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We have to learn what we can, but remain mindful that our knowledge not close the circle, closing out the void, so that we forget that what we do not know remains boundless, without limit or bottom, and that what we know may have to share the quality of being known with what denies it. What is seen with one eye has no depth.
— Stone Telling, Always Coming Home, Ursula K. Leguin
Civilizations in decline are consistently characterized by a tendency toward standardization and uniformity. Conversely, during the growth stage of civilization, the tendency is toward differentiation and diversity.
— Arnold Toynbee, A Study of History
As the piston continues to rise, creating vacuum in the crankcase, the inlet port is uncovered and thus the cycle is completed and repeated.
— "The Two Stroke Engine", Haynes Motorcyle Basics Techbook
If we knew what it was we were doing, it would not be called research.
— Albert Einstein
I certainly had no feeling for harmony, and Schoenberg thought that that would make it impossible for me to write music. He said, 'You'll come to a wall you won't be able to get through.' So I said, 'I'll beat my head against that wall.'
— John Cage
It is an ultimate act of rudeness to find fault with anything which is given to us in a spirit of love. So a modern, secular education is often painful. By it's very nature, it invites us to question the wisdom of the ones we love. Too bad.
— Kurt Vonnegut, address to the graduating class of Hobart and William Smith Colleges, Geneva, New York 1974, from Palm Sunday
Life is not ever either or. It's and and and and and.
— Philip Roth
'One whom the dragons will speak with,' he said, 'that is a dragonlord, or at least that is the center of the matter. It's not a trick of mastering the dragons, as most people think.'
— Ged, The Tombs of Atuan , Ursula K Le Guin
A superior pilot uses his superior judgment to avoid situations which require the use of his superior skill.
— Frank Borman, astronaut
He knew the difference between knowing the name of something and knowing something.
— Richard Feynman, referring to his father.