Discussion Quotes - Page 22

• We can't be anti-everything - we need an energy plan that adds up. But there's a lack of numeracy in the public discussion of energy. Where people do use numbers, they select them to sound big and score points in arguments, rather than to aid thoughtful discussion.

  David J. C. MacKay

  Thoughtful, Numbers, People

  "Think big on renewables scale" by David J. C. MacKay, www.theguardian.com. April 29, 2009.

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• Congress, after years of stalling, finally got around to clearing the way for informal discussions that might lead to possible formal talks that could potentially produce some kind of tenative agreements.

  Dave Barry

  Agreement, Years, Might

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• If the minority, and a small one too, is suffered to dictate to the majority, after measures have undergone the most solemn discussions by the representatives of the people, and their will through this medium is enacted into a law, there can be no security for life, liberty, or property; nor, if the laws are not to govern, can any man know how to conduct himself in safety.

  George Washington

  Men, Law, People

  George Washington, Jared Sparks (1836). “The Writings of George Washington: pt. IV. Letters official and private, from the beginning of his presidency to the end of his life: (v. 10) May, 1789-November, 1794. (v. 11) November, 1794-December, 1799”, p.440

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• The discussion of any subject is a right that you have brought into the world with your heart and tongue. Resign your heart's blood before you part with this inestimable privilege of man.

  Percy Bysshe Shelley

  Heart, Men, Blood

  1812 An Address to the Irish People.

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• A principal aim of education is to give students a taste for literature, for the books of life and power, and to accomplish this, it is necessary that their minds be held aloof from the babblement and discussions of the hour, that they may accustom themselves to take interest in the words and deeds of the greatest men, and so make themselves able and worthy to shape a larger and nobler future; but if their hours of leisure are spent over journals and reviews, they will, in later years, become the helpless victims of the newspaper habit.

  John Lancaster Spalding

  Book, Men, Years

  John Lancaster Spalding (1901). “Aphorisms and Reflections: Conduct, Culture and Religion”

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• The promotion of human rights cannot be about exhortation alone. At times, it must be coupled with painstaking diplomacy. I know that engagement with repressive regimes lacks the satisfying purity of indignation. But I also know that sanctions without outreach -- condemnation without discussion -- can carry forward only a crippling status quo. No repressive regime can move down a new path unless it has the choice of an open door.

  Barack Obama

  Moving, Rights, Doors

  Nobel Prize for Peace Acceptance Speech and Lecture, delivered 10 December 2009, Oslo City Hall, Oslo, Norway

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• I don't think my films are going to get rid of racism or prejudice. I think the best thing my films can do is provoke discussion.

  Spike Lee

  Thinking, Racism, Prejudice

  Spike Lee, Cynthia Fuchs (2002). “Spike Lee: Interviews”, p.26, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• The laws of art are eternal and don't change at all, as the moral laws don't change in human beings.

  Max Beckmann

  Art, Law, Moral

  Catalog Nationalgalerie Berlin, DDR, p. 109, 1986.

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• A powerful idea communicates some of its power to the man who contradicts it. Partaking of the universal community of minds, it infiltrates, grafts itself on to, the mind of him who it refutes, among other contiguous ideas, with the aid of which, counter-attacking, he complements and corrects it; so that the final verdict is always to some extent the work of both parties to a discussion.

  Marcel Proust

  Powerful, Party, Men

  Marcel Proust (1982). “Remembrance of Things Past: Swann's Way & Within a Budding Grove”, Vintage

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• The discussion of the game of marbles seems to have led us into rather deep waters. But in the eyes of children the history of the game of marbles has quite as much importance as the history of religion or of forms of government. It Is a history, moreover, that is magnificently spontaneous; and it was therefore perhaps not entirely useless to seek to throw light on the child's judgment of moral value by a preliminary study of the social behaviour of children amongst themselves.

  Jean Piaget

  Children, Eye, Deep Water

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• When free discussion is denied, hardening of the arteries of democracy has set in, free institutions are but a lifeless form, and the death of the republic is at hand.

  William Randolph Hearst

  Democracies Have, Hands, Democracy

  "In the News", June 13, 1941.

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• In any discussion of religion and personality integration the question is not whether religion itself makes for health or neurosis, but what kind of religion and how is it used? Freud was in error when he held that religion is per se a compulsion neurosis. Some religion is and some is not.

  Rollo May

  Errors, Personality, Neurosis

  Rollo May (2009). “Man's Search for Himself”, p.144, W. W. Norton & Company

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• Throughout Ronnie's presidency, there was an ongoing public discussion as to how much influence the first lady should have on the president. It's hardly a new problem. As long as mankind has lived in groups, there's always been a question of how to handle the boss's wife.

  Nancy Reagan

  Should Have, Long, Wife

  Nancy Reagan (2011). “My Turn: The Memoirs of Nancy Reagan”, p.75, Random House

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• So many little lives, amounting to nothing. I ask you: What is infinity multiplied by zero? It is hardly worth our discussion.

  Alan Lightman

  Life, Zero, Littles

  Alan Lightman (2012). “Mr g: A Novel About the Creation”, p.27, Vintage

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• As a result of our [my campaign's] discussions and other interactions with gay and lesbian voters across the state, I am more convinced than ever that as we seek to establish full equality for America's gay and lesbian citizens, I will provide more effective leadership than my opponent [Ted Kennedy].

  Mitt Romney

  Gay, America, Campaigns

  "Marriage Equality Opponent Mitt Romney To Gay People: 'I Don’t Discriminate'". Mitt Romney's letter to Log Cabin Republicans Club during 1994 United States Senate campaign, thinkprogress.org. January 8, 2012.

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• I know politicians are going to be judged on everything they say but sometimes in the heat of discussion you go a little bit further than you would if it was an absolutely calm, considered, prepared, scripted remark. The statements that need to be taken absolutely as gospel truth are those carefully prepared scripted remarks.

  Tony Abbott

  Taken, Needs, Littles

  "Gospel truth not always in the telling says Tony Abbott". "AM" with Lyndal Curtis, www.abc.net.au. May 18, 2010.

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• Disruption never helps your cause. ... It just looks like you're afraid to have rational discussion.

  Barney Frank

  Looks, Causes, Helping

  "Frank Blasts Nazi Comparisons From LaRouche Backers". voices.washingtonpost.com. August 19, 2009.

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• One thing that is sometimes forgotten in this "future of books" discussion is that there are all these awesome presses - big and small - that are producing and designing amazing books.

  Kevin Sampsell

  Book, Design, Sometimes

  Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

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• Holocaust is very much a part of present discussion all over the place. There are little plaques everywhere you go around in different neighborhoods. "This person here was prosecuted." "This person was sent to this concentration camp." "A family of Jews lived here. They took over his business." Little, very discrete, very dignified plaques are everywhere.

  Bob Balaban

  Holocaust, Different, Littles

  Source: collider.com

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• I believe one of the reasons we went through such a remarkable growth period was that we had this atmosphere of free discussion.

  Akio Morita

  Believe, Atmosphere, Growth

  "Made in Japan : Akio Morita and Sony" by Akio Morita, Edwin M. Reingold, Mitsuko Shimomura, (p. 146), 1986.

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• Give up this dry discussion, this hodge-podge of philosophy. Who has been able to know God by reasoning? Even sages like Suka and Vyasa are at best like big ants trying to carry away a few grains of sugar from a large hea.

  Sarada Devi

  Giving Up, Philosophy, Trying

  "Sri Sarada Devi, the Holy Mother; Life and Conversations" by Swami Tapasyananda, Swami Nikhilananda, (pp. 188-189), 2004.

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• I can't imagine where I'd be without the opportunities provided to me in sports. Sports taught me that gender isn't an issue; in fact, when people talk about me being the first female governor, I'm a little absent from that discussion, because I've never thought of gender as an issue. In sports, you learn self-discipline, healthy competition, to be gracious in victory and defeat, and the importance of being part of a team and understanding what part you play on that team. You all work together to reach a goal, and I think all of those factors come into play in my role as governor.

  Sarah Palin

  Sports, Team, Opportunity

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• Yoo's theory promotes frank discussion of the national interest and makes it harder for politicians to parade policy conflicts as constitutional crises. Most important, Yoo's approach offers a way to renew our political system's democratic vigor.

  David B. Rivkin

  Political, Important, Vigor

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• ... the media serve the interests of state and corporate power, which are closely interlinked, framing their reporting and analysis in a manner supportive of established privilege and limiting debate and discussion accordingly.

  Noam Chomsky

  Media, Supportive, Analysis

  Noam Chomsky (1989). “Necessary Illusions: Thought Control in Democratic Societies”, p.10, Pluto Press

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• So long as I confine my activities to social service and the blind, they compliment me extravagantly, calling me 'arch priestess of the sightless,' 'wonder woman,' and a 'modern miracle.' But when it comes to a discussion of poverty, and I maintain that it is the result of wrong economics-that the industrial system under which we live is at the root of much of the physical deafness and blindness in the world-that is a different matter!

  Helen Keller

  Roots, Long, Miracle

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