Backgrounds Quotes - Page 5

• Why should not our whole life and its scenery be actually thus fair and distinct? All our lives want a suitable background. They should at least, like the life of the anchorite, be as impressive to behold as objects in a desert, a broken shaft or crumbling mound against a limitless horizon.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Life, Broken, Solitude

  Henry David Thoreau, Jeffrey S. Cramer (2007). “I to Myself: An Annotated Selection from the Journal of Henry D. Thoreau”, p.17, Yale University Press

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• Ko Un's poems evoke the open creativity and fluidity of nature, and funny turns and twists of Mind. Mind is sometimes registered in Buddhist terms - Buddhist practice being part of Ko Un's background. Ko Un writes spare, short-line lyrics direct to the point, but often intricate in both wit and meaning. Ko Un has now traveled worldwide and is not only a major spokesman for all Korean culture, but a voice for Planet Earth Watershed as well.

  Gary Snyder

  Buddhist, Writing, Creativity

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• I actually don't see that strong of a connection between my background as a rock 'n roller and my early films. In a way I think your musical identity in film work is determined by the jobs that come your way.

  Cliff Martinez

  Strong, Jobs, Thinking

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• In the US, voters cast ballots for individual candidates who are not bound to any party program except rhetorically, and not always then. Some Republicans are more liberal than some Democrats, some libertarians are more radical than some socialists, and many local candidates run without any party identification. No American citizen can vote intelligently without knowledge of the ideas, political background, and commitments of each individual candidate.

  Ben Bagdikian

  Running, Party, Commitment

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• When you sit in a café, with a lot of music in the background and a lot of projects in your head, you're not really drinking your coffee or your tea. You're drinking your projects, you're drinking your worries. You are not real, and the coffee is not real either. Your coffee can only reveal itself to you as a reality when you go back to your self and produce your true presence, freeing yourself from the past, the future, and from your worries. When you are real, the tea also becomes real and the encounter between you and the tea is real. This is genuine tea drinking.

  Nhat Hanh

  Real, Drinking, Coffee

  Thich Nhat Hanh (2001). “Anger”, p.45, Penguin

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• My mistake was to project my skill beyond the limits of experience. I began investing outside the industries which I believe I thoroughly understood, in completely different spheres of activity; situations where I did not have comparable background knowledge.

  Philip Arthur Fisher

  Mistake, Believe, Skills

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• The material which a scientist actually has at his disposal, his laws, his experimental results, his mathematical techniques, his epistemological prejudices, his attitude towards the absurd consequences of the theories which he accepts, is indeterminate in many ways, ambiguous, and never fully separated from the historical background . This material is always contaminated by principles which he does not know and which, if known, would be extremely hard to test.

  Paul Feyerabend

  Attitude, Law, Historical

  Paul Feyerabend (1993). “Against Method”, p.51, Verso

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• The belief in creation as the background of empiricomathematical [sic] science - that seems strange. Yet the ways of thought, human thought, in its search for truth are, indeed, very strange.

  Alexandre Koyre

  Way, Belief, Strange

  "Newtonian Studies" by Alexandre Koyre, (p. 114), 1965.

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• All goes to show that the soul in man is not an organ, but animates and exercises all the organs; is not a function, like the power of memory, of calculation, of comparison, but uses these as hands and feet; is not a faculty, but a light, is not the intellect or the will, but the master of the intellect and the will; is the background of our being, in which they lie,--an immensity not possessed and that cannot be possessed.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Memories, Lying, Exercise

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2010). “Self-Reliance, the Over-Soul, and Other Essays”, p.57, Coyote Canyon Press

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• The Little Drummer Boy was playing in the background for what seemed like the third time in a row. I fought off an urge to beat that Little Drummer Boy senseless with his own drumsticks.

  Dana Reinhardt

  Christmas, Boys, Littles

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• Schools, the institutions traditionally called upon to correct social inequality, are unsuited to the task; without economic opportunity to follow educational opportunity, the myth of equality can never become real. Far more than a hollow promise of future opportunity for their children, parents need jobs, income, and services. And children whose backgrounds have stunted their sense of the future need to be taught by example that they are good for more than they dared dream.

  Kenneth Keniston

  Dream, Jobs, Children

  Kenneth Keniston, Carnegie Council on Children (1977). “All our children: the American family under pressure”, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt P

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• The true contrast between science and religion is that science unites the world and makes it possible for people of widely differing backgrounds to work together and to cooperate. Religion, on the other hand, by its very claim to know “The Truth” through “revelation,” is inherently divisive and a creator of separatism and hostility.

  Hermann Bondi

  Hands, People, Religion

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• Most people say I look mean, and because I play so many tough roles and because of my size and my martial arts background, they think I am, but I'm really not.

  Michael Jai White

  Art, Mean, Thinking

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• All intelligent faith in God has behind it a background of humble agnosticism.

  Harry Emerson Fosdick

  Humble, Intelligent, Faith In God

  Harry Emerson Fosdick (1961). “Dear Mr. Brown: letters to a person perplexed about religion”

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• Whether it be current or past, every single song that I recorded is about me. It's a peek into my life, past and present. Maybe it's coming from my theater and performance background, but nothing felt right unless I could relate to it.

  Lea Michele

  Song, Past, Theater

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• I listen to music when I write. I need the musical background. Classical music. I'm behind the times. I'm still with Baroque music, Gregorian chant, the requiems, and with the quartets of Beethoven and Brahms. That is what I need for the climate, for the surroundings, for the landscape: the music.

  Elie Wiesel

  Writing, Musical, Needs

  Source: www.commonwealmagazine.org

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• I play music - I write my own music, but I play music, just background music really, and just let it happen.

  Anthony Hopkins

  Writing, Play, Background Music

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• I would love to see music reinstated as an essential part of schooling. The culture that it brings; the knowledge that it brings. Just learning how to read music requires metrics, and I think that helps you with mathematics. A lot of scientists and doctors have a musical background - it's very interesting.

  Benjamin Carson

  Thinking, Doctors, Interesting

  "Interview with Dr. Ben Carson on Education". TheBestSchools.org Interview, thebestschools.org.

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• What we have is a more sophisticated form of imperialism, which is economic. But lurking in the background, always ready to go, is an armed force.

  Howard Zinn

  Sophisticated, Imperialism, Economic

  Source: bad.eserver.org

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• I think when you're 16, if you have good parents, they generally just fade in the background. I had great parents, and because they were great, I thought very little about them in high school.

  John Green

  School, Thinking, Parent

  Interview with Jade Chang, www.goodreads.com. December, 2012.

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• Most British playwrights of my generation, as well as younger folks, apparently feel somewhat obliged to Russian literature - and not only those writing for theatres. Russian literature is part of the basic background knowledge for any writer. So there is nothing exceptional in the interest I had towards Russian literature and theatre. Frankly, I couldn't image what a culture would be like without sympathy towards Russian literature and Russia, whether we'd be talking about drama or Djagilev.

  Tom Stoppard

  Drama, Writing, Russia

  Source: news.postimees.ee

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• The script in many ways is limiting and novel is liberating. You get to go into the heads of your characters and their background and have fun with them; something you are discouraged from doing with a script. With the novel, I can tell you what the characters are thinking, I can tell you their view of the world, background information, things I wouldn't dare touch in the script.

  Juliet Asante

  Fun, Character, Thinking

  Source: www.premiumtimesng.com

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• Whenever you try to work through the things that we're trying to work through, that we're addressing, it ends up looking negative. Our goal is nonjudgment, nonfiltered acceptance of everything. So much of our background collectively, especially in the United States, is denying and suppressing and disowning a lot of negativity and the darker areas. You can become swallowed up in it. It's cancerous. The goal should be to define acceptance for everything. To try and consider every aspect. To try to look into the shadows, as well as the light.

  Maynard James Keenan

  Acceptance, Light, Goal

  "Tool: Things Are Going to Work Out". Interview with Robert Makin, www.shroomery.org. November 10, 2002.

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• Yes, pain, disappointment, frustration, and anguish can be temporary scenes played out on the stage of life. Behind them can be a background of peace and the positive assurance that a loving Father will keep His promises.

  Richard G. Scott

  Peace, Pain, Disappointment

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• Jay-Z is more naturally gifted. He didn't depend as much as 50 did on his personal story. Jay-Z has a great story, he came from a pretty rough background. But 50's early success was so much fueled on the story and where he came from. With Jay-Z, I feel he has a more natural gift for language and for music itself. 50 really had to study and work at it much harder.

  Robert Greene

  Stories, Natural Gifts, Study

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