionStructureIncludingPsychologicalThemeConsistentDisorderRootedMultipleNeuroscienceElegantCognitiveThoughts And EmotionsNonverbalMultiple IntelligencesStructure And FunctionPsychological Disorders
Author:Steven Pinker
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“The corporate State considers that private enterprise in the sphere of production is the most effective and useful instrument in the interest of the nation. In view of the fact that private organisation of production is a function of national concern, the organiser of the enterprise is responsible to the State for the direction given to production.”

StatesFactsGivenNationsInterestViewsConcernFunctionResponsibleInstrumentsProductionsCorporateEnterpriseSpheresFascismOrganisationPrivate Enterprise
Book:Fascism: Doctrine and Institutions
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“We have more than two options. A critique of reason does not have to be a call for the return of superstition and arbitrary power. Our problems do not lie with reason itself but with our obsessive treatment of reason as an absolute value. Certainly it is one of our qualities, but it functions positively only when balanced and limited by the others.”

DoeTwoReasonProblemLyingValuesQualityReturnFunctionAbsolutesTreatmentSuperstitionsBalancedArbitraryPositivelyCritiqueObsessiveTwo Options
Author:John Ralston Saul
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“Money is indispensable to a long-circuit heavy load energy system. It must be used when a sufficient surplus is being produced to allow a margin for exchange, and cost of transport, over a considerable distance. Money represents a storage battery when idle, and a generalized mode of the conversion of energy when it is in motion, with a function of equating time and space.”

LongUsedEnergySpaceCostFunctionDistanceHeavyConversionSufficientLoadIdleIndispensableTime And SpaceMarginsTransportCircuitsBatteriesSurplusStorageHeavy Loads
Book:God of the Machine
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“The people were merely to acknowledge the authority of the Fuehrer, or, let us say, to declare themselves in agreement with the Fuehrer. If they gave the Fuehrer their confidence then it was their concern to exercise the other functions. Thus, not the individual persons were to be selected according to the will of the people, but solely the leadership itself.”

PeopleIfsPersonsIndividualExerciseAuthorityConcernFunctionAcknowledgeAgreementSelectedGoering
Author:Hermann Goring
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“Telephones in 2020 will be archaic, relics of a bygone era-like transistor radios are today. Telephony, which will be entirely IP-based by then, will be a standard communications chip on many devices. We'll probably carry some kind of screen-based reading device that will perform this function, though I assume when we want to communicate verbally, we'll do so through a tiny, earplug-based device.”

WantKindTodayReadingCommunicationStandardsFunctionAssumingRadioCommunicateScreensTinyErasDevicesTelephonesChipsRelicsTransistors
Author:Josh Quittner
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“In Matthew 16:19, Jesus said that He would give us the keys to the Kingdom. Faith is the major key that opens every door in the Kingdom. It is a master key. Therefore it is imperative that we understand the ways of faith. Because these keys are the ways of God the natural man cannot receive them. They are spiritually understood. They are foolishness to the natural man. When a gift of the Spirit operates. Then we are able to impart that gift to others and teach them how to function in it also.”

MenWayGivingSaidAbleSpiritJesusNaturalTeachDoorsMastersKeysMajorsUnderstoodFunctionKingdomsFoolishnessImperativesImpartMatthewGifts Of The SpiritKeys To The Kingdom
Author:Phil Pringle
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“Advocating the mere tolerance of difference between women is the grossest reformism. it is a total denial of the creative function of difference in our lives. Difference must be not merely toleration, but seen as a fund of necessary polarities between which our creativity can spark like a dialectic. Only then does the necessity for interdependency become unthreatening. Only within the interdependency of different strengths, acknowledged and equal, can the power to seek new ways of being in the world generate, as well as the courage and sustenance to act where there are no charters”

WorldWayWellsDoeDifferentDifferencesCreativityCreativeOur LivesEqualFunctionMereToleranceDenialFundSparksNew WaysAdvocatingCharterSustenanceTolerationDialecticsPolarity
Author:Audre Lorde
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“Get scared. It will do you good. Smoke a bit, stare blankly at some ceilings, beat your head against some walls, refuse to see some people, paint and write. Get scared some more. Allow your little mind to do nothing but function. Stay inside, go out - I don't care what you'll do; but stay scared as hell. You will never be able to experience everything. So, please, do poetical justice to your soul and simply experience yourself.”

PeopleWritingMindLittlesSoulCareAbleBitsJusticeHellWallPleaseBeatsFunctionPaintScaredRefuseDon't CareSmokeYour SoulI Don't CareStaringCeilingsLittle MindsExperience Yourself
Author:Albert Camus
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“A better distribution of incomes would increase that efficiency by diverting a great fund of wealth from the useless to the useful members of society. To cut off the income of the useless will not impair their efficiency. They have none to impair. It will, in fact, compel them to acquire a useful function.”

FactsWealthCuttingMembersFunctionIncreaseIncomeUselessAcquireFundEfficiencyDistribution
Book:Drift and Mastery: An Attempt to Diagnose the Current Unrest
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“The same polarity of the male and female principle exists in nature; not only, as is obvious in animals and plants, but in the polarity of the two fundamental functions, that of receiving and penetrating. It is the polarity of earth and rain, of the river and the ocean, of night and day, of darkness and light, of matter and spirit.”

TwoMatterLightEarthSpiritNightAnimalPrinciplesDarknessOceanRainFemaleRiversFunctionFundamentalsPlantMalesObviousReceivingLight And DarknessPolarity
Book:THE ART OF LOVING
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“Advertising is the modern substitute for argument, its function is to make the worse appear the better article. A confused competition of all propagandas -- those insults to human nature -- is carried on by the most expert psychological methods -- for instance, by always repeating a lie.”

HumansLyingModernHuman NatureArgumentFunctionMethodCompetitionPsychologicalAdvertisingInstancePropagandaExpertsConfusedInsultSubstitutesArticles
Book:The Works of George Santayana
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