Straightforward Quotes - Page 11

• So how can we test the idea that the transition from nonlife to life is simple enough to happen repeatedly? The most obvious and straightforward way is to search for a second form of life on Earth. No planet is more Earth-like than Earth itself, so if the path to life is easy, then life should have started up many times over right here.

  Paul Davies

  Simple, Should Have, Ideas

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• Today the human race is a single twig on the tree of life, a single species on a single planet. Our condition can thus only be described as extremely fragile, endangered by forces of nature currently beyond our control, our own mistakes, and other branches of the wildly blossoming tree itself. Looked at this way, we can then pose the question of the future of humanity on Earth, in the solar system, and in the galaxy from the standpoint of both evolutionary biology and human nature. The conclusion is straightforward: Our choice is to grow, branch, spread and develop, or stagnate and die.

  Robert Zubrin

  Mistake, Moon, Race

  Robert Zubrin (1999). “Entering Space: Creating a Spacefaring Civilization”, Tarcher

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• My films often have a very strong strain of irony, or even sarcasm, which is definitely related to homosexual camp. But it is by no means straightforward: quite often I am sincere when I appear to be sarcastic, and I am sarcastic when I appear to be sincere. I also try to contradict myself at least once a day, which is a camp must.

  Bruce LaBruce

  Sarcastic, Strong, Mean

  "Brucito Subversivo". Interview with Jane Harris, logger.believermag.com. May 29, 2014.

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• A system in which legal police shootings of unarmed civilians are a common occurrence is a system that has some serious flaws. In this case, the drawback is a straightforward consequence of America's approach to firearms. A well-armed citizenry required an even-better-armed constabulary. Widespread gun ownership creates a systematic climate of fear on the part of the police. The result is a quantity of police shootings that, regardless of the facts of any particular case, is just staggeringly high. Young black men, in particular, are paying the price for America's gun culture.

  Matthew Yglesias

  Gun, Men, America

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• The hypothesis of surviving intelligence and personality - not only surviving but anxious and able with difficulty to communicate - is the simplest and most straightforward and the only one that fits all the facts.

  Oliver Lodge

  Personality, Facts, Able

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• One who aspires to greatness should read and study, pursuing the True Way with such a firm resolve that he is perfectly straightforward and open, rises above the superficialities of conventional behavior, and refuses to be satisfied with the petty or commonplace.

  Yoshida Shoin

  Greatness, Way, Study

  "Yoshida Shoin Zenshu" by Yoshida Shoin, vol. II, 1938.

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• It's like night and day... to do business, in Europe, there is no bull, they are pretty straightforward.

  Caprice Bourret

  Night, Europe, Bulls

  "Caprice Bourret...the sexiest fish in the pond". www.askmen.com.

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• When it comes to dating, Im straightforward and traditional with a twist.

  Luke Pasqualino

  Dating, Twists, Traditional

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• I like to play characters that are convincing, that aren't just straightforward and nice.

  Clive Owen

  Nice, Character, Play

  "Any actor who thinks he's a sex symbol has got serious problems". Interview with Elizabeth Day, www.theguardian.com. February 14, 2009.

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• You can only write so many pop songs before they all sound the same. I got to a point where something overtly melodic and straightforward sounded sort of cheesy to me. Pop songs seemed too manufactured.

  Dylan Baldi

  Song, Writing, Cheesy

  Source: pitchfork.com

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• I do think there would be a receptivity to somebody who campaigned in a straightforward, cohesive way, supporting an increase in the minimum wage, being for universal health care for all Americans, and opposing trade agreements like NAFTA.

  Russ Feingold

  Thinking, Agreement, Would Be

  Interview with Matthew Rothschild for The Progressive Magazine, www.thirdworldtraveler.com. May 2002.

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• When I'm teaching, I'm not really doing my job if the student who's always comfortable doing wacko stuff all over the page keeps getting gold stars from me for doing wacko stuff all over the page. A riskier assignment for that student, who might be used to hiding behind a lot of formal armor, would be to try to do something straightforward, traditionally, in which they are much more directly laid bare for the reader.

  John D'Agata

  Jobs, Stars, Teaching

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• I don't think in time signatures, and when I do, what I write is generally 3/4 or 4/4, the most basic, straightforward stuff. I think that comes from just not being a super-schooled musician.

  Blake Judd

  Writing, Thinking, Signatures

  "Don't Call It a Rip-Off". Pitchfork Interview, pitchfork.com.

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• I was just thinking of Rush. I went to see Rush a few years ago, because my record label guy in the States really wanted to go. We had crazy good seats. It was fascinating watching the crowd - mostly men - who were so moved by these really esoteric lyrics. I don't know Neil Peart's lyrics super well, but they're not that straightforward to me.

  Sarah Harmer

  Crazy, Men, Thinking

  Source: www.macleans.ca

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• Movies you pay for - well, sometimes they throw some ads at the beginning now - but generally you pay for ads. And that business model - actually, much more ancient, paying for stuff - is much more straightforward in terms of the incentives of the people who are then giving you the stuff.

  Tim Wu

  Giving, People, Incentives

  Source: www.npr.org

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• In my own writing, I've mostly abandoned end-rhyme, but wordplay is still a huge part of my process. I've written a series of mermaid poems in the last few years. The first one was called "The Straightforward Mermaid" which arose from my delight in that word combination. After that, I decided that future mermaid poems would have to be words ending in "d" or "t," which led to "The Deadbeat Mermaid," "The Morbid Mermaid" and so forth . . .

  Matthea Harvey

  Writing, Mermaid, Morbid

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• I've seen an awful lot of plays that I'd read before they were put into production and been shocked by what's happened to them. In the attempt to make them straightforward and commercially successful, a lot of things go out the window.

  Edward Albee

  Successful, Play, Awful

  Edward Albee, Philip C. Kolin (1988). “Conversations with Edward Albee”, p.49, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• There are always so many things happening [to us] at one time. We read Isherwood's A Single Man in class, and we had to ask: How is he talking about all this stuff: teaching, being lonely, all his memories, all at the same time? He's telling us: This is where my head is at, let me be straightforward. And of course, try be artful about it.

  Paul Beatty

  Lonely, Memories, Teaching

  Source: www.guernicamag.com

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• I don't feel like I have a super straightforward relationship with the idea of fame. It makes me sort of level things out in my own brain almost immediately when I meet someone.

  Zoe Kazan

  Ideas, Brain, Levels

  Source: www.avclub.com

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• The characters I tend to play are a little more interesting than the standard heroes. Romantic leads can be a little more straightforward, I guess. But it just seems to be the parts I get, I don't know what that says about me. I enjoy interesting characters and interesting people, I suppose.

  Iwan Rheon

  Hero, Character, Play

  Source: www.harpersbazaar.com

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• I have to say that I think Bernie Sanders is the first politician since Dennis Kucinich that I've been truly inspired by. Where you actually are truly speaking truth to power, in a legitimate way and in an unpretentious and very straightforward way.

  Viggo Mortensen

  Thinking, Way, Firsts

  Source: www.progressive.org

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• The most basic organizing principle was pretty straightforward, and is frankly pretty common: the shorter of what are by my lights the two most engaging stories goes first, the longer of the two goes at the end, and everything else goes in the middle.

  Roy Kesey

  Light, Two, Principles

  Source: therumpus.net

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• Think of aerobics plus weight lifting minus the music or camaraderie. Combine unalloyed endurance with straightforward strength and demand poise, timing, and practiced form as well. Think of pure pain: that's the ergometer.

  Barry S. Strauss

  Pain, Thinking, Weight Lifting

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• From my point of view, why shouldn't I work in every possible mode, to see if it's viable? "Los Gigantes" would not have worked as a straightforward, naturalistic tale. Part of the fun of it is that it's so preposterous and yet at the same time, it could have happened. Think of eugenics. Hitler certainly would have been doing it if he could have.

  T.C. Boyle

  Fun, Thinking, Eugenics

  Source: therumpus.net

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• The films that I love are very straightforward stories, like really old-fashioned stuff.

  Paul Thomas Anderson

  Stories, Stuff, Film

  "Tell the story! Tell the story!" by Ed Pilkington, www.theguardian.com. January 4, 2008.

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