Month: December 2004

The Cow

The cow is of the bovine ilk;
One end is moo, the other, milk.

Results! Why man, I have gotten a lot of results. I know several thousand things that won’t work.

“Life is strange” said Jeremy”. “Compared with what?” replied the spider.

I am sure that one cannot love life enough; but I believe, too, one mustn’t confuse love of life with love of certain things in it. One cannot pick the moment and the place as one pleases and say “Enough! This is all I want. This is how it is henceforth to be.”

We’re fools whether we dance or not, so we might as well dance.

He who joyfully marches to music in rank and file has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would fully suffice.

The Nativity

Among the oxen (like an ox I’m slow)
I see a glory in the stable grow
Which, with the ox’s dullness might at length
Give me an ox’s strength.

Among the asses (stubborn I as they)
I see my Saviour where I looked for hay;
So may my beastlike folly learn at least
The patience of a beast.

Among the sheep (I like a sheep have strayed)
I watch the manger where my Lord is laid;
Oh that my baa-ing nature would win thence
Some woolly innocence!

The first thing I remember about the world…is that I was a stranger in it. This feeling, which is at once the glory and desolation of homo sapiens, provides the only thread of consistency that I can detect in my life.

If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell’s equations, then so much the worse for Maxwell’s equations. And if your theory contradicts the facts, well, sometimes these experimentalists make mistakes. But if your theory is found to be against the Second Law of Thermodynamics, I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation”—

A physicist is an atom’s way of knowing about atoms.

Trees
I think that I shall never see
A poem as lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the earth’s sweet flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in Summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.

Progress isn’t made by early risers. It’s made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something.

The free man owns himself. He can damage himself with either eating or drinking; he can ruin himself with gambling. If he does he is certainly a damn fool, and he might possibly be a damned soul; but if he may not, he is not a free man any more than a dog.

Any defineable sytem of mathematics or logic is either inconsitent or incomplete; that is for any finite or infintely enumerable set of axioms, sufficient to encompass arithemtic there is either a statement “X” and a statement “not X” that can both be proved (inconsitent) or there is a meaningful statement X that can neither be proved not disproved (incomplete) within that system.

or

Truth is deeper than proof

or (more importantly)

Mathermatical Logicians will always find employment.

To arrive at the simplest truth, as Newton knew and practiced, requires years of contemplation. Not activity Not reasoning. Not calculating. Not busy behaviour of any kind. Not reading. Not talking. Not making an effort. Not thinking. Simply bearing in mind what it is one needs to know. And yet those with the courage to tread this path to real discovery are not only offered practically no guidance on how to do so, they are actively discouraged and have to set abut it in secret, pretending meanwhile to be diligently engaged in the frantic diversions and to conform with the deadening personal opinions which are continually being thrust upon them.

A wise traveller has no fixed rules and is not intent upon arrival.

The Herring is a lucky fish
From all disease inured.
Should he be ill when caught at sea;
Immediately – he’s cured!

The last temptation is the greatest treason: to do the right deed for the wrong reason.

There is nothing in the world that some man cannot make a little worse and sell a little cheaper, and he who considers price only is that man’s lawful prey.

Why do you think your best friend can keep a secret if you can’t.

A discovery is said to be an accident meeting a prepared mind.

I always keep a supply of stimulant handy in case I see a snake–which I also keep handy.

Take everything you like seriously, except yourselves.

Abou Ben Adhem’s name led all the rest..
Prompting a thesis, quite hypothethetical,
That even recording angels find it best,
To keep us alphabetical.

Abou Ben Adhem

Abou Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase!)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace,
And saw, within the moonlight in his room,
Making it rich, and like a lily in bloom,
An Angel writing in a book of gold:

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,
And to the Presence in the room he said,
“What writest thou?” The Vision raised its head,
And with a look made of all sweet accord
Answered, “The names of those who love the Lord.”

“And is mine one?” said Abou. “Nay, not so,”
Replied the Angel. Abou spoke more low,
But cheerily still; and said, “I pray thee, then,
Write me as one who loves his fellow men.”

The Angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again with a great wakening light,
And showed the names whom love of God had blessed,
And, lo! Ben Adhem’s name led all the rest!

A Plan for the Improvement of English Spelling

For example, in Year 1 that useless letter “c” would be dropped to be replased either by “k” or “s”, and likewise “x” would no longer be part of the alphabet. The only kase in which “c” would be retained would be the “ch” formation, which will be dealt with later. Year 2 might reform “w” spelling, so that “which” and “one” would take the same konsonant, wile Year 3 might well abolish “y” replasing it with “i” and Iear 4 might fiks the “gj” anomali wonse and for all.Jenerally, then, the improvement would kontinue iear bai iear with Iear 5 doing awai with useless double konsonants, and Iears 6-12 or so modifaiing vowlz and the rimeining voist and unvoist konsonants. Bai Iear 15 or sou, it wud fainali bi posibl tu meik ius ov thi ridandant letez “c”, “y” and “x” — bai now jast a memori in the maindz ov ould doderez — tu riplais “ch”, “sh”, and “th” rispektivli.Fainali, xen, aafte sam 20 iers ov orxogrefkl riform, wi wudhev a lojikl, kohirnt speling in ius xrewawt xe Ingliy-spiking werld.

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.

The right to swing my fist ends where the other man’s nose begins.

Beer is proof that god loves us and wants us to be happy.

The sciences do not try to explain, they hardly even try to interpret, they mainly make models. By a model is meant a mathematical construct which, with the addition of certain verbal interpretations, describes observed phenomena. The justification of such a mathematical construct is solely and precisely that it is expected to work.