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“I mistrust all systematizers and avoid them. the will to a system is a lack of integrity.”
― Twilight of the Idols
― Twilight of the Idols
“So: Police are bureaucrats with weapons. If you think about it, this is a really ingenious trick. Because when most of think about police, we do not think of them as enforcing regulation. We think of them as fighting crime, and when we think of "crime," the kind of crime we have in our minds in violent crime. Even though, in fact, what police mostly do is exactly the opposite: they bring the threat of force to bear on situations that would otherwise have nothing to do with it.”
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“Last time I asked: 'What does mathematics mean to you?', and some people answered: "The manipulation of numbers, the manipulation of structures.' And if I had asked what music means to you, would you have answered: 'The manipulation of notes?”
― The Beauty of Doing Mathematics: Three Public Dialogues
― The Beauty of Doing Mathematics: Three Public Dialogues
“Working serves a purpose, or is meant to do so. Being forced to pretend to work just for the sake of working is an indignity, since the demand is perceived—rightly—as the pure exercise of power for its own sake. If make-believe play is the purest expression of human freedom, make-believe work imposed by others is the purest expression of lack of freedom. It’s not entirely surprising, then, that the first historical evidence we have for the notion that certain categories of people really ought to be working at all times, even if there’s nothing to do, and that work needs to be made up to fill their time, even if there’s nothing that really needs doing, refers to people who are not free: prisoners and slaves, two categories that historically have largely overlapped.”
― Bullshit Jobs: A Theory
― Bullshit Jobs: A Theory
“You once said that you would like to sit beside me while I write. Listen, in that case I could not write at all. For writing means revealing oneself to excess; that utmost of self-revelation and surrender, in which a human being, when involved with others, would feel he was losing himself, and from which, therefore, he will always shrink as long as he is in his right mind-- for everyone wants to live as long as he is alive-- even the degree of self-revelation and surrender is not enough for writing.
Writing that springs from the surface of existence-- when there is no other way and deeper wells have dried up-- is nothing, and collapses the moment a truer emotion makes the surface shake. That is why one can never be alone enough when one writes, why there can never be enough silence around one when one writes, why even night is not night enough.”
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Writing that springs from the surface of existence-- when there is no other way and deeper wells have dried up-- is nothing, and collapses the moment a truer emotion makes the surface shake. That is why one can never be alone enough when one writes, why there can never be enough silence around one when one writes, why even night is not night enough.”
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Aidan W.’s 2025 Year in Books
Take a look at Aidan W.’s Year in Books, including some fun facts about their reading.
229 books
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38 friends
99 books
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15 friends
506 books
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55 friends
45 books
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3 friends
110 books
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3 friends
52 books
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3 friends
16 books
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2 friends
11 books
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3 friends
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