Remember Ronnie

'Tis a windy night to be a swing,' me old mate Leon used to say.
Hurricane Katia's tail-end is supposed to hit shore sometime tomorrow evening with winds of up to 160km an hour, traveling across the country on into Monday, before making its way across the water. That's a pretty snappy tail in any one's terms and you just hope whatever is up there will suck it up. Maybe the ghost of Ronnie Drew? Knock the whip out of her because the country seriously doesn't need another weather event like the ones experienced over the last few years here in Ireland.
I'd have been a climate skeptic in my day, partially because of historical fact and partly because academics were caught manipulating the numbers. That kinda craic should get a Professor sent packing, but hey, it didn't take long for that story to disappear.
The one thing I am certain of is man's contribution to the current, shall we say, turbulence. The planet and the immediate outer space is being choked to death. I'm sure the Outer Space doesn't mind too much, as well, for all human purposes it's as dead as a .... but for us here down in Ireland, we like the mildness of our incessant rainfall and we'd like to get back to that.
I mean, what's the story? What's a planet without a human? I'll leave that up to the individual to answer. And why the hurry? What does all this money guarantee at the end of the day? It's definitely not to get off the planet anyway. With the amount of junk floating about up there, that would be a dodgy ride. It will probably be left to Richard Bronson now to clean it up. I'm sure he won't mind. He's Tthat kinda man.

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Today or yesterday, depending on where your reading from was World Suicide Prevention Day. This blog is almost two years old now. The first post recorded here dealt somewhat with the issue. It was around the time Irish Olympic hero, Darren Sutherland took his life. Every instance of suicide I come across always leaves me cold. Sense of disbelief, best swept to the back of the mind, in a place not often visited. Here's a few statistic's concerning the issue.
In Ireland it has been described as an epidemic. Long swept under the carpet which is down to multiple factors, the stigma is lifting, but as the statistics suggest, the efforts are to slow and although their was a decrease from the 2009 high, when it's human lives we are speaking of, it's an extremely weak Minister that will cut funding to vital services. It's too important an issue to be a minority issue. The constitution states a desire for an equal society. It's how those who wrote it wanted it to be.
I dealt partly with the issue in Booker's World. From the viewpoint of someone left behind and from a male standpoint. Terribly selfish of me, but there you go. Why I chose to write about it somewhat really doesn't matter. It was my interpretation of perhaps where some mind-sets perhaps are even in 2011. I think the problem can be addressed by continually making people aware that it is a serious issue that has scarred families, defiant of class and stature in every corner of this country.
A greater understanding as to why is important, but so too the feelings of those left behind who are left to carry the questions inside, sometimes on their own. There is great work being done and more is needed.
I also believe work toward a cognitive approach through the Arts can be of great benefit to someone reaching out. That's a personal opinion, but I think I've read enough material at this stage to laud some worthwhile benefits. To often people just get lost. To often we can be too busy to see. Too often we only see the signs when it's too late. Not that we didn't want to see them, but because life got to unmanageable keeping everything together under the stress and strain of daily living.
I hope James Reilly stands up and is counted on this one. He'd get a hell of a lot of good press here anyway if he did. Reilly for Taoiseach. I can almost see it now.
He got the poison chalice that is the HSE. Harney's legacy as she enjoys the fruits of her progressive democracy, or Independence, or whatever she counts herself as these days. There's many things Reilly has to address...and fast. Everything's against him. But on this issue he should not fail. Legacy can bring its own stigma and legacy stretches further than the in-club of the time. Though we know History lies even to this day, you'd have to say we are getting better at recording it for future generations to ponder over. As Leon Jackson once said, 'It's what you leave behind.'

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The three best sporting moments Ireland has delivered over the course of my own lifetime are recorded here. Opinions vary, as do reasons, but I'd still stand by them today.
In a few hours time Ireland kick off their Rugby World Cup campaign against the good ol' USA in New Zealand. Coming off the back of four straight defeats there is cause for worry. I got to be honest. Anything but a semi final and perhaps the money sending them there might have been better spent. But no point being negative, hey?
Sport throws up surprises and moments that unite people. It has the capacity for that. I hope whoever speaks in those dressing rooms over the coming weeks wakes a spark inside our men down there. The country could do with the lift.
At club level Ireland is a powerhouse. That hasn't reflected nationally despite the Slam in '09. When i again reflected after a drubbing by the French last year it was from a bath tub in Booker's World... but that's another story.
Maybe we can do a Denmark. Or a Greece. But with an oval ball. Sometimes it's ok to bleed for your country. Hopefully Brian, Paul and Deco can stoke a little national pride and give us all something to be proud of over the coming month. In language we can all understand too.

*************

It's 3-13 on a Saturday morning now. What the hell, I was always fond of a late Saturday night. A lot of good ones too, mixed in with the ones sometimes forgotten.
Things are calmer this windy weather. The wind has any cloud cover dispersed and it's as clear a night I have seen this year.
It's also the 10th anniversary of 9-11, an event that changed the world in so many bad ways. Just when perhaps we might of thought we'd move away from wars fought to show who had the bigger tech member, or who indeed were the brave souls high-fiving to the reign of a missile down on civilians from the safety of a calm sea.
A war on Terror, as a war on Drugs are not winnable. In my world, it's the sole reason they are fought. It may be our eventual downfall. That need in some for power and control. Perhaps genetics will explain much in the decades to come. Perhaps computers will provide us with the answers to much. It should - and could - be an exciting time in the history of things.
Perhaps ten years on we'll do more than remember those who died that day - however they died - and actually set the wheels in motion of restoring some sort of order to the economic and social mess we are in today. Maybe Obama in his final year in office will call it as it is and be that leader that promised much just three short years ago.

The world's a bit like Sky News and Sports. The world could do without one and couldn't possibly survive without the other. One serves the worst in us, the other the best.
Quotes often grab my attention. Today, two passed my way. They both just seemed to fit into the day that's in it. For this fictional has-been anyway.

'Enjoy life now .. it has an expiration date.'
Thanks John F. Kennedy for that one. I lie not, for the F is not Fitzgerald, but a noble practitioner of life all the same.

'Better to write for yourself and have no public than to write for the public and have no self.'
Thanks to Damauri Dreved (more later) for that one. He advised me it was Cyril Connelly who bestowed such profound wisdom on us lesser mortals. It kinda fits in to the realities of the day. But such are the joys of the absurd path. You get to create your own meaning. And there's no greater freedom than that.

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Highways

'And now the end is near,' goes the lyric from Sinatra's, My Way. The song popped into my head this morning for some reason as I rode out a dose of insomnia to the tune of Sky reporters commenting on the overnight news that Credit Rating Agency, Standard's and Poor's had downgraded America's credit status to AA+, removing its triple A rating for the first time in American History.
In justifying the move, the Agency stated that the 'downgrade reflects the view that the effectiveness, stability, and predictability of American policy-making and political institutions have weakened at a time of ongoing fiscal and economic challenges to a degree more than we envisioned when we assigned a negative outlook to the rating on April 18, 2011.'
I don't think many could argue with that. And the Americans should not be too despondent. Ireland's status is near Junk. But it's the political commentary behind the downgrading that once again shows up the distinct lack of leadership, on both sides of the Atlantic foam. The Market response on Monday will tell more. But nothing suggests anything but a continuance into an economic hell that nobody seems to want us out of.

Not only is the US in trouble, China is now calling for the dollar to be removed as the world's stable currency and events in Europe threaten the nations involved in the single currency. Italy have vowed to implement Austerity measures of historic proportions on its citizens in a move to try and stabilize market reaction against them for a stagnant economy. But it is doomed to failure on a number of fronts. Italians, like the French, like their standard of life. Good luck taking it away from them.
EU leaders, most of whom are on Holidays are keeping in the loop with each other via conference and telephone calls. Cheaper on the tax payer I guess.
The main problem is the markets are screaming austerity and when it does not go far enough it screams some more. It's like one of those hostage situations of old. Austerity will not get any economy moving again, yet this is the call? Why?
Ireland this week announced another rise of people signing on the live register and when weighed against emigration the proof lies in the pudding. So how can anyone see any light at the end of the tunnel when those charged to lead are not the real leaders after all. The governments of the world have allowed for a state of play where bankers are allowed go unaccountable for heaping misery on people through any means they wish to invent and are allowed that free reign by elected officials put on a ballot paper for us by political parties who get more and more capitalistic with each passing day, right or left, despite the escalating reality that Capitalism in its present form has failed and failed catastrophically.
There is little or no divide in the political spectrum anymore. You get the feeling for that based on a number of things. When, say for instance, a left party like Labour in Ireland go to bed with a right wing party like Fine Gael you know the fix is in. When probably the most powerful man in the world, Ben Bernanke 'serves' under both a Republican and Democratic President you know the fix is in.
Possible Presidential candidate Ron Paul once said of Bernanke 'there is something fishy about the head of the world's most powerful government bureaucracy, one that is involved in a full-time counterfeiting operation to sustain monopolistic financial cartels, and the world’s most powerful central planner, who sets the price of money worldwide, proclaiming the glories of capitalism.'
When you take the relationships highlighted in Capitalism- A Love Story you know the fix is in. When you know that JFK took one from the Knoll, you know the fix is in. You know when you research all the previous American Presidents who met with the same fate and their views towards bankers and banking methods, you know the fix is in.
The wider connotations is none of this is taught in our educational system. Thinking for yourself is rarely encouraged. And perhaps through ignorance we are all complicit to some degree and will probably only care when it is too late.

If there was any real will on the behalf of world leaders for the betterment of mankind all these problems could be gone tomorrow with debt forgiveness and longer terms to pay back outstanding debt after that. I'm sure those who play with digital money and profit from the Interest on that while manipulating governments the world over would not want that. It's a disturbing feature of modern day society when sociopaths run the show. It's hard to describe them as anything else when they have such a lack of empathy for all those suffering the World over so the practice of greed can continue. I read about the Great Depression following the Crash of 1929 and if some accelerated radical thinking on an economic and political level does not come into play very soon, barely a century later we could be back in the midst of one again.

The words of My Way were given to me by my Dad on the morning I boarded a plane for New York back in 1999 for the Summer. Best gift I ever got off anyone. It's an honorable thing to do, to give a child that sort of freedom of scope even if they are delivered via lyrics sang by an old swooner.

''For what is a man? What has he got?
If not himself - Then he has naught.
To say the things he truly feels
And not the words of one who kneels.
The record shows I took the blows
And did it my way.'' - Paul Anka

The Optimistic Pessimistic.

Regular readers will know that I set up this blog to co inside with the writing of my first book. The shambles that has taken place in Ireland over that time also led me to comment politically. In certain areas of the World I'd have been sent to the Gulag or would have been slipped a sly one to the back of the head. Thank fate for small mercy's.
My original plan was to set up a business based on the routes for authors now available to writers on the Independent stage. It was hard not to come to that conclusion with the explosion of reputable self publishing companies and the eBook. Ebooks are now beginning to outperform the hardback and are fast closing in on the paperback as well. It certainly has forced the mainstream to stand up and take notice.

Mainstream publishing is a business. Sales at the end of the day, though never guaranteed, are the bottom line. With the amount of people and effort it takes to take a book from start to finish the expense laid out initially by a mainstream publisher makes them have to think that way. It makes good business practice. So, this writer anyway, can understand how a book from someone with a half arsed profile based on celebrity will always take precedent over a first-time nobody.


Booker's World was going to be the start of something for me. That was until my original plan were blown out of the water by those in the employment of the state, who choose what's worth supporting and what's not.
I have to say the refusal by them to help in some way was a bitter blow, but on reflection, should I not have been surprised. In hindsight, the answer is no. It made me think further about all that is wrong with modern day Ireland.
Emigration is now on the cards, and trust me, it is not something I would even contemplate but for the fact that I tried to use my unemployment to do something worthwhile, but in this part of the country all the bodies I sought some assistance from slammed the door in my face. Government departments and educational bodies to name just two. When I was refused the back-to-work enterprise allowance a few months ago, i emailed the Department of Social Welfare five times to see how to go about appealing the decision. No reply!
I have them all, dated and saved and ready for use very soon. See, I think there is something wrong with preaching positivity and togetherness when it comes to addressing Ireland's woes, yet when you do, people are treated with such scant disregard. The past two years have been an eye-opener to me in so many way. I genuinely felt effort in this country would be worth something. To date, it means nothing. There would be nothing wrong with this country if the money at our disposal was used in a competent manner. I think we all know by now, this is not the case. Competence is not a word any rational thinker would use.

As i mentioned before I got 50 copies of the book printed and am having a small launch on April 17 for people who helped me out in its writing and some family and friends. Then it's my intention to re-submit the actual book to some publishers to keep the other work in their slush piles warm. I tried before, but judgement can only be made on what is allowed to be submitted, I'm not sure if seeing it between a jacket will make any difference, but at the moment I feel like a guy in Guantanamo, being held back against my will, so I guess everything is worth a shot.
I'll also be contacting some media outlets who are not in bed with the government in an attempt to highlight the wrongs i perceive in denying people a chance to get themselves out of the hole this damn recession has dug for them. I certainly didn't dig this whole for myself, yet as long as I'm here, I'll be paying for it. And for what... to lie on a hospital trolley or watch corruption being bailed out with no accountability.

I find great encouragement in the words of others from the past. When I want to discover something about a subject which I don't fully understand, away I go for looking for the wisdom of others to keep plugging away. It's an effective way to keep motivated. I've included a few below. People have often posted or wrote stuff that has resonated with me or impacted on my thinking. By quoting them they may do the same for others. Enjoy...

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.
Mahatma Gandhi

If one advances confidently in the direction of his dreams and endeavors to live the life which he has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.
Henry David Thoreau

A man can succeed at almost anything for which he has unlimited enthusiasm.
Charles Schwab

To the question whether I am a pessimist or an optimist, I answer that my knowledge is pessimistic, but my willing and hoping are optimistic.
Albert Schweitzer

History has demonstrated that the most notable winners usually encountered heartbreaking obstacles before they triumphed. They won because they refused to become discouraged by their defeats.
Bertie C. Forbes

If you always think what you've always thought, You will always do what you've always done.If you always do what you've always done,You will always get what you've always got.If you always get what you've always got,You will always think what you've always thought.
Unknown

The only way to deal with an un-free world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion. Albert Camus

Enjoy the sunshine folks!

Green Day

To people, Irish or otherwise, I hope you have had or are having a great St. Patrick's Day. To celebrate, in a writing sense as opposed to the more fun way, I've included a few quotes from people who spoke of Ireland or are from Irish stock, people who have helped make us a truly unique race on this little Planet of ours.
Enjoy...

Everywhere I go I'm asked if I think the university stifles writers. My opinion is that they don't stifle enough of them. There's many a best-seller that could have been prevented by a good teacher.
Flannery O'Connor

I spent 90% of my money on women and drink. The rest I wasted.
George Best

We have always found the Irish a bit odd. They refuse to be English.
Winston Churchill

Hugging trees has a calming effect on me. I'm talking about enormous trees that will be there when we are all dead and gone. I've hugged trees in every part of this little island.
Gerry Adams

All the world's a stage and most of us are desperately unrehearsed.
Sean O'Casey

This is one race of people for whom psychoanalysis is of no use whatsoever.
Sigmund Freud, speaking of the Irish. (allegedly)

The most important thing to remember about drunks is that drunks are far more intelligent than non-drunks. They spend a lot of time talking in pubs, unlike workaholics who concentrate on their careers and ambitions, who never develop their higher spiritual values, who never explore the insides of their head like a drunk does.
Shane MacGowen

Not a shred of evidence exists in favor of the idea that life is serious.
Brendan Gill

I'm Irish. I think about death all the time.
Jack Nicholson

and my own particular favourite ...

I am a drinker with a writing problem.
Brendan Behan

Happy St.Patrick's Day!

It's A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.

Back in the last century I used to spend Summers out in the country, a guest, whether wanted or not, to a host of relatives. One particular Uncle was the owner of not only an Atari game system, but also a Video Player. Among his collection were timeless classics recorded directly off the TV and on rainy days it was a cool world to be in.
One of my favourite films when I was a kid was, It's a Mad Mad Mad Mad World. It might not rank in many all-time favourite lists for the movie-buff among us, but even to this day, I watch it at least twice a year. I do that with films sometimes.

Indeed the World has moved on from such primitive technology, but I think it's fair to say the world is still a mad, mad, mad, mad old place.
Regular readers know I have a fondness for the bizarre at times, and have discovered absurdity provides a 'structure' to a lot of the thinking I seem to do, especially when it comes to forming ideas about what to write about.
Having spent nearly three months entirely commenting on the disgraceful way we have let Ireland slip from our grasp, absurdity, at every juncture, was the first word I sought when looking to sum up the travesty that has been allowed to happen here in a short context. I promised I'd move away from politics here so I won't mention that another €25 billion may be needed to put in our saving graces, the great institutions of banking. Did you ever feel like a saddle?

We don't have to look to far to see the frailty of human existence on the Planet today. The devastation of the Japanese earthquake and the resulting tsunami would be more than enough for any race of people to bear, but add in the panic involved in being in an area where nuclear reactors are threatening to melt and dangerous levels of radiation threaten the very air that should be free for us all to breath, it begins to touch on a Hollywood screenplay from the mind of some apocalyptic addict.
It says a lot about people with power, and the lengths they will go to provide energy systems to us, energies that hold no sentiment for people but have the ability to wipe us out forever if we go to far with it.
Branches of science, for all it's worth, may very well be the thing that eventually sees us off as a civilisation. Greed and mad men who continually plot to destroy something so beautiful as the planet. Conditional reasoning's, we may never truly understand.

Take Ireland with it's 'important' people walking around having played the cards that bankrupted us, still living the high life and apparently not going to be held accountable, and the ordinary Joe-soap slopping out in the 'Joy' for not paying a fine.
I'm sure parenting is something some among us are doing. What I'd like to know, is how or what way do you explain things like that to children, while trying to guide them in the right way. It's difficult to figure out sometimes.

Meltdown of another kind also takes up large segments of the mainstream news feeds. Seems actor, fellow seeker of the truth and all round Mr. Bizarre, Charlie Sheen is going solo, having signed up for Twitter and gathering two million followers in a matter of days. Talk about adding fuel to a fire.
He announced two live shows to follow up on his online 'rants' which have people wondering about his state of mind. They sold out in minutes. To me, it's just Charlie Sheen being Charlie Sheen. 'Activism' is in his blood, his Father is noted for it.
If it doesn't work out and he decides to go back on the box, it will be Charlie having a mental breakdown, much will be written about the man and little of the condition. It's how the media works in contemporary society.
I get the feeling Sheen is tired of the mainstream for the time being and his 'tour' should be, as they say in Galway, Mad!

Certainly doesn't take away from the encounter I have being having this past week.
Still weak of will, I find myself at times outside my back door sucking on a cigarette. Above, a marauding tree, still bare, offers a pleasant view on a clear night. But crows, trying to sing, as the early hours make their way toward the dawn somehow just doesn't fit in with the peace the night can bring.
They seem to be joined by other wannabes of flight and equally void of vocals. Very strange indeed.

I've always liked my comedy dark, strange beings interest me, and science, which I hated as a student, now is an area of fascination at times.
Some of the complexities of people, life and existence can be found within some of its current finding and introducing elements of dark humour and 'strange beings' into some of my writing, has definitely added to the pleasure of being in its practice. It's certainly filled the gap left by a mis-spent youth, a lot of the twenties and the early days of thirties.

What can I say, in a mad world, it's was hard to let go at times. Though testing at times, it's easier when I don' take life so seriously. That's easier said than done in a mad world, but I read this last night (below) on Facebook, and it's good to know that even in that mad world, people of greater, more profound, but very simple thinking still dwell among us. That's always good to know.

The Dalai Lama, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, answered -

"Man....... Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money. Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health. And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present; the result being that he does not live in the present or the future; he lives as if he is never going to die, and then dies having never really lived."

Now ain't that the truth, Charlie!

Two Great Quotes

Yesterday I was lucky enough to come across two brilliant quotes from two people who in my own humble believe both had brilliant minds.

The first is attributed to Ayn Rand . Rand was a novelist, philosopher and playwright, throughout her career. She is known for her two best-selling novels and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism. You can find out more about her extraordinary life here -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand.

Here is the quote -

"When trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion - when you see that in order to produce, you need permission from men who produce nothing, when you see money flowing to those who deal, not in goods, but in favors - and your laws don’t protect you against them, but protect them against you, when you see corruption being rewarded and honesty becoming a self-sacrifice, you may know that your society is doomed".

The second quote is from an Anonymous source, but equally speaks volumes in such a short span. Here it is -

“It's not enough to have a dream unless I'm willing to pursue it. It's not enough to know what's right unless I'm strong enough to do it. It's not enough to join the crowd, to be acknowledged and accepted. I must be true to my ideals, even if I'm excluded and rejected. It's not enough to learn the truth unless I also learn to live it. It's not enough to reach for love unless I care enough to give it.”~Anonymous

Which all leads me to say this. If you have something to say it is best to say it. It can sometimes have a profound effect on people and perhaps their way of thinking. And for me, it really does not matter if you have had the most glorious of existences of whether no one ever knew who you were. The impact can be exactly the same.

The Quotes Of Albert Einstein

[Note: This list of Einstein quotes was being forwarded around the Internet in e-mail, so I decided to put it on my web page. I'm afraid I can't vouch for its authenticity, tell you where it came from, who compiled the list, who Kevin Harris is, or anything like that. Still, the quotes are interesting and enlightening.]

Collected Quotes from Albert Einstein

"Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius -- and a lot of courage -- to move in the opposite direction."
"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
"Gravitation is not responsible for people falling in love."
"I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details."
"The hardest thing in the world to understand is the income tax."
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one."
"The only real valuable thing is intuition."
"A person starts to live when he can live outside himself."
"I am convinced that He (God) does not play dice."
"God is subtle but he is not malicious."
"Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character."
"I never think of the future. It comes soon enough."
"The eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility."
"Sometimes one pays most for the things one gets for nothing."
"Science without religion is lame. Religion without science is blind."
"Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new."
"Great spirits have often encountered violent opposition from weak minds."
"Everything should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler."
"Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen."
"Science is a wonderful thing if one does not have to earn one's living at it."
"The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources."
"The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education."
"God does not care about our mathematical difficulties. He integrates empirically."
"The whole of science is nothing more than a refinement of everyday thinking."
"Technological progress is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal."
"Peace cannot be kept by force. It can only be achieved by understanding."
"The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is comprehensible."
"We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them."
"Education is what remains after one has forgotten everything he learned in school."
"The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing."
"Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater."
"Equations are more important to me, because politics is for the present, but an equation is something for eternity."
"If A is a success in life, then A equals x plus y plus z. Work is x; y is play; and z is keeping your mouth shut."
"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity; and I'm not sure about the the universe."
"As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain, as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality."
"Whoever undertakes to set himself up as a judge of Truth and Knowledge is shipwrecked by the laughter of the gods."
"I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones."
"In order to form an immaculate member of a flock of sheep one must, above all, be a sheep."
"The fear of death is the most unjustified of all fears, for there's no risk of accident for someone who's dead."
"Too many of us look upon Americans as dollar chasers. This is a cruel libel, even if it is reiterated thoughtlessly by the Americans themselves."
"Heroism on command, senseless violence, and all the loathsome nonsense that goes by the name of patriotism -- how passionately I hate them!"
"No, this trick won't work...How on earth are you ever going to explain in terms of chemistry and physics so important a biological phenomenon as first love?"
"My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind."
"Yes, we have to divide up our time like that, between our politics and our equations. But to me our equations are far more important, for politics are only a matter of present concern. A mathematical equation stands forever."
"The release of atom power has changed everything except our way of thinking...the solution to this problem lies in the heart of mankind. If only I had known, I should have become a watchmaker."
"Great spirits have always found violent opposition from mediocrities. The latter cannot understand it when a man does not thoughtlessly submit to hereditary prejudices but honestly and courageously uses his intelligence."
"The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious. It is the source of all true art and all science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger, who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe, is as good as dead: his eyes are closed."
"A man's ethical behavior should be based effectually on sympathy, education, and social ties; no religious basis is necessary. Man would indeeded be in a poor way if he had to be restrained by fear of punishment and hope of reward after death."
"The further the spiritual evolution of mankind advances, the more certain it seems to me that the path to genuine religiosity does not lie through the fear of life, and the fear of death, and blind faith, but through striving after rational knowledge."
"Now he has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present, and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion."
"You see, wire telegraph is a kind of a very, very long cat. You pull his tail in New York and his head is meowing in Los Angeles. Do you understand this? And radio operates exactly the same way: you send signals here, they receive them there. The only difference is that there is no cat."
"One had to cram all this stuff into one's mind for the examinations, whether one liked it or not. This coercion had such a deterring effect on me that, after I had passed the final examination, I found the consideration of any scientific problems distasteful to me for an entire year."
"...one of the strongest motives that lead men to art and science is escape from everyday life with its painful crudity and hopeless dreariness, from the fetters of one's own ever-shifting desires. A finely tempered nature longs to escape from the personal life into the world of objective perception and thought."
"He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder."
"A human being is a part of a whole, called by us _universe_, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feelings as something separated from the rest... a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
"Not everything that counts can be counted, and not everything that can be counted counts." (Sign hanging in Einstein's office at Princeton)

Copyright: Kevin Harris 1995 (may be freely distributed with this acknowledgement)