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Language Quotes

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Language Quotes

“But once an original book has been written - and no more than one or two appear in a century - men of letters imitate it, in other words, they copy it so that hundreds of thousands of books are published on exactly the same theme, with slightly different titles and modified phraseology. This should be able to be achieved by apes, who are essentially imitators, provided, of course, that they are able to make use of language.”

MenShouldWritingHas BeensTwoBookDifferentUseAbleCoursesLanguageWrittenCenturyLettersOriginalsTitlesThemeCopiesApesImitatorUse Of Language
Book:Planet of the Apes
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“Music is a language and different people who come along are each using that language to do something different, but all coming at it in a similar vein inasmuch as it's always community based and for the most part nonprofit. Most bands don't ever come within a mile of profit - clearly these people are not playing music to make money.”

PeopleDifferentLanguageCommunityBandMusic IsProfitMilesMaking MoneyVeinsDifferent PeoplesPlaying MusicNonprofits
Author:Ian MacKaye
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“King is a title which translated into several languages, signifies a magistrate with as many different degrees of power as there are kingdoms in the world, and he can have no power but what is given him by law; yea, even the supreme or legislative power is bound by the rules of equity, to govern by laws enacted, and published in due form; for what is not legal is arbitrary.”

WorldDifferentFormLawLanguageGivenKingsDegreesBoundsDuesSupremeKingdomsTitlesEquityArbitraryMagistrates
Book:A Supplement to the Miscellaneous Works of the Late Dr. Arbuthnot
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“And there are also languages that divide nouns into much more specific genders. The African language Supyire from Mali has five genders: humans, big things, small things, collectives, and liquids. Bantu languages such as Swahili have up to ten genders, and the Australian language Ngan’gityemerri is said to have fifteen different genders, which include, among others, masculine human, feminine human, canines, non-canine animals, vegetables, drinks, and two different genders for spears (depending on size and material).”

HumansSaidTwoDifferentBigsLanguageAnimalFiveMaterialsDrinkTenSizeGenderCollectivesFeminineDividesVegetablesFifteenBig ThingsMasculineSmall ThingsAustralianLiquidSpearsCanineNounsMali
Author:Guy Deutscher
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“God has come again and again in various Forms, has spoken again and again in different words and different languages the Same One Truth - but how many are there that live up to it? Instead of making Truth the vitalbreath of his life, man compromises by making over and over againa mechanical religion of it - a handy staff to lean on in times of adversity, a soothing balm for his conscience or a tradition to be followed.”

MenDifferentFormLanguageConscienceTraditionAdversityVariousCompromiseAgain And AgainStaffSoothingHandyDifferent LanguagesTimes Of Adversity
Author:Meher Baba
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“The idea of human rights and freedoms must be an integral part of any meaningful world order. Yet, I think it must be anchored in a different place, and in a different way, than has been the case so far. If it is to be more than just a slogan mocked by half the world, it cannot be expressed in the language of a departing era, and it must not be mere froth floating on the subsiding waters of faith in a purely scientific relationship to the world.”

IfsThinkingWorldWayHumansHas BeensIdeasDifferentOrderLanguageWaterHalfCasesRightsMereHuman RightsMeaningfulErasDifferent WaysFloatingSlogansDifferent PlaceWorld OrderRights And FreedomsDeparting
Author:Vaclav Havel
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“It would be naïve to imagine that any analysis of experience is dependent on pattern expressed in language. Any concept, whether or not it forms part of the system of grammatical categories, can be conveyed in any language. If a notion is lacking in a given series, it implies a different configuration and not a lack of expressive power.”

IfsDifferentWould BeFormLanguageGivenImagineConceptsSeriesNotionPatternsAnalysisDependentCategoriesImagine ThatLackingExpressiveConfiguration
Author:Edward Sapir
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“New York doesn't exactly have neighborhoods, the way most cities do. What it has is closer to distinct and separate villages, some of them existing on different continents, some of them existing in different centuries, and many of them at war with one another. English is not the primary language in many of these villages, but the Roman alphabet does still have a slight edge.”

WayDoeStillsDifferentWarLanguageCitiesCenturyNew YorkEdgesPrimariesNeighborhoodVillageContinentsAlphabet
Book:What's So Funny?
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“Indeed, what forces us at all to suppose that there is an essential opposition of 'true' and 'false'? Is it not sufficient to assume degrees of apparentness and, as it were, lighter and darker shadows and shades of appearance- different 'values', to use the language of painters?”

DifferentUseValuesLanguageForceEssentialsDegreesShadowAssumingAppearancePainterSufficientOppositionShadeRationalityLightersTrue And FalseDifferent Values
Book:Basic Writings of Nietzsche
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“If Zen is approached with the usual mental attitude, it will seem quite incomprehensible. Our average Western intellectuality would consider its paradoxical language simply as a play upon words. Its full significance is revealed only when we approach it in a different manner, making our minds available to the new processes of inner perception which it suggests.”

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Book:Living Zen
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“Faculty Psychology is getting to be respectable again after centuries of hanging around with phrenologists and other dubious types. By faculty psychology I mean, roughly, the view that many fundamentally different kinds of psychological mechanisms must be postulated in order to explain the facts of mental life. Faculty psychology takes seriously the apparent heterogeneity of the mental and is impressed by such prima facie differences as between, say, sensation and perception, volition and cognition, learning and remembering, or language and thought.”

KindMeanDifferentFactsRememberOrderLanguageDifferencesViewsPsychologyCenturyTypePerceptionPsychologicalFacultySensationsMechanismDifferent KindsImpressedRespectableCognitionDubiousHanging AroundVolition
Author:Jerry Fodor
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“Although mathematical notation undoubtedly possesses parsing rules, they are rather loose, sometimes contradictory, and seldom clearly stated. [...] The proliferation of programming languages shows no more uniformity than mathematics. Nevertheless, programming languages do bring a different perspective. [...] Because of their application to a broad range of topics, their strict grammar, and their strict interpretation, programming languages can provide new insights into mathematical notation.”

DifferentSometimesShowsLanguagePerspectiveMathematicsInsightMathematicalRangeProgrammingInterpretationBroadsApplicationNeverthelessStrictTopicsGrammarContradictoryProgramming LanguagesDifferent PerspectiveUniformityProliferation
Author:Kenneth E. Iverson
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“Amis is acutely, vibrantly sensitive to the different registers of laughter. He knows that it can be the most affirming and uniquely human sound, and also the most sinister and animalistic one. He understands every note of every octave that separates the liberating shout of mirth from the cackle of a bully or the snigger of a sadist.”

KnowsHumansBookDifferentLanguageSoundLaughterNotesSensitiveBullyLiberatingRegisterSinisterMirthAffirmingAnimalistic
Author:Martin Amis
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“All communication is more or less cross-cultural. We learn to use language as we grow up, and growing up in different parts of the country, having different ethnic, religious, or class backgrounds, even just being male or female - all result in different ways of talking.”

WayDifferentCountryUseLanguageGrowsReligiousResultsTalkingClassGrowing UpGrowingCommunicationFemaleCrossesMalesBackgroundsDifferent WaysJust BeingWay Of Talking
Book:That's not what I meant!: how conversational style makes or breaks your relations with others
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“My research suggests that men and women may speak different languages that they assume are the same, using similar words to encode disparate experiences of self and social relationships. Because these languages share an overlapping moral vocabulary, they contain a propensity for systematic mistranslation.”

MenMayDifferentSelfSpeakLanguageSocialMoralShareResearchMen And WomenAssumingVocabularySystematicPropensityDifferent LanguagesOverlappingSocial Relationships
Book:In a Different Voice
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“The trees change their voices in autumn as well as their shapes. No longer do they whisper to one another in muffled tones as they did in summer; they talk in a different leaf-language now. The wind moves through the boughs like fingers drawn across the strings of a harp filling the air with the harsh dry sound of sapless leaves. It is the main theme of the autumn music, this murmuring counterpoint of dead leaves.”

WellsDifferentMovingLanguageSoundVoiceAirTreeWindShapesSummerFingersToneThemeDryAutumnStringsHarshLeafsFillingHarpsMurmuring
Book:The Glory of the Garden
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“the way in which a faith community shapes language about God implicity represents what it takes to be the highest good, the profoundest truth, the most appealing beauty. ... While officially it is rightly and consistently said that God is spirit and so beyond identification with either male or female sex, yet the daily language of preaching, worship, catechesis, and instruction conveys a different message: God is male, or at least more like a man than a woman, or at least more fittingly addressed as male than as female.”

MenWaySaidDifferentGodSpiritLanguageSexCommunityShapesWorshipMessagesHighestFemaleMalesInstructionConsistentlyPreachingIdentificationFaith Community
Author:Elizabeth A. Johnson
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