William James

This famous philosopher, in his address "The Dilemma of Determinism", used the analogy of a chess game to deal with questions of God, and choice, and chance: "The expert cannot foresee any single move by the novice. But he knows all the possible moves and he knows how to counter each and every possible move to assure his victory. Thus, although the game may follow a devious and unpredictable course, the checkmate ending the game is inevitable."

Groucho

"One morning I shot an elephant in my pajamas. How he got in my pajamas I'll never know."

Nature's Secrets

Sir James Jeans, British physicist and astronomer, has said : "The essential fact is simply that all the pictures which science now draws of nature, and which alone seem capable of according with observational fact, are mathematical pictures."
Therein lies our inability to visualize, and nature's ever present ability to protect, her secrets from mankind's curiosity.

Andy Rooney

"If you smile when you are alone then you really mean it."

Far Out

In his book "A Mathematician Reads the Newspaper" John Allen Paulos teases us with this far out statement: "The sensitive dependence of nonlinear systems on their initial conditions has been called the Butterfly Effect, from the idea that a butterfly flapping its wings in China, say, might spell the difference several months later between a hurricane and a balmy day along the eastern U.S. seaboard."

Chaos Theory

Forty six years ago meteorologist Edward Lorenz inserted numbers of six decimal places (representing current initial conditions) into his computer model and derived weather projections. He later repeated this process but this time rounded off his numbers to three decimal places. To his surprise the weather projections were entirely different. Very very slight change in initial conditions gave entirely different results. Unknowingly, he had just been midwife to the birth of chaos theory and the study of nonlinear systems.

Sam Goldwyn

"I had a great idea this morning but I didn't like it."

Max Planck

German physicist who discovered that radiation is electromagnetic in nature, emitting energy in descrete values which he called quanta. In his book "Where is Science Going" he describes the endless challenge of science: "We see in all modern scientific advances that the solution of one problem only unveiles the mystery of another. Each hilltop that we reach discloses another hilltop beyond, We must accept this as a hard and fast irrefutable fact."

Flashes

Flashes of thought are as unpredictable and unstopable as flashes of lightning:
- What I should have said
- Seemingly guided actions
- A bird call piercing the gloom of worry
- Rainbow in a drop of dew on a blade of grass

John Locke

In 1690, this English philosopher wrote two "Letters concerning Toleration" and issued his two "Treatises on Government". The principles which we hold so dear and consider so American were conceived in the mind of this brilliant Englishnan. Our patriotism need not be wounded. Our capable American forefathers recognized the value of these principles and made them anchor points in the Constitution of the United States.

Stanislaw Lec

"Thoughts, like fleas, jump from man to man, but they don't bite everybody."

Abigail Adams

Much has been written of our second president but what of his wife Abigail? Historian David McCullough had this to say: Newly elected president Jefferson had been invited to dinner by defeated John and Abigail along with members of the House and Senate. Jefferson "sat at the table beside Abigail, asking 'Who's that man over there?' and 'Who's this one over here?' And she told him everything about them - where they came from, what their constituenisy was, what their interests were. She was as bright as can be and had a backbone of iron. She probably didn't weigh 100 pounds, standing only about five feet one. I think she's one of the greatest Americans of all times."

Abigail Adams

Much has been written of our second president but what of his wife Abigail? Historian David McCullough had this to say: Newly elected president Jefferson had been invited to dinner by defeated John and Abigail along with members of the House and Senate. Jefferson "sat at the table beside Abigail, asking 'Who's that man over there?' and 'Who's this one over here?' And she told him everything about them - where they came from, what their constituenisy was, what their interests were. She was as bright as can be and had a backbone of iron. She probably didn't weigh 100 pounds, standing only about five feet one. I think she's one of the greatest Americans of all times."

George Orwell

On the whole human beings want to be good - not too good and not quite all of the time.

Question?

Scientists are rightly proud of their part in today's rapidly expanding world of technology. A few are atheists. How can these few be so self satisfied with their accomplishments and concepts when they have been concerned with less than 10% of the matter in the universe? Over 90%, which the scientists call "dark matter", has not yet been found.

Charlie Brown

"Sometimes I lie awake at night and ask where have I gone wrong? Then a voice says to me - this is going to take more than one night."

Support

Today there are support groups for every conceivable problem or ailment of mankind. I have observed that the strong, with problems, tend to turn inward rather than to seek out these groups, except when they are motivated to try to help their fellowmen.

Henny Youngman

"My grandmother is over 80 and still doesn't need glasses. Drinks right out of the bottle."

Collective Electrodynamics

Carver Mead, motivated by his belief that the goal of scientific research should be the simplification and unification of knowledge, has documented, in this book, his experments which he sees as a first step toward reformating quantum concepts - his basis - treating the electron as a wave.

Carver A. Mead

Professor Emeritis California Institute of Technology has challenged the legacy of Niels Bohr - considered the father of the quantum theory with its statistics-based ultimately random foundation. Mead believes that Bohr sold his statistical concept by intimidation to resolve the apparent conflict between classical and theoretical physics. Mead believes there is no conflict but a deeper single reality. Einstein agreed, famously protesting: "God dosen't play dice!"

George Burns

"At my age flowers scare me!"

Francois Rabelais

French Renaissance writer, often bawdy, if he lived today I'm sure he would be a rapper. He believed in grateful enjoyment of the good things in life and cheerful acceptance of its inescapable vicissitudes, or as he described it: "A certain gaiety of spirit preserved in contempt of the accidents of life."

Computer Talk (again)

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Computer Talk

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Rousseau

Jean-Jacques Rousseau - 18th century Swiss born thinker, writer, philosopher - a contemporary of Hume, Diderot, Voltaire - a controversial figure drawing both acclaim and criticism for his views. I think this, an expression of one of his views, is worth sharing: "Virtue! sublime science of simple minds,---are not your principles graven upon every heart? Need we do more, to learn your laws, than---listen to the voice of conscience?"

Goof

This thing has a mind of its own. First it refused my message, and then, as if to apologize, it printed it twice!

Albert Einstein

"As for the search for truth, I know from my own painful searching, with its many blind alleys, how hard it is to take a reliable step, however so small, toward the understanding of that which is truly significant."

Albert Einstein

"As for the search for truth, I know from my own painful searching, with its many blind alleys, how hard it is to take a reliable step, be it ever so small, toward the understanding of that which is truly significant."

Help?

Neatly packaged answers to human need fill the bookstores and many make the best seller lists. I believe generalizing on this subject can sometimes even be destructive as the "experts" try to force an 11c mind into what they perceive to be a more conventional 10b category. As we are each unique, so also, I think, are the answers we seek.

Will Durant

A quotation from his volume IV (The Age of Faith) : "Nothing, save bread, is so precious to mankind as its religious beliefs; for man lives not by bread alone, but also by the faith that lets him hope. Therefore his deepest hatred greets those who challenge his sustenance or his creed."

Golf

"Is my friend in the bunker or is the bastard on the green?"

Will Durant

It took me a few years to read his dozen thick volumes of "The Story of Civilization." What a vocabulary! - I had to have a dictionary at my side at all times. Once, just for fun, I tried to use some of his words: "I speak to you from my seraglio - such as it is. I speak as a tonsured patriarch. My message is esoteric - hopefully erudite. I speak wiyhout avarice, hopefully euphoniously, but with rubicund integument should I be perceived as concupiscent as I am in no way profligate."

Yogi

"Half this game is ninety percent mental."

V. S. Naipaul

Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul - knighted by the British in 1989. I recommend his book "Among the Believers- an Islamic Journey." He attracted my attention because of his middle east heritage, his interesting and readable prose, his extensive study and travel in Islamic countries, and his first hand reporting of the contradictions of the Islamic mind."