Bilge

“when we get into a physiological uproar and activate the stress-response for no reason at all, or over something we cannot do anything about, we call it things like “anxiety,” “neurosis,” “paranoia,” or “needless hostility.” Thus, the stress-response can be mobilized not only in response to physical or psychological insults, but also in expectation of them.”
― Robert M. Sapolsky, Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: The Acclaimed Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping

“If things were always what they seemed, how impoverished would be the imagination of man!”
― Lawrence Durrell, The Alexandria Quartet

“science has failed to rid us of the gender stereotypes and dangerous myths we’ve been laboring under for centuries. Women are so grossly underrepresented in modern science because, for most of history, they were treated as intellectual inferiors and deliberately excluded from it. It should come as no surprise, then, that this same scientific establishment has also painted a distorted picture of the female sex. This, in turn again, has skewed how science looks and what it says even now.”
― Angela Saini, Inferior: How Science Got Women Wrong—and the New Research That's Rewriting the Story

“If you are trying to frighten me, I assure you, my imagination is every bit as Gothic as yours. I can well imagine the poisoned tea or the slim dagger in the night and the claims that I succumbed to a fever while everyone rallies around my infant,” I said repressively.”
― Deanna Raybourn, A Curious Beginning