Small Numbers Quotes

• Discipline is the soul of an army. It makes small numbers formidable; procures success to the weak, and esteem to all.

  George Washington

  Military, War, 4th Of July

  George Washington, Stephen Lucas (1999). “The Quotable George Washington: The Wisdom of an American Patriot”, p.24, Rowman & Littlefield

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• Taste is the best judge. It is rare. Art only addresses itself to an excessively small number of individuals.

  Paul Cezanne

  Art, Judging, Addresses

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• Zero invites imagination, but small numbers invite questions about whether large numbers will ever materialize.

  Eric Ries

  Zero, Imagination, Invites

  Eric Ries (2011). “The Lean Startup: How Today's Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses”, p.52, Crown Business

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• The gratification which affluence of wealth, extent of power, and eminence of reputation confer, must be always, by their own nature, confined to a very small number; and the life of the greater part of mankind must be lost in empty wishes and painful comparisons, were not the balm of philosophy shed upon us, and our discontent at the appearances of unequal distribution soothed and appeased.

  Samuel Johnson

  Philosophy, Humanity, Wish

  Samuel Johnson, Arthur Murphy (1857). “The Works of Samuel Johnson, LL.D.: With an Essay on His Life and Genius”, p.110

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• A small number of peasants - brave peasants - shot down two Apaches

  Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf

  Funny, Military, Two

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• The simplicity of nature is not to be measured by that of our conceptions. Infinitely varied in its effects, nature is simple only in its causes, and its economy consists in producing a great number of phenomena, often very complicated, by means of a small number of general laws.

  Pierre-Simon Laplace

  Nature, Mean, Science

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• Every climate scientist has his or her own views on some issues that differ from the mainstream in detail. But the broad findings of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) have general support amongst scientists with relevant specialist expertise. The broad wisdom of the IPCC is strongly contested by a small number, and a small minority, of reputed climate scientists. It is not contested by the large majority of specialists, and by the leaders of the relevant learned academies in the countries of great scientific accomplishment.

  Ross Garnaut

  Country, Ignorance, Knowledge

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• Despite the international scientific community's consensus on climate change, a small number of critics continue to deny that climate change exists or that humans are causing it. Widely known as climate change "skeptics" or "deniers," these individuals are generally not climate scientists and do not debate the science with the climate scientists.

  David Suzuki

  Science, Community, Energy

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• I am troubled by the lack of common sense regarding carbon dioxide emissions. Our greatest greenhouse gas is water. Atmospheric spectroscopy reveals why water has a 95 percent and CO2 a 3.6 percent contribution to the 'greenhouse effect.' Carbon dioxide emissions worldwide each year total 3.2 billion tons. That equals about 0.0168 percent of the atmosphere's CO2 concentration of about 19 trillion tons. This results in a 0.00064 percent increase in the absorption of the sun's radiation. This is an insignificantly small number.

  Michael Myers

  Years, Common Sense, Water

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• [T]he delegation of the government, in [a republic], to a small number of citizens elected by the rest . . . [is] to refine and enlarge the public views by passing them through the medium of a chosen body of citizens, whose wisdom may best discern the true interest of their country and whose patriotism and love of justice will be least likely to sacrifice it to temporary or partial considerations.

  James Madison

  Country, Sacrifice, Government

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• The awful discretion, which a court of impeachments must necessarily have, to doom to honor or to infamy the most confidential and the most distinguished characters of the community, forbids the commitment of the trust to a small number of persons.

  Alexander Hamilton

  Character, Commitment, Community

  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (2003). “The Federalist: With Letters of Brutus”, p.319, Cambridge University Press

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• Life science research can be done on multiple platforms. Since we have a very small number of people flying into space, the more people you have, the better.

  Laurel Clark

  Space, People, Flying

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• With his continual doctrine [Bishop Hooper] adjoined due and discreet correction, not so much severe to any as to them which for abundance of riches and wealthy state thought they might do what they listed. And doubtless he spared no kind of people, but was indifferent to all men, as well rich as poor, to the great shame of no small number of men nowadays. Whereas many we see so addicted to the pleasing of great and rich men, that in the meantime they have no regard to the meaner sort of poor people, whom Christ hath bought as dearly as the other.

  John Foxe

  Men, People, Doctrine

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• Clearly, we were hoping to get some competitive proposals, but the reality is there are only a small number of firms that would be interested and have the wherewithal to bid.

  Michael Perrin

  Reality, Would Be, Proposal

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• All the effects of Nature are only the mathematical consequences of a small number of immutable laws.

  Pierre-Simon Laplace

  Beauty, Art, Nature

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• Muslims are the first victims of Islam. Many times I have observed in my travels in the Orient that fanaticism comes from a small number of dangerous men who maintain the others in the practice of religion by terror. To liberate the Muslim from his religion is the best service one can render him.

  Ernest Renan

  Men, Practice, Islam

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• We are always looking for a small number of very evil needles in a very large haystack, which is the city of London.

  Charles Clarke

  Cities, Evil, London

  "MI5 Faces Tough Questions on Decision to Relax Security". www.independent.co.uk. July 08, 2005.

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• If we understand the mechanisms and motives of the group mind, it is now possible to control and regiment the masses according to our will without their knowing it In almost every act of our daily lives, whether in the sphere of politics or business, in our social conduct or our ethical thinking, we are dominated by the relatively small number of persons who understand the mental processes and social patterns of the masses. It is they who pull the wires which control the public mind.

  Edward Bernays

  Thinking, Knowing, Mind

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• Because we do not know when we will die, we get to think of life as an inexhaustible well. And yet everything happens only a certain number of times. And a very small number really.

  Brandon Lee

  Life, Thinking, Numbers

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

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• A State divided into a small number of rich and a large number of poor will always develop a government manipulated by the rich to protect the amenities represented by their property.

  Harold Laski

  Government, Political, Manipulation

  Harold J. Laski (2014). “A Grammar of Politics (Works of Harold J. Laski)”, p.157, Routledge

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• Persons of genius are, ex vi termini, more individual than any other people - less capable, consequently, of fitting themselves, without hurtful compression, into any of the small number of moulds which society provides in order to save its members the trouble of forming their character.

  John Stuart Mill

  Character, Order, People

  John Stuart Mill (2015). “On Liberty, Utilitarianism and Other Essays”, p.129, OUP Oxford

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• The campaign against the death penalty has been - while a powerful campaign, its participants have been those who attend all of the vigils, a relatively small number of people.

  Angela Davis

  Powerful, Numbers, People

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• Civilization is maintained by a very few people in a small number of places and we need only some bombs and a few prisons to blot it out altogether.

  Cyril Connolly

  Civilization, People, Needs

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• I think fine dining is dying out everywhere... but I think there will be - and there has to always be - room for at least a small number of really fine, old-school fine-dining restaurants.

  Anthony Bourdain

  School, Thinking, Dying

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• I will forever stick up for Catholics and Christians in general. With a small number of very horrible exceptions, they do play by the rules.

  Penn Jillette

  Christian, Play, Forever

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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