“The mind is a machine that is constantly asking: What would I prefer? Close your eyes, refuse to move, and watch what your mind does. What it does is become discontent with that-which-is. A desire arises, you satisfy that desire, and another arises in its place.” MindDoeEyeMovingDesireWatchesMachinesAskingRefuseAriseDiscontent Book:The Brain-Dead Megaphone Source: The Brain-Dead Megaphone
“Everyone wants rather to be pleasing to women and that desire is not altogether, though it is very largely, a manifestation of vanity. But one cannot aim to be pleasing to women any more than one can aim to have taste, or beauty of expression, or happiness; for these things are not specific aims which one may learn to attain; they are descriptions of the adequacy of one's living. To try to be happy is to try to build a machine with no other specification than that it shall run noiselessly.” WantTryingMayRunningDesireExpressionTasteMachinesAimVanityManifestationDescriptionSpecificationsAdequacyTrying To Be Happy Author:J. Robert Oppenheimer
“Who's in or out, who moves the grand machine, Nor stirs my curiosity, or spleen; Secrets of state no more I wish to know Than secret movements of a puppet-show; Let but the puppets move, I've my desire, Unseen the hand which guides the master wire.” KnowsStatesShowsHandsMovingDesireWishSecretMovementMastersMachinesCuriosityGuidesUnseenWirePuppetsSpleenPuppet Shows Author:Winston Churchill
“I came to photography with the desire to conquer this machine, the camera, and make it my slave. Instead, I have now a respect for it and all machines as expanders of my awareness.” DesireAwarenessPhotographyMachinesCamerasSlaveConquer Author:Todd Walker
“So if there was a way that I knew something about my character's desires or the things that they were resisting because I was saving it for some grand epiphany moment for my readers, I just feel like that's when you can feel the machine at work in a story. That's when you can feel the writer pulling the strings of the puppet.” IfsWayFeelsMomentsCharacterStoriesDesireReaderMachinesSavingStringsPullingPuppetsResistingEpiphany Author:Molly Antopol
“Like our bodies and like our desires, the machines we have devised are possessed of a heart which is slowly reduced to embers.” HeartBodyDesireMachinesPossessedEmbers Book:The Rings of Saturn Source: The Rings of Saturn
“A car crash harnesses elements of eroticism, aggression, desire, speed, drama, kinesthetic factors, the stylizing of motion, consumer goods, status - all these in one event. I myself see the car crash as a tremendous sexual event really: a liberation of human and machine libido (if there is such a thing).” IfsHumansDesireCarEventsDramaElementsMachinesSpeedFactorsConsumersLiberationGoodsAggressionCrashHarnessCar CrashLibido Author:J. G. Ballard
“We’ve all selected the wrong partners, all gotten hurt, and hopefully all moved on wiser for the experience. But there are those who, even in the face of constant disappointment, continue to believe that the intensity of their desire will be rewarded by an eventual jackpot of affection. And if that’s the slot machine you’re playing, friend, you’d better leave the casino ‘cause that one don’t pay out” IfsBelieveFacesDesireCausesHurtPayMachinesMovedConstantAffectionDisappointmentPartnersHopefullyIntensityWiserSelectedMoved OnCasinosSlot MachinesJackpot Author:Paul Dini