Complexes Quotes - Page 5

• There can be very little of present-day science and technology that is not dependent on complex numbers in one way or another.

  Keith Devlin

  Math, Technology, Numbers

  Keith J. Devlin (1988). “Mathematics: the new golden age”, Penguin Books

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• I believe that mycelium is the neurological network of nature. Interlacing mosaics of mycelium infuse habitats with information-sharing membranes. These membranes are aware, react to change, and collectively have the long-term health of the host environment in mind. The mycelium stays in constant molecular communication with its environment, devising diverse enzymatic and chemical responses to complex challenges.

  Paul Stamets

  Nature, Believe, Communication

  Paul Stamets (2011). “Mycelium Running: How Mushrooms Can Help Save the World”, p.21, Ten Speed Press

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• In the past, [medicalization]has been portrayed as something that doctors inflict on a passive and un-suspecting world - an expansion of the Medical Empire. But in reality, it seems that these reductionist bio-medical stories can appeal to us all, because complex problems often have depressingly-complex causes, and the solutions can be taxing, and unsatisfactory.

  Ben Goldacre

  Past, Reality, Doctors

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• To read a novel is a difficult and complex art. You must be capable not only of great fineness of perception, but of great boldness of imagination.

  Virginia Woolf

  Art, Imagination, Perception

  Virginia Woolf (2013). “The Common Reader”, p.375, Lulu Press, Inc

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• How wonderful it is that we believe in modern revelation. I cannot get over the feeling that if revelation were needed anciently, when life was simple, that revelation is also needed today, when life is complex. There never was a time in the history of the earth when men needed revelation more than they need it now.

  Gordon B. Hinckley

  Believe, Simple, Men

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• What we choose to emphasize in this complex history will determine our lives. If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something. If we remember those times and places--and there are so many--where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.

  Howard Zinn

  Future, People, Giving

  Howard Zinn (2006). “A Power Governments Cannot Suppress”, p.270, City Lights Publishers

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• Being concerned about other people is especially relevant in today's world. If we consider the complex inter-connected ness of our modern lives, how we depend on others and others depend on us, our outlook will change. We’ll begin to see 'others' not as somehow distant from us, but as people we are in touch with, people close to us; we will no longer feel indifferent to them.

  Dalai Lama

  Change, Buddhist, Buddhism

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• I learned this, at least, by my experiment; that if one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams, and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours. . . . In proportion as he simplifies his life, the laws of the universe will appear less complex, and solitude will not be solitude, nor poverty poverty, nor weakness weakness.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Inspirational, Dream, Live Life

  Walden ch. 18 (1854)

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• I see the God complex around me all the time in my fellow economists. I see it in our business leaders. I see it in the politicians we vote for - people who, in the face of an incredibly complicated world, are nevertheless absolutely convinced that they understand the way that the world works.

  Tim Harford

  Motivation, Inspiration, Complicated World

  "Trial, error and the God complex". TED conference, www.ted.com. July 2011.

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• Forget your environmental footprint. Think about your ethical footprint. What good is it to build a zero-carbon, energy efficient complex, when the labor producing this architectural gem is unethical at best?

  Cameron Sinclair

  Zero, Motivation, Inspiration

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• I feel so strongly that deep and simple is far more essential than shallow and complex.

  Fred Rogers

  Simple, Interesting, Essentials

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• When the number of factors coming into play in a phenomenological complex is too large scientific method in most cases fails. One need only think of the weather, in which case the prediction even for a few days ahead is impossible. Nevertheless, no one doubts that we are confronted with a causal connection whose causal components are in the main known to us. Occurrences in this domain are beyond the reach of exact prediction because of the variety of factors in operation, not because of any lack of order in nature.

  Albert Einstein

  Thinking, Order, Play

  Albert Einstein (2000). “Albert Einstein in his own words in two complete books: Relativity-the special and general theory; Out of my later years-the scientist, philosopher and man portrayed through his own words”

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• The Connection Machine was the most powerful supercomputer in the world. It is a complex supercomputer and it will take forever to completely describe how it works.

  Philip Emeagwali

  Powerful, Forever, Connections

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• I had an enormous complex about my looks. I thought I was ugly and I was afraid nobody would marry me.

  Fred Zinnemann

  Looks, Ugly, Marry Me

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• Computer programs are the most complex things that humans make.

  Douglas Crockford

  Computer, Program, Humans

  Douglas Crockford (2008). “JavaScript: The Good Parts: The Good Parts”, p.94, "O'Reilly Media, Inc."

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• My mitochondria comprise a very large proportion of me. I cannot do the calculation, but I suppose there is almost as much of them in sheer dry bulk as there is the rest of me. Looked at in this way, I could be taken for a very large, motile colony of respiring bacteria, operating a complex system of nuclei, microtubules, and neurons for the pleasure and sustenance of their families, and running, at the moment, a typewriter.

  Lewis Thomas

  Running, Taken, Typewriters

  Lewis Thomas (1990). “A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays”

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• Under Confucianism, the use of precisely measured court music, prescribed steps, actions, and phrases all added up to an extremely complex system of rituals, each used for a particular purpose at a particular time.

  Benjamin Hoff

  Steps, Purpose, Phrases

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• A writing teacher once told me that the most successful movies and books were simple plots about complex characters. You should be able to articulate your concept in a couple of lines.

  James Scott Bell

  Teacher, Couple, Book

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• Poverty is too complex to be answered with a one-size-fits-all approach, and if there is any place that illustrates that complexity, as well as a better way forward, it is Rwanda.

  Jacqueline Novogratz

  Way Forward, Poverty, Size

  Jacqueline Novogratz (2012). “The Blue Sweater : Bridging The Gap Between Rich And Poor In An Intercnnected World”, p.158, HarperCollins Publishers

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• Gender has always been considered a fact immutable. But we now know it's actually more fluid, complex, and mysterious. Because of my success, I never have the courage to share my story. Not because I thought what I am is wrong but because of how the world treats those of us who wish to break free.

  Geena Rocero

  Wish, Stories, World

  "Why I must come out". TED conference, www.ted.com. March 2014.

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• We tend to rush toward the complex when trying to solve a daunting problem, but in this case, simplicity wins. Better buildings, responsible energy use and renewable energy choices are all we need to tackle both energy independence and climate change.

  Edward Mazria

  Winning, Choices, Simplicity

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• It is easier for the world to accept a simple lie than a complex truth.

  Alexis de Tocqueville

  Lying, Simple, World

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• Loss of genetic diversity in agriculture is leading us to a rendezvous with extinction--to the doorstep of hunger on a scale we refuse to imagine. To simplify the environment as we have done with agriculture is to destroy the complex interrelationships that hold the natural world together. Reducing the diversity of life, we narrow our options for the future and render our own survival more precarious.

  Cary Fowler

  Loss, Agriculture, Diversity

  Cary Fowler, Patrick R. Mooney (1990). “Shattering: Food, Politics, and the Loss of Genetic Diversity”, p.9, University of Arizona Press

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• We are moving away from the old idea of leadership - leadership has less to do (now) with heroism. We don't look for... unblemished omnipotent heroes, but leaders who are complex, dependent, changeable... We do not need one dominant authority structure telling all our inner voices to shut up.

  Walter Truett Anderson

  Moving, Hero, Ideas

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• To feel the anguish of waiting for the next moment and of taking part in the complex current (of affairs) not knowing that we are headed toward ourselves, through millions of stone beings - of bird beings - of star beings - of microbe beings - of fountain beings toward ourselves.

  Frida Kahlo

  Stars, Knowing, Bird

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