Xaad Saud > Xaad's Quotes

“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the universe.”
― Albert Einstein

“A room without books is like a body without a soul.”
― Marcus Tullius Cicero

“Those who can make you believe absurdities, can make you commit atrocities.”
― Voltaire

“It is difficult to free people from the chains they revere.”
― Voltaire

“It is particularly incumbent on those who never change their opinion, to be secure of judging properly at first.”
― Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice

“An availability cascade is a self-sustaining chain of events, which may start from media reports of a relatively minor event and lead up to public panic and large-scale government action. On some occasions, a media story about a risk catches the attention of a segment of the public, which becomes aroused and worried. This emotional reaction becomes a story in itself, prompting additional coverage in the media, which in turn produces greater concern and involvement. The cycle is sometimes sped along deliberately by “availability entrepreneurs,” individuals or organizations who work to ensure a continuous flow of worrying news. The danger is increasingly exaggerated as the media compete for attention-grabbing headlines. Scientists and others who try to dampen the increasing fear and revulsion attract little attention, most of it hostile: anyone who claims that the danger is overstated is suspected of association with a “heinous cover-up.” The issue becomes politically important because it is on everyone’s mind, and the response of the political system is guided by the intensity of public sentiment. The availability cascade has now reset priorities. Other risks, and other ways that resources could be applied for the public good, all have faded into the background.”
― Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow

“The statement “Hitler loved dogs and little children” is shocking no matter how many times you hear it, because any trace of kindness in someone so evil violates the expectations set up by the halo effect.”
― Daniel Kahneman, Thinking, Fast and Slow

“George Bernard Shaw once put it: “The reasonable man adapts himself to the world: the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man.”
― Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants

“It has been said that most revolutions are not caused by revolutionaries in the first place, but by the stupidity and brutality of governments,” Seán MacStiofáin, the provisional IRA’s first chief of staff, said once, looking back on those early years.”
― Malcolm Gladwell, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants

“Occam’s Razor’ (so-called because the principle encourages one to cut out unnecessary complications from theory) is ultimately aesthetic: why postulate two things when one will do? Or as Occam is said to have put it, ‘It is vain to do with more what can be done with fewer’.”
― Philip Stokes, Philosophy 100 Essential Thinkers

“Galileo’s findings attracted such sharp criticism, both from secular and ecclesiastical quarters that he felt compelled to offer, both in his defence and in reply to his critics, the Letter to the Grand Duchess Christina in 1615. In the Letter, Galileo argues that scientific and theological matters should not be confused. Science could not cast doubt on religious doctrine, only strengthen it. Nonetheless he was condemned by the Inquisition, first in private communication in 1616 and later in 1633, when he publicly recanted.”
― Philip Stokes, Philosophy 100 Essential Thinkers

“A defence of the Enlightenment is a defence of the modern world, along with all its possibilities for self-criticism and transformation. If you’re committed to Enlightenment, you’re committed to understanding the world in order to improve it.”
― Susan Neiman, Why Grow Up?: Subversive Thoughts for an Infantile Age

“The fact that man is capable of action means that the unexpected can be expected of him, that he is able to perform what is infinitely improbable. And this again is possible only because each man is unique, so that with each birth something uniquely new comes into the world. (Human Condition, p. 178) For de Beauvoir, this newness”
― Susan Neiman, Why Grow Up?: Subversive Thoughts for an Infantile Age

“Reason drives your search to make sense of the world by pushing you to ask why things are as they are. For theoretical reason, the outcome of that search becomes science; for practical reason, the outcome is a more just world.”
― Susan Neiman, Why Grow Up?: Subversive Thoughts for an Infantile Age

“Nietzsche turned the question into a cornerstone of his philosophy. His Twilight of the Idols states: ‘In every age the wisest have passed the identical judgment on life: it is Worthless … Everywhere and always their mouths have uttered the same sound – a sound full of doubt, full of melancholy, full of weariness with life, full of opposition to life’ (p. 29).”
― Susan Neiman, Why Grow Up?: Subversive Thoughts for an Infantile Age

“Because of the unknowable, life means something. When everything is known, then everything is flat. You will be fed up, bored.”
― Osho, Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic

“Intellect is your mind. Instinct is your body. And just as instinct functions perfectly on behalf of the body, intuition functions perfectly as far as your consciousness is concerned. Intellect is just between these two—a passage to be passed, a bridge to be crossed. But there are many people, many millions of people, who never cross the bridge. They simply sit on the bridge thinking they have arrived home.”
― Osho, Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic

“To know means to be silent, utterly silent, so you can hear the still, small voice within. To know means to drop the mind. When you are absolutely still, unmoving, nothing wavers in you, the doors open. You are part of this mysterious existence. You know it by becoming part of it, by becoming a participant in it. That is knowing.”
― Osho, Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic

“The world of politics is basically of the instinctive level. It belongs to the law of the jungle: might is right. And the people who get interested in politics are the most mediocre. Politics needs no other qualifications except one—that is, a deep feeling of inferiority.”
― Osho, Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic

“If the left hemisphere of the brain goes on dominating you, you will live a successful life—so successful that by the time you are forty you will have ulcers; by the time you are forty-five, you will have had at least one or two heart attacks. By the time you are fifty you will be almost dead—but successfully dead! You may become a great scientist, but you will never become a great being. You may accumulate enough wealth, but you will lose all that is of worth. You may conquer the whole world like an Alexander, but your own inner territory will remain unconquered.”
― Osho, Intuition: Knowing Beyond Logic

“We must not cease from exploration. And the end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we began and to know the place for the first time.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“As Eleanor Roosevelt observed, “No one can hurt you without your consent.” In the words of Gandhi, “They cannot take away our self respect if we do not give it to them.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

“Without involvement, there is no commitment. Mark it down, asterisk it, circle it, underline it. No involvement, no commitment.”
― Stephen Covey

“the best thinking in the area of time management can be captured in a single phrase: Organize and execute around priorities.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“It is much more ennobling to the human spirit to let people judge themselves than to judge them. And”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“Valuing the differences is the essence of synergy—the mental, the emotional, the psychological differences between people. And the key to valuing those differences is to realize that all people see the world, not as it is, but as they are.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“Religious leader David O. McKay taught, “The greatest battles of life are fought out daily in the silent chambers of the soul.” If you win the battles there, if you settle the issues that inwardly conflict, you feel a sense of peace, a sense of knowing what you’re about. And you’ll find that the public victories—where you tend to think cooperatively, to promote the welfare and good of other people, and to be genuinely happy for other people’s successes—will follow naturally.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“Goethe taught, “Treat a man as he is and he will remain as he is. Treat a man as he can and should be and he will become as he can and should be.”
― Stephen R. Covey, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change

“I was appalled at the pervasive ignorance and illiteracy of the common people.”30 This was fifteen years after the discovery of oil; it helps to explain the State Department’s concern about whether the government was spending its money wisely, a concern that would eventually prompt the United States to take a direct hand in running the Kingdom’s affairs.”
― Thomas W. Lippman, Inside The Mirage: America's Fragile Partnership With Saudi Arabia

“The way to love anything is to realize that it might be lost. —G. K. CHESTERTON T”
― Robert B. Cialdini, Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion