Subtraction Quotes - Page 2

• If production does not increase in Iraq in an exponential way between now and 2015, we have a very big problem, even if Saudi Arabia meets its obligations. The figures are very simple, you do not need to be an expert. It is enough to know how to do a subtraction. China will grow very quickly, India also, and even Saudi Arabia projections of the 3 Mb/day will not be enough to meet the rise of Chinese demand.

  Fatih Birol

  Simple, Iraq, Chinese

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• But the best read naturalist who lends an entire and devout attention to truth, will see that there remains much to learn of his relation to the world, and that it is not to be learned by any addition or subtraction or other comparison of known quantities, but is arrived at by untaught sallies of the spirit, by a continual self-recovery, and by entire humility.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Knowledge, Humility, Recovery

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (2017). “The Best Read Naturalist": Nature Writings of Ralph Waldo Emerson”, p.130, University of Virginia Press

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• I shall argue that it is the capital stock from which we derive satisfaction, not from the additions to it (production) or the subtractions from it (consumption): that consumption, far from being a desideratum, is a deplorable property of the capital stock which necessitates the equally deplorable activity of production: and that the objective of economic policy should not be to maximize consumption or production, but rather to minimize it, i.e. to enable us to maintain our capital stock with as little consumption or production as possible.

  Kenneth E. Boulding

  Littles, Satisfaction, Arguing

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• The external view [of agency] forces itself on us at the same time that we resist it. One way this occurs is through the gradual erosion of what we do by the subtraction of what happens.

  Thomas Nagel

  Agency, Erosion, Views

  Thomas Nagel (1991). “Mortal Questions : Canto”, p.38, Cambridge University Press

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• Can you do Division? Divide a loaf by a knife - what's the answer to that?

  Lewis Carroll

  Math, Knives, Division

  Lewis Carroll (1875). “Through the Looking-glass: And what Alice Found There”, p.189

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• The Difference Engine can in reality (as has been already partly explained) do nothing but add; and any other processes, not excepting those of simple subtraction, multiplication and division, can be performed by it only just to that extent in which it is possible, by judicious mathematical arrangement and artifices, to reduce them to a series of additions.

  Ada Lovelace

  Simple, Reality, Differences

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• If the unusual never happened there would be no difference in people and then there wouldn't be any fun in life. The game would become merely a matter of addition and subtraction. It would make of us a race of bookkeepers with plodding minds. It's the guessing that develops a man's brain power.

  Jesse Lauriston Livermore

  Fun, Men, Race

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• My working method has more often than not involved the subtraction of weight. I have tried to remove weight, sometimes from people, sometimes from heavenly bodies, sometimes from cities; above all I have tried to remove weight from the structure of stories and from language. . . . Maybe I was only then becoming aware of the weight, the inertia, the opacity of the world--qualities that stick to the writing from the start, unless one finds some way of evading them.

  Italo Calvino

  Writing, Cities, People

  "Six Memos For This Millennium" by Sam Cooney, therumpus.net. November 22, 2010.

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• It's all very Italian (and decidedly un-American): to insist that doing the right thing is the most pleasurable thing, and that the act of consumption might be an act of addition rather than subtraction.

  Michael Pollan

  Italian, Might, Consumption

  Michael Pollan (2009). “The Omnivore's Dilemma: The Search for a Perfect Meal in a Fast-Food World”, p.134, Bloomsbury Publishing

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• I have to admit that business-type thoughts do sneak into my head: I hope our customers pay us, I hope this stuff is decent, I hope we get it done on time. The little additions and subtractions that one has to do. Take sales, take costs and try to get that big positive number at the bottom.

  Bill Gates

  Numbers, Trying, Done

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• The worst class of sum worked in the every-day world is cyphered by the diseased arithmeticians who are always in the rule of Subtraction as to the merits and successes of others, and never in Addition as to their own.

  Charles Dickens

  Class, Words Of Wisdom, World

  Charles Dickens (1867). “Charles Dickens's works. Charles Dickens ed. [18 vols. of a 21 vol. set. Wanting A child's history of England; Christmas stories; The mystery of Edwin Drood].”, p.307

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• The going away of friends does not make the remainder more precious. It takes so much from them as there was a common link. A. B. and C. make a party. A. dies. B. not only loses A. but all A.'s part in C. C. loses A.'s part in B., and so the alphabet sickens by subtraction of interchangeables.

  Charles Lamb

  Friends, Party, Going Away

  Charles Lamb, Thomas Noon Talfourd (1838). “The letters of Charles Lamb, with a sketch of his life. The poetical works”, p.196

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• He wondered how he could ever have thought of the planets, even of the Earth, as islands of life and reality floating in a deadly void. Now with a certainty which never after deserted him, he saw the planets - as mere holes or gaps in the living heaven - excluded and rejected wastes of heavy matter and murky air, formed not by addition to, but by subtraction from, the surrounding brightness.

  C. S. Lewis

  Reality, Islands, Air

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• No more Lastrygonians.” Ella fluttered down and landed next to them. “Six minus six is zero. Spears are good for subtraction, yep.

  Rick Riordan

  Zero, Down And, Next

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• "She can't do sums a bit!" the Queens said together, with great emphasis. "Can you do sums?" Alice said, turning suddenly on the White Queen, for she didn't like being found fault with so much. The Queen gasped and shut her eyes. "I can do Addition, if you give me time-but I can do Subtraction, under any circumstances!"

  Lewis Carroll

  Time, Queens, Eye

  Lewis Carroll (2016). “Alice In Wonderland Collection: All Four Books: Alice in Wonderland, Alice Through the Looking Glass, Hunting of the Snark and Alice Underground”, p.144, Enhanced Media Publishing

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• In an ideal world, social responsibility would be a prerequisite for design, and designers would vow to produce beautiful, useful, positive, responsible, functional, and economical things and concepts that are meaningful additions to—or sometimes subtractions from—the world we live in. Indeed, design deserves such thoughtful consideration.

  Paola Antonelli

  Beautiful, Meaningful, Responsibility

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• we middle-aged folk have the education of life, truly; we know the multiplication table of anxieties and sorrows, the subtraction table of loss, the division table of responsibility.

  Margaret Deland

  Responsibility, Loss, Anxiety

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• "Try another Subtraction sum. Take a bone from a dog: what remains?" [asked the Red Queen] Alice considered. "The bone wouldn't remain, of course, if I took it-and the dog wouldn't remain; it would come to bite me-and I'm sure I shouldn't remain!" "Then you think nothing would remain?" said the Red Queen. "I think that's the answer." "Wrong, as usual," said the Red Queen, "the dog's temper would remain."

  Lewis Carroll

  Dog, Queens, Science

  Lewis Carroll (2015). “Through the Looking-Glass (Alice): Top 100 Classic Novels”, p.87, 谷月社

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