"...quite ordinary people can be good at science. To say that is not to depreciate science but to appreciate ordinary people. But to be good at science one must want to be-- and must feel a first stirring of that sense of disquiet at lack of comprehension that is one of a scientist's few secure distinguishing marks. I think it is the lack of this exploratory, hunting trait that makes it unthinkable to many people who could be scientists that they should be so."
-PB Medawar (quoted at the blog "49 percent")
"Selection is the very keel on which our mental ship is built. And in the case of memory its utility is obvious. If we remembered everything, we should on most occasions be as ill off as if we remembered nothing."
-William James
"He used to think things like, 'This organic soymilk will make me healthy and that'll make my brain work better and that'll improve my writing.' Also things like, 'The less I eat the less money I spend on publicly owned companies the less pain and suffering will exist in the world.' Now he thinks things like, 'It is impossible to be happy.' Why would anyone think that?"
-Tao Lin, Eeeee Eee Eeee
"Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation; but of the adopted talent of another you have only an extemporaneous half-possession."
-R.W. Emerson, "Self-Reliance"
"Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd."
-Voltaire
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The third quote is one of my favorites of all time. ^_^
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