Know thyself. - Apollo "Let us, therefore, Senators, remain united with confidence, forgetting all past events as if they had been brought to pass by a divine plan, and begin to love each other without suspicion as if we were new citizens. So that you will treat me as a father, enjoying my care and protection without fearing anything unpleasant, and I will take thought for you as for my children, praying that all your deeds may always be the best, and yet enduring perforce the limitations of human nature, rewarding the good citizens with fitting honors and correcting the rest as far as that may be possible." - Gaius Julius Caesar as quoted by Dio Cassius HR 43.17.4-5 Wisdom is one thing. It is to know the thought by which all things are steered through all things. - Heraclitus CNN: Did you ever think about getting into the money game, getting insanely rich from the operating system, which is now the fastest growing operating system in the world that you created? Linus Torvalds: Well, I got rich enough. In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. - Dwight Eisenhower There is nothing in the world so much admired as a man who knows how to bear unhappiness with courage. - Seneca It so happens that the greatest good for a human being is this, each day to make arguments about virtue. . . and the unexamined life is not worth living for a human being. - Socrates, in Plato, The Apology Virtue consists in a will which is in agreement with Nature. The wicked, though perforce they obey God’s law, do so involuntarily; in the simile of Cleanthes, they are like a dog tied to a cart, and compelled to go wherever it goes. In the life of an individual man, virtue is the sole good; such things as health, happiness, possessions, are of no account. Since virtue resides in the will, everything really good or bad in a man’s life depends only upon himself. He may be poor, but what of it? He can still be virtuous. He may be sentenced to death, but he can die nobly, like Socrates. - Zeno The policy of Sparta was not to exact tribute from her allies, but merely to secure their subservience to her interests by establishing oligarchies among them. - Thucydides "Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the government's purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well meaning but without understanding." - Justice Louis Brandeis, 1928 And when it is said to them, Do not make mischief in the land, they say: We are but peace-makers. Now surely they themselves are the mischief makers, but they do not perceive. - The Koran "The white man has sadness, despair, difficulty, but nhebasu is more than that. The Indian feels nhebasu, and then he kills himself." 'SUICIDES' RAISE QUESTIONS FOR BRAZILIAN TRIBE Seattle Times; Seattle, Wash.; Mar 15, 1998; MICHAEL ASTOR "And you all know security is mortals' chiefest enemy." - Macbeth Act III Scene V "The Webster's Dictionary tells us that "cynic" used to refer to 'a memeber of an ancient Greek philosophical sect who believed virtue to be the only good and practice of self-control to be the only way of achieving virtue.' But Webster's second definition more aptly describes the word today: 'One who believes all people are motivated by selfishness.' In my book, that's also the definition of an economist." - Sean Gonsalvez, Cape Cod Times, July 2003 Poverty is the parent of revolution and crime. - Aristotle, Politics II. 1265b Into the same rivers we step and do not step. You cannot step twice in the same river. - Heraclitus, Fragments Yeah, yeah. You can never step onto the same sidewalk twice. I _know_! - Mree I must not fear. Fear is the mind killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration. I will face my fear. I will permit it to pass over me and through me. And when it is passed I will turn the inner eye to see its path. Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain. - Frank Herbert, _Dune_, The Littany Against Fear "Ironically, a group named Pax had just handed out peace candles to the audience moments before the first fire was set. Scher says the outcome of the candle giveaway was unexpected, and unfortunate." - CNN.com, "Seven arrested in connection with Woodstock '99 fracas" "In the treaty councils the commissioners have claimed that our country had been sold to the Government. Suppose a white man should come to me and say, 'Joseph, I like your horses, and I want to buy them.' I say to him, 'No, my horses suit me, I will not sell them.' Then he goes to my neighbor, and says to him: 'Joseph has some good horses. I want to buy them, but he refuses to sell.' My neighbor answers, 'Pay me the money, and I will sell you Joseph's horses.' The white man returns to me and says, 'Joseph, I have bought your horses, and you must let me have them.' If we sold our lands to the Government, this is the way they were bought." - Hinmaton-Yalaktit (Chief Joseph), arguing against the right of the US Goverment to force his people to leave their lands (1876) Blossoms at night, and the faces of people moved by music. - Kobayashi Issa "The Master said: 'Riches and rank are what every man craves; yet if the only way to obtain them goes against his principles, he should desist from such a pursuit. Poverty and obscurity are what every man hates; yet if the only escape from them goes against his principles, he should accept his lot." - Confucius' Analects 4:5 "Let us train our minds to desire what the situation demands." - Seneca "As they neared the qanat they heard music from a high entrance of the sietch. It was an old-style Fremen group -- two-holed flutes, tambourines, tympani made on spice-plastic drums with skins stretched taut across one end. No one asked what animal on this planet provided that much skin." - Frank Herbert, "Children of Dune" "To prohibit sharing software is to cut the bonds of society." - Richard Stallman "Well ,you're the, you and a few other critics are the only people I've heard use the phrase immediate threat. I didn't! The president didn't! And it's become kind of folklore that that's. . . that's what happened!" - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Face the Nation, CBS, Mar. 14, 2004. "Some have argued that the nuclear threat from Iraq is not imminent, that Saddam is at least five to seven years away from having nuclear weapons. I would not be so sure." - Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld Sep. 18, 2002 "No terrorist state poses a greater or more immediate threat to the security of our people than the regime of Saddam Hussein and Iraq." - Testimony of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, Senate Armed Services Committee (9/19/2002). "This is about imminent threat." - White House spokesman Scott McClellan, 2/10/03 "Absolutely." - White House spokesman Ari Fleischer answering whether Iraq was an "imminent threat," 5/7/03 "Simply stated, there is no doubt that Saddam Hussein now has weapons of mass destruction. There is no doubt he is amassing them to use against our friends, against our allies, and against us." - Vice President Dick Cheney, August 2002 "Go fuck yourself." - Vice President Dick Cheney, speaking to Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) on the floor of the Senate, June 2004 "If a leader cannot admit mistakes, these mistakes will be hidden." - Frank Herbert, Omni Magazine, July 1980 But now at last fair fall the welcome hour That sets me free, wheneer the thick night glow With beacon-fire of hope deferred no more. All hail! Fire of the night, that brings my spirit day, Shedding on Argos light, and dance, and song. Greetings to fortune, hail! - Aeschylus, _Agamemnon_ Were all the world mine from the sea to the Rhine, I would starve myself of it so that the queen of England might lie in my arms. - Carmina Burana The pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Parmenides taught that the only thingss that are real are things which never change... and the pre-Socratic Greek philosopher Heraclitus taught that everything changes. If you superimpose their two views, you get this result: Nothing is real. There is a fascinating next step to this line of thinking: Parmenides could never have existed because he grew old and died and disappeared, so, according to his own philosophy, he did not exist. And Heraclitus may have been right -- let's not forget that; so if Heraclitus was right, then Parmenides did exist, and therefore, according to Heraclitus' philosophy, perhaps Parmenides was right, since Parmenides fulfilled the conditions, the criteria, by which Heraclitus judged things real. - PKD, 1978 lecture i wonder if people would get mad if i used the jabba the hutt/bobba fett thing as a demonstration/example. use jabba fuckwads they will relate you see this big slug guy.. thats jabba, or all of you. this here is bobba fett. hes hardcore. he wants yr passwds so he can own yr INFOZ - July 2004 "A political candidate who jumps to conclusions without knowing the facts is not a person you want as your commander in chief." - President George W. Bush, Oct. 27, 2004 "In a land of idiots, a moron is a genius." - Tom Magliozzi, _Car_Talk_ In the desert I saw a creature, naked, bestial, Who, squatting upon the ground, Held his heart in his hands, And ate of it. I said: "Is it good, friend?" "It is bitter - bitter," he answered; "But I like it Because it is bitter, And because it is my heart." - Stephen Crane, "In the desert" "We of the Tleilaxu believe that in all the universe there is only the insatiable appetite of matter, that energy is the only true solid. And energy learns. Hear me well, Princess: energy learns. This, we call power." - Dune Messiah "The choice here is stark and simple, the Bible says, 'I have set before you life and death, therefore choose life.' The time has arrived in this conflict to choose peace and hope and life." - President George W. Bush, quoting Deuteronomy in regards to the Israeli/Palistinian "Roadmap to Peace" "Annihilate the nations you are dispossessing and make your home in their country." - Deuteronomy 12:29 "The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny." - James Madison, Federalist 47 "The answer is simple: eliminate institutions of hierarchy and domination." - Prof. Noam Chomsky At daybreak, when you loathe the idea of having to leave your bed, have this thought ready in your mind: I am rising for the work of man." Should I have misgivings about doing that for which I was born, and for the sake of which I came into this world? Is this the grand purpose of my existence-to lie here snug and warm underneath my blanket? Certainly it feels more pleasant. Was it for pleasure that you were made, and not for work, nor for effort? Look at the plants, sparrows, ants, spiders, and bees, all working busily away, each doing its part in welding an orderly Universe. So who are you to go against the bidding of Nature? Who are you to refuse man his share of the work? - Marcus Aurelius RENDITE NOS GERMANICUM ("Give us back Germanicus") - a popular graffiti tag in Rome during the reign of Tiberius PooP - a popular graffiti tag in Seattle during the Bush II administration Now, the sight of Iraqis having a constitutional convention has put a lump in the throat of Bush, Rumsfeld and Cheney, all of whom have compared the American patriots of 1776 to our soldiers in Iraq today, mostly because they're using the same equipment. Let's just mention a few ways this analogy breaks down. One: the American Revolution was a home-grown rebellion fought with guerilla tactics against an occupying army of foreigners and mercenaries. . . okay, that is exactly what's going on in Iraq. Oh, except for one thing: this time, _we're_ England! You need proof? The only people on our side? England. - Bill Maher The spirit of Muad'Dib is more than words, more than the letter of the Law which arises in his name. Muad'Dib must always be that inner outrage against the complacently powerful, against the charlatans and the dogmatic fanatics. It is that inner outrage which must have its say because Muad'Dib taught us one thing above all others; that humans can endure only in a fraternity of social justice. - The Fedaykin Compact While it may appear that Microsoft is a 'pleasant' place to work, I remain convinced that nothing could be further from the truth. - Ed Helms I have numbered the sands and taken the measure of the sea; I understand the dumb and hear where there has been no speech. - Apollo I am the eye with which the Universe Beholds itself, and knows it is divine; All harmony of instrument or verse, All prophecy, all medicine, is mine, All light of art or nature; - to my song Victory and praise in its own right belong. - Shelley, "Hymn of Apollo" There is a heaven, for ever, day by day, The upward longing of my soul doth tell me so. There is a hell, I'm quite as sure; for pray, If there were not, where would my neighbours go? - Paul Lawrence Dunbar, "Theology" So that you may not be the martyred slaves of Time, get drunk, get drunk, and never pause for rest! With wine, poetry, or virtue, as you choose! - "Get Drunk!" - by Charles Baudelaire I basically only read books that are over 2,000 years old. - Hans-Georg Gadamer "It is evidently equally foolish to accept probable reasoning from a mathematician and to demand from a rhetorician scientific proofs." - Aristotle, Nicomachaen Ethics (I,3) The life of money-making is one undertaken under compulsion, and wealth is evidently not the good we are seeking; for it is merely useful and for the sake of something else. - Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics (I,5) Bless us, divine number, thou who generated gods and men! O holy, holy Tetractys, thou that containest the root and source of the eternally flowing creation! For the divine number begins with the profound, pure unity until it comes to the holy four; then it begets the mother of all, the all-comprising, all-bounding, the first-born, the never-swerving, the never-tiring holy ten, the keyholder of all. - A Pythagorean prayer Nero was opposed to philosophy, because he suspected its devotees to be addicted to magic, and of being diviners in disguise; and at last the philosopher's mantle brought its wearers before the law courts, as if it were a mere cloak of the divining art. - Flavius Philostratus: The Life of Apollonius I have anticipated you, Fortune, and entrenched myself against all your secret attacks. And we will not give ourselves up as captives to you or to any other circumstance; but when it is time for us to go, spitting contempt on life and on those who here vainly cling to it, we will leave life crying aloud in a glorious triumph-song that we have lived well. - Epicurus Vatican Sayings #47 I am struck by the contrast with Woodrow Wilson's reaction to the tumultuous applause that greeted his address to Congress in which he committed the US to participation in World War I. On returning to the White House, Wilson remarked in despair to a friend and advisor: "My message today was a message of death for our young men. How strange it seems to applaud that." Even as the death toll continues to mount at an ever-increasing rate, it is impossible to imagine George W. Bush, with his perpetually ill-suppressed smirk of complacency and self-congratulation, having the imagination or sensitivity to be haunted by such a reflection. - Jeff McMahan Department of Philosophy Rutgers University, September 2004 "Oh Lord, eat aids." - The Prayer of St. Dayv "But even if he who is honoured among the Hebrews really was the immediate creator of the universe, our beliefs about him are higher than theirs, and he has bestowed on us greater blessings than on them, with respect both to the soul and to externals." - Flavius Claudius Iulianus http://www.statue.com/itemdesc.asp?CartId=1-EVEREST-4676356XUFCZ24&i c=BER22%2D30&cc=&tpc= sold there should be one of yoda wow, they've got one of manelaus for. . . $1,206.00 damn thats a good deal for _manelaus_ who? . . . he was agamemnon's brother husband of helen of troy started the trojan war, etc ! i don't watch star wars it was the prequel hah good shit haha brad pitt was in it - #pkd 10/24/07 "There is no salvation outside the church" (Salus extra ecclesiam non est) - St. Augustine, De Bapt. IV, cxvii.24 Let every man in mankinds frailty Consider his last day; and let none Presume on his good fortune until he find Life, at his death, a memory without pain. - Sophocles, Oedipus the King, l. 1529 (429 BCE) "water continually dropping will wear hard rocks hollow" - Plutarch, Moralia VolI "Learning alone, of all things in our possession, is immortal and divine." - ibid. "it is the top of wisdom to philosophize, yet not appear to do it" - Plutarch, Table Talk, Ch1 "In voluntarily hastening his own end, Zeno only illustrated the teaching of his school. One day, on leaving the Stoa, he stumbled and fell, breaking one of his fingers in the fall. Regarding this as a warning of Providence, which it was folly to neglect, and convinced that the right course for a wise man is willingly to assist in carrying out the decrees of destiny, he returned home and at once committed suicide." - from "The Fragments of Zeno and Cleanthes" Pearson, A. C. (Alfred Chilton), 1861-1935 ". . . among human beings two things stand out preeminent, of highest rank. Goddess Demeter is one - she's the earth (though you can call her any name you wish), and she feeds mortal people cereal grains. The other one came later, born of Semele - he brought with him liquir from the grape, something to match the bread from Demeter. He introduced it among mortal men. When they can drink up what streams off the vine, unhappy mortals are released from pain. It grants them sleep, allows them to forget their daily troubles. Apart from wine, there is no cure for human hardship." - Euripides, "The Bacchae" Let me put it to you bluntly. In a changing world, we want more people to have control over your own life. - George W. Bush "life in Lubbock, Texas taught me two things: "one is that God loves you and you're going to burn in hell; the other is that sex is the most awful, filthy thing on Earth and you should save it for someone you love." haha nice that requires citation, missy attrbuted to Butch Hancock, the Flatlanders (gimme a sec, i got it off tv) - #pkd.org 07/03/08 Go before the maiden Get down on your knees Should you win her favor She may tell you what she sees The harvest is reaped Seeds are shown Multiplied by three She is the maiden, the mother, the crone - "The Sword", _Maiden,_Mother,_&_Crone_ "Increased deployment and use of information systems creates dependencies which in turn increase our vulnerability to attack. All that is required to attack DoD computers today is a home computer, access to the Internet, and a little ingenuity." - Information Assurance: the Achilles¿ Heel of Joint Vision 2010? CDR Sam Cox, USN MAJ Ron Stimeare, USA MAJ Tim Dean, USA Maj Brad Ashley, USAF "Respect and uphold society's moral order as you would have society respect and uphold your autonomy." - _The_New_Golden_Rule_, Amitai Etzioni "Men would never be superstitious, if they could govern all their circumstances by set rules, or if they were always favoured by fortune: but being frequently driven into straits where rules are useless, and being often kept fluctuating pitiably between hope and fear by the uncertainty of fortune's greedily coveted favours, they are consequently, for the most part, very prone to credulity." - _A_Theologico-Polictical_Treatise_, Baruch Spinoza, 1,(1) "The logic of my prewar shift on invading Iraq has now been doubly confirmed. I believe that the neoconservative movement, with which I was associated, has become indelibly associated with a failed policy, and that unilateralism and coercive regime change cannot be the basis for an effective American foreign policy. I changed my mind as part of a necessary adjustment to reality." - "Why shouldn't I change my mind?" Francis Fukuyama, April 2006 "I'm always for less regulation. . . I'm fundamentally a deregulator." - John McCain, March 3, 2008 "Too many firms on Wall Street have been able to count on casual oversight by regulatory agencies in Washington." - John McCain, Sept. 17, 2008 "I know why you are conservatives -- you favor private enterprise for the poor and socialism for the rich." - Gary Hart, 1984 Presidential Campaign "She doesn't have to quote Leo Strauss, but she has to put together full paragraphs, make an argument, and that will calm some of the fears." - David Brooks, speaking of the Republican Vice-Presidential nominee, Sarah Palin, 10/02/08 "Nor can we say that democracy has found a solution to the problem of education. In the first place, what is today called education, very frequently does not mean education proper, i.e., the formation of character, but rather instruction and training. Secondly, to the extent to which the formation of character is indeed intended, there exists a very dangerous tendency to identify the good man with the good sport, the cooperative fellow, the "regular guy," i.e., and overemphasis on a certain part of social virtue and a corresponding neglect of those virtues which mature, if they do not fourish, in privacy, not say in solitude: by educating people to cooperate with each other in a friendly spirit, one does not yet educate non-conformists, people who are prepared to stand alone, to fight alone, "rugged individualists." Democracy has not yet found a defense against the creeping conformism and the ever-increasing invasion of privacy which it fosters. - Leo Strauss, 1973 "What is Political Philosophy?" "After all you must have had some education?" Bond laughed. "Mostly in Latin and Greek. All about Caesar and Balbus and so on." - _You_Only_Live_Twice_, p86.