A recent paper on ArXiv reports a novel idea about the central regions of "our" galaxy.
Remember the hoopla a few years ago about radio-astronomical observations producing an "image" of our central black hole - or rather, an image of the accretion disc around the black hole - long designated by astronomers as "Sagittarius A*" (or SGR-A*)? If you remember the image published then,
one thing should be striking - it's not very symmetrical. If you think about viewing a spinning object, then you'd expect to see something with a "mirror" symmetry plane where we would see the rotation axis (if someone had marked it). If anything, that published image has three bright spots on a fainter ring. And the spots are not even approximately the same brightness.
This paper suggests that the image we see is the result of the light (radio waves) from SGR-A* being "lensed" by another black hole, near (but not quite on) the line of sight between SGR-A* and us.
By various modelling approaches, they then refine this idea to a "best-fit" of a black hole with mass around 1000 times the Sun, orbiting between the distance of the closest-observed star to SGR-A* ("S2" - most imaginative name, ever!), and around 10 times that distance. That's far enough to make a strong interaction with "S2" unlikely within the lifetime of S2 before it's accretion onto SGR-A*.)
The region around SGR-A* is crowded. Within 25 parsecs (~80 light years, the distance to Regulus [in the constellation Leo] or Merak [in the Great Bear]) there is around 4 times more mass in several millions of "normal" stars than in the SGR-A* black hole. Finding a large (not "super massive") black hole in such a concentration of matter shouldn't surprise anyone.
This proposed black hole is larger than anything which has been detected by gravitational waves (yet) ; but not immensely larger - only a factor of 15 or so. (The authors also anticipate the "what about these big black holes spiralling together?" question : quote "and the amplitude of gravitational waves generated by the binary black holes is negligible"
Being so close to SGR-A*, the proposed black hole is likely to be moving rapidly across our line of sight. At the distance of "S2" it's orbital period would be around 26 years (but the "new" black hole is probably further out than than that). Which might be an explanation for some of the variability and "flickering" reported for SGR-A* ever since it's discovery.
As always, more observations are needed. Which, for SGR-A* are frequently being taken, so improving (or ruling out) this explanation should happen fairly quickly. But it's a very interesting, and fun, idea.
Many years ago, I went walking in the highlands, all over. One place I circled around - literally - was the eclogite field on Beinn Sgritheall to the south of Glenelg, on the coast opposite Barrisdale in Knoydart. Wonderful area. And I've always been interested in eclogites, granulites, and ultra-deep metamorphics. Comes of getting started on the Lewisian foreland, I suppose.
(Oh, you've got to love the OS speelung-chokers. I'm sure they have a good reason for having "Barisdale" farm overlooking "Barrisdale Bay". Hang on! Sandaig - the place "Ring of Bright Water" was set - is in the paper's field area too. And I now have a GPX first-draft of a route for getting to the localities, "Eclogites-v1.gpx" ; that'll need some more work.)
Anyway, I spotted this article going by on EarthArxiv (which I don't pay enough attention to, I know). Even if it doesn't contain much in the way of field guides to this eclogite field, it still interests me. I'm sadly out of practice at this stuff - too long looking at (per Mike Lappin) "crustal ephemera which haven't been down to 100km for 100 Myr, and are clearly nowhere near equilibrium, so can be safely ignored. Otherwise known as the oil industry.
So, what is going on here? They seem to have evidence (structural, geochemical) that these eclogites were obducted onto the Lewisian (Laurentian, even) foreland in the Grenvillian orogeny, about 1200 Myr ago - before the Caledonian orogeny that formed most of Scotland ; before the preceding deposition of the Moinian and Torridonian (very approximate correlates) and their orogeny under the Caledonian ; back into the late assembly of the Laurentian foreland itself, these eclogites were obducted onto the foreland as an ophiolite.
Ah, approaching Real Geology : Pressure-temperature estimations obtained from various lithologies, including the eclogites, indicate peak metamorphic conditions of c. 20 kbar and 730-750°C, consistent with burial to depths of c. 70 km.. but do they give locations? "The eclogites are typically composed of garnet + omphacite + rutile + quartz (Sanders, 1989)" sounds like some fun rocks for the collection. "Omphacite grains occur with symplectites of diopside and plagioclase and are replaced around their rims by hornblende. Rutile has been replaced round the rims by ilmenite" sounds like some good hand-specimen textures are possible.
Oh goody - most of their locations are coastal. That turns an area search into a linear search. Where's my maps - sheet 32 or 33, IIRC.
T-Ż objects are (arguably) theoretical objects where a compact body - a white dwarf or a black hole - becomes entrained in an otherwise normal star, with lots of interesting consequences for both the behaviour of the object and it's evolution. The really interesting thing is, such a peculiar internal state may not be that obvious from the outside.
I wrote a post about these a while ago (2023-05), when some authors discussed whether or not the Sun could actually be hosting such a stellar viper in it's thermonuclear bosom. Their conclusions were that it would be hard to tell, even if the Sun had acquired it's internal parasite early in it's evolution. The energy produced by the accretion of matter onto an asteroid-mass primordial BH would to large degree replace the energy yield from thermonuclear fusion.
Obviously, other people find these objects interesting, in a train-wreck sort of way. This paper is an early version of a chapter on the bodies for an astrophysics textbook/ review forthcoming from Elsevier.
Sections cover :
Formation,
Internal Structure and Evolution,
and their final fates,
Bearing in mind that none of these bodies have been observed (though proposals have been made - and disputed), the constraints of reality upon theory are relatively slight. More ink will be spilt!
Formation
Thorne and Żytkow originally considered the collapse of a large star's core without the normal disruption of it's envelope in nova/ supernova. However doing this without getting a large amount of "thermonuclear ash" ("metals" to an astrophysicist - any nuclei heavier than helium) on the surface of the resulting body seems challenging. And we have a wealth of spectroscopic data from many such events which do reveal various (super-)nova remnants - but no Thorne-Żytkow Objects.
Thorne and Żytkow also considered merger scenarios where a closely orbiting pair of stars, the heavier of which (most-rapidly evolving) becomes a neutron star (or black hole), and which could then inspiral into it's companion (with various requirements for ejecting material from the pair to conserve energy and angular momentum. That's a complex process, inherently variable ; hard to predict. Examples have been proposed. And disputed.
Direct collision is thought (by some) to be the most plausible formation path, particularly in the dense cores of globular clusters or molecular clouds (which the most massive stars don't have time to migrate away from before evolving into compact-body-hood. Again, the details can be complex - closing energy and angular momentum have to be accounted for.
Internal Structure and Evolution,
The main model is that the compact body has a zone near it's surface where the infall energy of the rest of the system releases large amounts of energy, producing a zone where outwards radiation is dominant, and supports the rest of the star's mass against inflow (exactly as Eddington discussed in the 1920s for formation of regular stars, leading to ideas of the Eddington limit. Beyond this "radiative zone" the star is convective as for normal stars. Potentially, with black-hole cored Thorne and Żytkow objects, the accretionary radiative zone can be surrounded by a conventional nuclear-fusing core, then it's radiative-limited zone, then the convective zone. Distinguishing these from conventional giant to super-giant stars could be very "challenging". If, however, this core material gets mixed into the upper parts of the star, that potentially is observable.
Understanding the nuclear reactions in such systems remains both controversial and challenging. Signals from both stable and unstable nuclear species have been considered.
Understanding the evolution of the objects is obviously complex. Some solutions suggest a Thorne-Żytkow object might have a shorter lifetime than the same mass regular star ; some calculations suggest the Thorne- Żytkow object could have a longer lifetime than the regular star.
And their final fates,
Like many large stars, there are multiple routes to mass loss for Thorne- Żytkow object through their evolution. The envelope mass might decrease enough that the accretionary structures can radiate through to the surface, which would rapidly radiate down to being a regular (-ish) neutron star. Or the NS could collapse to a black hole, triggering an (abnormal, ?) supernova. Many of the models produce periods of pulsation in the Thorne- Żytkow object (another potential observable?).
Fun objects, Thorne- Żytkow objects. The universe should contain such strange objects. Whether it does or not remains to be seen.
W-R stars are getting a deal of attention with the focus on recurrent novae and (potential) supernovæ. That's not particularly because being a WR star is associated with the SN process(-es), but because they're by definition evolved massive stars with a strong stellar wind, which means they've already run a lot of their short life. On the other hand, a powerful WR stage can lead to so much mass loss (into a large planetary nebula) that the star falls out of the window in which a SN can occur. The high mass (Mini >e; ~20 M☉ (before late-stage mass loss) and high luminosity makes for very short lifetimes (for a 20 M☉ star, 3.7~5.5 million years ; for a 40 M☉ star, 2.6 to less than 1.0 million years), which in turn means the stars die (as planetary nebulae, or supernovae) still in their natal molecular clouds. Often they are part of the dismantling process of the collapsing of the cloud. But why am I trying to summarise a review paper? The death of WR stars - there is some evidence of SN being sourced from WR stars, but other arguments that they are too compact to form SN and instead collapse directly. This latter scenario is argued for from the geometry of SNR-BH couples such as Cygnus X-1.
No, I'm not going to get into the "Is Pluto (♇) a planet?" question. If I'd had my 'druthers, I'd have gone for an intrinsic property of planets vs dwarf planets vs other "small bodies", probably based on the "potato radius", self-rounding or something geological. but I can live with the IAU's extrinsic orbit-clearing definition. Hal Levison's "hand-waving" argument about formation mechanisms holds water too. Argument, as far as I'm concerned, over. Yes, I grew up with 9 planets in my Solar system too. I also watched the discovery of Charon, the increasing puzzlement over Pluto's minuscule size, the initial mapping by mutual occultations, and the discovery of the outer Solar System (3rd or 4th most massive element, to date, is Pluto ♇ ) ; maybe the geometrically largest. Science is a process of improving approximations to the truth, and if the solar system has a 9th planet, we've not seen it yet. That said, @PlutoKiller@Twitter.com (the social media handle of the discoverer of Eris, the most massive (known ; to-date) outer Solar system body) has been quiet lately - maybe he's found something? Rant over. Debate not engaged with.
This is a proto-chapter for another Elsevier book. Probably not the same astrophysics book as the previous entry, but there's no law against them having multiple in production at one time.
This "key point" is one of the less "stamp collecting" parts of the field : "The sizes and shapes of Kuiper Belt objects tell us about the details of planet formation, while Kuiper Belt orbital distribution puts constraints exactly how and when the giant planets migrated."
That there are now over 3000 known TNOs brings statistics to the subject of the outer Solar system, in the same way that the Kuiper telescope brought statistics to the subject of planetary systems in general. The classical a [semi-major axis ; ∝ orbital energy] vs. eccentricity (e) plot, reveals the sculpting of the Kuiper belt by interaction with Neptune (incidentally, clarifying why Neptune is a planet and Pluto isn't), while the avs. inclination (i) plot shows that something has been sculpting the Kuiper Belt (Outer Solar system) by dragging everything through the nit-comb of small-number-integer resonances with Neptune.
Detecting, recognising, and calculating the orbits of TNOs is a noisy, bias-prone topic. What the biases are (per instrument/ methodology), how severe they are, and how to de-bias observations towards estimating the underlying population parameters, are important topics. Once orbits have been calculated, they can be classified. But classifications can change over time, as interactions with Neptune (and to a lesser degree, Uranus, Jupiter, Saturn, potentially Planet9 [Brown, Batygin 2016] ...) lead to the orbit evolving over periods of more than a few million years ; few thousand orbits. Classification is a moving goal in many cases, and needs to be tested in all cases. Not all trans-Neptunian Objects are Kuiper Belt Objects ; there are various other classes, some of which enter the inner Solar system (e.g. Centaurs).
The composition of TNOs/ KBOs are generally only available by spectroscopy (if you can get the time on a light-bucket) or colour in different filters (if you can't get the light-bucket time). This gives a hint of evolution, from the polymerisation of surface organic matter to dark-red "tholin" mixtures. The properties of TNOs eventually tend towards those of the dust of the outer Solar system, which can be compared to the dust- and debris- disks surrounding other stars. A 2024 result from the dust-detector on the New Horizons spacecraft [Doner et al (2024), Feb.] suggests that there is more dust than models of the 2010s would suggest, pointing to the Kuiper Belt being more populous and extending further from the Sun than thought in the 2010s.
Review article on ... well, as the title says. Io excepted, these are N2 - CH4 dominated atmospheres, with the outer bodies (Pluto, Triton) developing seasonal methane frosts. Io is different - it's atmosphere is dominated by SO2 with minor SO, but these components can freeze out rapidly when Io goes into eclipse behind Jupiter. Complicated systems, worth review.
The prospect of (sub)solar mass primordial black holes comes up on an almost monthly basis when people are discussing the problem of Dark Matter. Last year someone, for reasons not at all clear, speculated that the putative "Planet9" [of Brown & Batygin, 2016, as modified] might be such a "primordial" black hole. It's a pretty dead idea - if they were present in significant amounts (mass-wise), then we'd have seen them in gravitational lensing experiments (observation projects) like MACHO and OGLE. They're not(MACHO, <25% of necessary dark mass) there. To mis-quote Feynmann, a beautiful hypothesis slain by an ugly fact.
Anyway, this paper suggests that moderste mass, sub-stellar black holes (so, presumably "primordial"), particulalrly those in highly eccentric orbits, might be marginally detectable by the in-work LISA mission, and more detectable by planned missions such as DECIGO.
Back to top. And that, I think is enough for this one. Plough through more backlog now.
Bloody hell, pushing 3 months since I touched this. Got to get back into this. 6 weeks visiting Dad didn't help, but I've got to get back into the habit.
So, what other things are in today's (well, yesterday's) list from Arχiv ?
Another MOND publication. An interesting topic, but primarily because the Internet Kook Department loves a conspiracy theory, and the (bullshit) "suppression of heterodox opinion" by the Illuminati, the Physics Orthodoxy, and Uncle Tom Cobbley is high on the list of popular idiocies. I've been tracking this for a while, mostly to piss-off the conspiracy wingnuts (TL;DR version - the field remains a moderate, but minor part of science publication). But in a random pick from Arχiv, there it is. [Distant sound of deflating Internet wind-bag. Or maybe not.]
Ultrashort Recurrence Time Nova M31N 2017-01e "Recurrent novae" are rare beasts. So it shouldn't be a great surprise to see that at least one has been spotted in the Andromeda Galaxy ("Messier 31", "M31" in the object's designation) because we can see most of the disc of that galaxy and half of the core, compared to under 1/3 of our galaxy. Which should remind me to check the status of the famous "T" variable in Corona Borealis ("T Cr B"), which has been observed to erupt twice, and which was predicted - with good clear reasoning - to erupt in May 2024 ± 6 months. Which prediction period we're getting to the end of. And it hasn't "gone" yet. Regarding the pattern-matching which constituted that "good, clear reasoning", it looks as if there is another cycle of the binary star's orbit to go before it goes "bang". That's the difficulty of making predictions, particularly regarding the future. It'll almost certainly go bang ; but when? That's the problem of dealing with small data sets - in this case a single recurrence after the original nova. What is this paper about? Prior to this report, the star had 4 known eruptions (discovery in 2017-01 ; a pre-covery in 2012-01, and subsequent observations in 2019-09 and 2022-03 ; see previous comment about datasets of 1) ; with an additional two eruptions the estimated timing has improved to 924 ± 7 days. Which is oddly consistent for a process that should have a significant random component to it. A 900-day recurrence time implies a very high accretion rate of material onto the (inferred) white dwarf. So, a potentially important system.
Narrowing down the Hubble tension to the first two rungs of distance ladders. OK, I'm not going to introduce the "Hubble Tension" here. But I bet @Dr_Becky covers this on her YouTube channel of "Night Sky News this week. Which reminds me of something else to do tonight. Long story short - because they had a large (and increasing) data set, they could divide the data into smaller groups where the derivation of distance had been done by different methods. And they found that the values of H0 derived with different distance estimate techniques show a discontinuity where there is a change from stage 2 (Cepheids-bearing host galaxies for SNe, z <e; 0.03) to stage 3 (using SNe as standard candles, 0.02 <e; z <e; 2.3) of the "cosmic distance ladder". Which suggests a systematic problem in one or other of stage 2 or 3. Which is pretty much what most people had been hoping to find, to resolve the "Hubble tension". The problem isn't solved - yet - but this is a pretty big step forward. What does Dr_Becky have to say? Well, she's back from holiday. Ah, bollocks - I forgot that youTube had started a new round of whack-a-mole against video downloaders. But since it's a Thursday paper, when she produces her videos, it hasn't made it into this week's NSN.
"Limits on planetary-mass primordial black holes from the OGLE high-cadence survey of the Magellanic Clouds" Pretty much does what it says on the tin. Almost any discussion of astrophysics or astronomy, even accompanying a well-based repoting set-up such as @Dr_Becky's (above) will almost inevitably have someone chiming in in the comments section, "What if Planet 9 were a black hole?" or "What if a runaway black hole were to come into the Solar system tomorrow?" While they're perfectly fair questions, the askers generally don't seem to know that we've been taking a census of such non-incandescent material in the Milky Way (and the part of it's halo towards the Magellanic Clouds), and (this is what upsets them) there's not a lot of it about. Not enough to solve Vera Rubin's early-1970s discovery of "flat" galactic rotation curves. Not enough to have a credible chance of ex-President Trump being head-shot by a primordial black hole. Such non-glowing conventional matter is present - but not in sufficient quantities to make long standing cosmological problems go away. Worse - we've known this since the first reports from such occultation programmes in the mid-1980s (I personally remember reading the reports in between lectures, over a cup of tea in the Student's Union.) They're a nice idea to solve various problems - but there are not enough of them about, and several whole (academic) generations of astronomers have known they're an insufficient solution to observational problems. Sorry, guys!
In-situ crystallographic mapping constrains sulfate deposition and timing in Jezero crater, Mars. That's a very geological one. Ca-sulphate minerals (they're careful to not say "gypsum" nor "anhydrite", so they plainly mean something else) have been reported from Mars for a while. Studying the crystallinity of these materials reveals some veins/ deposits were deposited more than 80m below then-current surface (so ... 80+m of erosion since then, to breing them to the present surface), while other veins were deposited much closer to the surface. Both types of rock sample are already cached for sample-return. Fun stuff, but it doesn't make Mars any the more habitable.
Anything from the oldest collection that I haven't thrown away yet? All the way back to June 30th.
An ancient Indian Solar eclipse recorded in myth. The Rig Veda (hindu holy book ; one of several) records an eclipse "vanquished" by Invisible Sky Fairies (&TM;). Based on "the eclipse [...] having occurred when the Vernal Equinox was in Orion, and three days prior to the Autumnal Equinox [... the authors] identify ‘Atri’s eclipse’ as the one that occurred on 22 October 4202 BC or on 19 October 3811 BC." There are considerable uncertainties when looking back this far (6000-odd years), not least of which is that the tidal friction of the Moon (well, the sub-lunar ocean bulge) starts adding up to thousands of seconds, or hours of Earth rotation, which is a substantial fraction of the sub-solar point's travel through the regions of Central Asia where the ancestors of the Hindu aristocracy were inhabiting in the time interval. The several centuries of time uncertainty also allow for up to 30°ree; of longitude variation between eclipses that would have been visible near the Iranian-Kazakh border (today), or sites as far east as the modern Afghan- Pakistan-China border.
What's this, Lassie? From the Aug 5 collection, "On Interstellar Quantum Communication and the Fermi Paradox"- sounds fun! Well, it does sound fun. Someone (the author) obviously thought "what sort of apparatus would be needed to transmit (and to receive) quantised data structures called "QuBits". Which, yes, fair enough question. Maybe the old stand-by of throwing "quantum" at a problem, like the Fermi Paradox ("where is everyone?") could result in a solution, sweetness, light and the odd Nobel gong for the lucky thinker. Tough luck : between Earth and Proxima Centauri, you'd need telescopes around 100km in diameter. Not going to happen soon ; may never happen. But worth feeding the guy while he scratches symbols on the blackboard.
2023-04 - Ah-ha! (I'd probably worked this out previously, but I haven't been here for a year or so.) The badly-formed bits of table get dumped first as un-formatted text, then the table. I need to force the table wider, and accept sideways scrolling. Does table {width: 200% ; } work? Yes, considerable improvement.]Update the data rows structure too.Done. Publication/ updating date fixed too. There's some unresolved xGML entities in there, but that's minor.
Years ago, when I first started carrying a mobile computer (a Psion 5, still unmatched for convenience, working for several months on a pair of AA cells), I started to keep a database of "bons mots" which I called "Who Said What", because I was fed up of thinking "I recognise that saying, phrase, aphorism or whatever it is, but where did I hear it previously?"
Sadly,that machine has gone the way of the dodo (the screens were always the weak point), and I never did get the emulator to work well enough to get the database out of my backups. So, try again.
I found an old backup, far from up to date (only 280 rows), but the fields I have are : (a nickname) ; author surname ; given name ; publication reference ; date ; the quote itself ; my notes, and whether it is complete.
Changed theme is allowing more room for the data.
Could I do this as a separate blog, with one entry per entry and a template? I can't get internal linking to work in tr, th or td elements, not even by putting them inside a DIV element.
A little more work done. And my bottle is empty. Maybe a separate blog. But really, this screams to be a database (and one of my remaining reasons to re-implement an Psion emulator to recover from the backups. Which I did test.) so, would that be a GoogleDocs document now? A little more progress. Each time I feel a need to add something, I do a few more rows. It'll get there, or I'll run out first. Meh.
2024, and I'm adding a little bit, including how to link to my other "Penrose" pages. I also want to update the table style, to "fix" the header in the viewing window.
The next problem is how to make the table sortable, in runtime. But that probably means making it a database.
So ... THEAD and TFOOT should be fixed in position while TBODY is a block with scroll bars. Which they are, now.
This is a specific fix for this page, not something I'll use generally. Well, maybe the THEAD and TFOOT stuff.
Well, it's loading. A big table, and it's taking it's time to render. Sizes look like they need adjustment. Yes, lots of adjustment. Start off with the widths. At least the headers and TBODY columns are aligning. Add a TFOOT too.
Yes, that is working for the footer. Horrible styling, for now. Overall width? Scrolling? Eventually looks like I'll have to wrap it in the DIV option.
The columns are picking up a fixed width from somewhere. And while the table is reaching version 1 (1000px) , it's not got a horizontal scroll, and it's over-spreading the blog column.
Why don't the THEAD and TBODY elements get the same border styles? Is that amenable to the "item inspector" in the debugger?
Who said What Records
A.K.As :
Auth. Surname :
Auth. 1st Name :
Publ/ co-Author :
Date :
Quote :
Notes :
Complete? :
A.K.As :
Auth. Surname :
Auth. 1st Name :
Publ/ co-Author :
Date :
Quote :
Notes :
Complete? :
Doubt
Abelard
Pierre (the Breton)
Sic et Non (Yes & No)
1135~ CE
Use systemic doubt and question everything.Learn the difference between statements of rational proof and those merely of persuasion. Be precise in the use of words, and expect precision from others. Watch for error, even in Holy Scripture.
Did not endear himself to the Church authorities. Founded the study of Law as we now know it.
Compl
Getting your bag
Adams
Douglas
Mostly Harmless
1992
... she [Trisha] reflected that if there was one thing life had taught her it was that there are times when you do not go back for your bag, and there are other times when you do. It had yet to teach her to distinguish between the two types of occasion.
Compl
Dent-Arthur-Dent's Prayer
Adams
Douglas
Mostly Harmless
1992
-Protect me from knowing what I don't need to know. -Protect me from knowing that there are things that I don't know. -Protect me from knowing that I decided not to know about the things I decided not to know about. Amen CODA: Protect me from the consequences of the above prayer.
Compl
Time
Adams
Douglas
The Hitchiker's Guide To The Galaxy (www.H2G2.com)
1977
Time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so. IIRC, Ford Prefect to Dent Arthur Dent, to persuade him out of the mud in front of the house-demolishing bulldozer and into the pub, so as to get salt and alcohol to cushion the system against the shock of transporting to the planet-demolishing bulldozers.
InCompl
assumptions
Adams
Douglas
?
?
Assumptions are things you don't know you're making.
-
In/Compl
headache
Adams
Douglas Noel
Hitchhikers guide
1978
It gives me a headache to think down to that level.
(in voce Marvin, the Paranoid Android) in the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, but not in the first few episodes I think ; Adams had slight differences between the radio scripts and the books.
In/Compl
frogs
Adams
Scott
Dilbert
1999
Have you noticed that when you kiss the frogs, their tongues taste of flies?
In/Compl
Feeping Creaturitis
Adams
Scott
Dilbert
ca 1990
If it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet.
Isn't the name from the Jargon File?
Compl
authority
Abelard
of Bath
reference
early 12th C
[From the Arabs] I have learned one thing: if you are lead by authority, you are lead by a halter.
Adelard travelled widely through the Cailiphate in the 12th C acquiring a large amount of knowledge from them, culminating with a period in the newly-Christainised Toledo.
In/Compl
Orders to Fitzroy
Admiralty
Given name
British Penguin Classics, Voyage of The Beagle, 1989
1831
[On subject of imperfect charts] Of this kind of half-knowledge we have had too much: the present state of science, which affords such ample means, seems to demand that whatever is now done should be finally done...
Do it right, once.
Compl
Ager
Derek V.
The Nature of The Stratigraphic Record
1981
Palaeontologists cannot live by uniformatarianism alone.
-
Compl
Wimps use WIMPS
Albe
Frank
CIS/ Unixforum/ #336970
20 Jul 2000, 19:33
Isn't a toolbar where mechanics go when the clock strikes "{BEER} Time"?
Compl
Magnificent desolation!
Aldrin
Buzz
On pausing before climbing down to the Moon's surface
20 July 1969
Magnificent desolation!
Compl
Immortality
Allen
Woody
biography?
1975
I don't want to achieve immortality through my work . . . I want to achieve it through not dying.
Compl
complication
Anderson
Poul
?
-
I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, which, when you look at it in the right way, did not become still more complicated.
-
In/Compl
Haiku
Anon
-
[From R4 poetry program]
1999
A Haiku is a poem in 3 phrases (lines). First line is 5 syllables; second 7; third 5. One line must mention a season.
(OED leaves out last and subs "traditionally evoking images of the natural world")
Compl
Theory
Anon
found
1999/09/18
The difference between theory and practice is that in theory there is no difference between theory and practice.
Compl
Planning
Anon
If you plan for a year, plant rice If you plan for ten years, plant trees. If you plan for a hundred years, teach the people.
quoted in reference to Subrahaman Chandrashekhar
Compl
Guards
Anon
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
Who guards the Guards themselves?
In/Compl
pigsty
Anon
Happy as a muc in sloc("shloch"), happy as a pig in shit.
Irish
In/Compl
Murphy's Law
Anon,
var
Murphy's Law;
The Law of Constant Cussedness; Sod's Law; Finagale's Law; The Perversity of the Universe Tends to a Maximum;
Tëcke des Objekts (German- the spite of things)
In/Compl
Inheritance
Anon.
-
-
--
We have not inherited the earth from our father(s), we are borrowing it from our children.
Attributed to an Amish farmer
In/Compl
Mistake
Anon.
-
-
-
Remember, a common mistake is still a mistake.
quote from a glyphs/ languages website by Jonathon Halabi
In/Compl
Research
Anon.-
-
-
-
If we knew what we were doing, it wouldn't be research.
Allegedly, a bumper sticker.
In/Compl
Freiheit- Freedom
Anon.
-
1933-1945
Dachau -
On the roof of the admin block at Dachau KZk 1933- 1945 Es gibt einen Weg zur Freiheit. Seine Meilensteine heiße: Gehorsam - Fleiß- Ehrlichkeit- Ordnung- Sauberkeit- Nächternheit- Wahrheit-Opfersinn und Leibe zum Vaterland. -
There is one road to freedom.It's milestones are: obedience - diligence - honesty - order - Cleanliness - temperance - truthfulness - sacrifice and love of one's country. -
Compl
Alsace Meteorite
Anon.
-
-
1492
Ensisheim, Alsace, France. Inscription associated with meteorite seen to fall in 1492. Many know much about this stone, everyone knows something, but no-one knows quite enough.
-
In/Compl
BASIC
Anon
-
-
-
BASIC is the Computer Science equivalent of 'Scientific Creationism'
In/Compl
Incapable god
Aquinas
Thomas
Summa Theologica
1255
God cannot make the sum of the internal angles of a [plane] triangle add up to more than two right angles.
ohh, have to throw this one in Yirrell's face one day.
In/Compl
Three Laws of Robotics
Asimov
Issac
-
1943
First Law: A robot must not harm a human being or through inaction allow a human being to come to harm;Second Law: A robot must obey orders given to it by a human being except where those orders conflict with the First Law; Third Law: A robot must protect it's own existance except where such protection would conflict with the First or Second Laws.
First explicitly quoted in 'Runaround',1943. This can be generalised to three laws of Tools -- First Law : A tool must be safe to use; Second Law : A tool must perform it's function, providing it does so safely; Third Law : A tool must remain intact in use unless it's destruction is required for safety or it's destruction is part of it's use.
In/Compl
Frankenstein Complex
Asimov
Issac
The Robot Chronicles
1990
I was an ardent science fiction reader in the 1930s and I became tired of the ever-repeated robot plot. I didn't see robots that way. I saw them as machines -- advanced machines -- but machines. They might be dangerous, but surely safety factors would be built in. The safety factors might be faulty, or inadequate, or might fail under unexpected types of stresses, but such failures could always yield experience that could be used to improve the models.
Doesn't need my input.
Compl
Tolerance
Atkinson
Rowan
Blackadder II
1983
Cold is God's way of telling us to burn more Catholics
Wasn't Ben Elton scriptwriter?
Compl
Maths is a religion
Barrow
John
Writer of pop.sci books, astronomy based, big bang + age of universe.
recent
If a 'religion' is defined to be a system of ideas that contains unprovable statements, then Godel taught us that mathematics is not only a religion, it is the only one that can prove itself to be one.
I'm not entirely sure that Godel's Incompletelness theorem dpes say that, but I'll leave that ot a mathematical heretical war to setle.
In/Compl
doggrel
Belloc
Hilaire
poetry book somewhere
1900-ish
Decisive action in the time of need, denotes the hero, but rarely suceeds.
just nice cynicism
In/Compl
Science
Belloc
Hillaire
The Microbe
1897
But scientists, who ought to know, Assure us that this must be so. Oh! Let us never, never doubt. What nobody is sure about!
doggrel
Compl
Media
Biafra
Jello
The Dead Kennedys group lyrics
ca. 1980
Don't hate the media, become the media!
-
Compl
Tolerence
Bible
KJV
Leviticus, c20v13
150AD
If an man lieth with mankind, as he lieth with a woman, both of them have committed an abomination: they shall surely be put to death; their blood shall be upon them.
major hand-washing
In/Compl
Sounding Brass
Bible
KJV
1 Corinthians 13
ca 400 CE
If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am only a resounding gong or clanging cymbal
[a "sounding brass" in other versions]
In/Compl
Sodom
Bible
-
Jude, 1:11
150 BCE?
Woe unto them! for they have gone in the way of Cain, and ran greedily after the error of Balaam for reward, and perished in the gainsaying of Core.
[Korah, not my boss at the time, in other editions]
In/Compl
visiting iniquity
Bible
-
Deuteronomy 5:9
400 BCE?
Exodus 20:5 for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them. 23:1 He that is wounded in the stone, or hath his privy member cut off, shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD. 23:2 A bastard shall not enter into the congregation of the LORD; even unto his tenth generation shall he not enter into the congregation of the LORD.
23:3 [same for Ammonites & Moabites]
In/Compl
Friends
Bierce
Ambrose
Devil's Dictionary
1925?
Think twice before you speak to a friend in need.
-
In/Compl
The Excuse File
Travaglia
Simon
BOfH: The Excuse File
1999
Hiroshima '45, Chernobyl '86, Windows '98, Covid 19 ... .
... Windows Millennium, Windows XP, Windows Vista
In/Compl
potted biography
Brahe
Tycho
apocryphal, but worth repeating
ca 1550
Did lots of things: had his nose cut off in a duel; replaced it with a silver prothesis; top notch pre-telescopic astronomer; observed a supernova in 1557/8(?), the penultimate naked eye one for 430 years; died from a burst bladder following a beer session.
Aidan SEZ: Top man. Neil SEZ: This guy is buried in the Tyn Church, on Staro Mestro in Prague. After my visit there, I still enjoy Czech beer, but ensure that I always go to the toilet whenever nature calls - Neil Fletcher
In/Compl
Censorship
Censors
British Board of Film
J.C. Robertson, Hidden Cinema, 1989
1929
So cryptic as to be almost meaningless. If there is a meaning, it is doubtless objectionable. So saying, they banned Jean Cocteau's film "The Seashell and the Clergyman".
-
Compl
Boring
Institute
British Standards
BS 3704
var
How to make a good condom.
-
In/Compl
Knowledge Range
Brucke
Ernst
reference
1878
Today it is difficult for the artist to be taught the theoretical science he needs, and even more difficult for him to learn it. Leonardo da Vinci was thoroughly familiar with all the knowledge of his day; he knew geometry, mechanics, physics, physiology, anatomy, all that was known of them in his time. That is impossible now because of all the developments which the sciences have undergone.
In 1878!
In/Compl
Invention in social emergency
Buckminster-Fuller
-
-
1950?
Only under the stresses of total social emergencies do the effectively adequate alternative technical strategies synergetically emerge.
word salad, with maybe a little meat buried
In/Compl
Lawyers
Burns
Robert/ Rabbi
?
1790?
How easy can the barley-bree, Cement the quarrel, It's aye the cheapest Lawyer's fee, To taste the barrel!
-
In/Compl
chickens, eggs
Butler
Samuel
-
-
A chicken is merely an eggs way of making another egg.
-
In/Compl
Optimism
Cabell
James Branch
"The Silver Stallion"
1926
The optimist proclaims that we live in the best of all possible worlds; and the pessimist fears this is true.
(is this a Lone Ranger story?) This has a very Dr Pangloss air to it.
In/Compl
garbage
Campbell
John W.
attributed to
-
90% of scence fiction, indeed 90% of anything, is garbage.
legendary SF editor
In/Compl
Science truism.
Carlson
Shawn
Sci Am v282 n1 p76
Jan 2000
Yesterday's discovery is today's calibration and tomorrow's noise.
-
In/Compl
define god
Bradlaugh
Charles
Plea for Atheism (pamphlet name)
1890
Late Victorian essayist, Northampton's MP for a time, Charles Bradlaugh The Bible God I deny ; the Christian God I disbelieve in. But I am not rash enough to say there is no God as long as you are unprepared to define god to me.
A nice rhetorical trick to undermine the majority of deists who, when challenged, will slip their definitions under fire. Play this card early, then when they bow under fire you can pull the rug from them as soon as they try to slip away. (Of course, once they define their God, you can still decry believing in it.)
Compl
snapping Churchill
Churchill
Winston
recounted by #10 secretary
1941
You must never be frightened of me when I snap. I'm thinking of the work, not of you.
gilding the frog
In/Compl
Possibilities
Clarke
Arthur C.
New Yorker
1969
If an elderly but distinguished scientist says that something is possible he is almost certainly right, but if he says it is impossible he is very probably wrong.
Associated with "2001: A Space Odyssey" publicity?
Compl
magic
Clarke
Arthur C.
passim
passim
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
See also, "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo."-- Anon.
In/Compl
Caverns Measureless to Man
Coleridge
Samual Taylor
Lyrical Ballards
1798
In Zanadu did Kubla Khan, A stately pleasure dome decree, Through caverns measureless to man, The sacred River Aleph ran to the sea, ... And here were forests ancient as the hills, Enfolding sunny spots of greenery,
the caver's dream
In/Compl
A sadder and a wiser man
Coleridge
Samuel Taylor
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
1798
He went like one that hath been stunned, And is of sense forlorn: A sadder and a wiser man, He rose the morrow morn.
(last verse?)
In/Compl
homos
Crisp
Quentin
The Naked Civil Servant
1968
You can't harm me. I am one of England's stately homos.
(q.v. "How to have a Life Style"1974 and "How to Become a Virgin" 1981)
In/Compl
housekeeping
Crisp
Quentin
The Naked Civil Servant
1968
The dust doesn't get any worse after three years.
born Denis Charles Pratt, poor sod. 25/12/1908 - 21/11/1999 [when describing his notoriously dirty flat at 129 Beaufort St Chelsea] [some obits give 4 years- he probably said it frequently]
In/Compl
social climbing down
Crisp
Quentin
-
mid 1980's
Never try to keep up with the Joneses. Drag them down to your level. It's cheaper.
no source, spoken?
In/Compl
crass
Croesus
-
var
-
If you invade, a great empire will be destroyed
Croesus was an interesting person. Apart from being so blatently money-grubbing, and using his wealth to buy political influence (a modification of his name gives many languages the word/ meaning "crass"), he also made at least one serious mistake: he bankrolled Julius Caesar for some time, but demanded the leadership of the Eastern Army in return. He then led them on a campaign against the Persians. They won, he died. q.v. Sic Transit Gloria Mundae.
In/Compl
prick
Lawrence
D. H., Anon
Lady Chatterley's Lover
1930
Most people know of John Thomas from Lawrence. But edition #1 of "The Pearl" uses the samephrase from 1878.
my notes
In/Compl
philosophical illusion of self
Dagg
Frederick
reference
date
Anyone who really thinks that they are not really here can buy their own beer.
in discussions of the illusiory nature of consciousness
In/Compl
Obscure
Alleghri
Dante
Inferno
1580-odd
Obscure, profound it was, and nebulous. So that by fixing on it's depths my sight--Nothing whatever I discerned therein.
A seminal description of the Windoze API, written some centuries before the dvelopment of the system.
In/Compl
cruel nature
Darwin
Charles
in letter to Joseph Hooker
1856
What a book a devil's chaplain might write upon the clumsy, wasteful, blundering, low, and horribly cruel works of nature!
-
Compl
Eyes (full)
Darwin
Charles
On The Origin of Species, Ch 6, section 3
1859
Organs of extreme Perfection and Complication To suppose that the eye with all it's inimitable contrivances for adjusting the focus to differing distances, for admitting different amounts of light, and for the correction of spherical and chromatic abberations, could have been formed by natural selection, seems, I freely confess, absurd in the highest degree. When it was first said that the sun stood still and the world turned round, the common sense of mankind declared the doctrine false; but the old saying of Vox populi, vox Dei, as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science. Reason tells me, that if numerous gradations from a simple and imperfect eye to one complex and perfect can be shown to exist, each grade being useful to it's posessor, as is certainly the case ; if further, the eye ever varies, and the variation be inherited, as is likewise certainly the case and if such variations should be useful to any animal under changing conditions of life, then the difficulty of believing that a perfect and complex eye could be formed by natural selection, though insuperable by our imagination, should not be considered as subversive of the theory.
[last phrase "cannot be considered real" in Dawkins quotation-- a later edition?]
Compl
Beneficent design
Darwin
Charles
letter to J Hooker
1870
I can see no evidence of beneficent design, or indeed design of any kind, in the details.
-
Compl
free thinking
Darwin
Charles
notebook or letter?
1880
It seems to me (rightly or wrongly) that direct arguments against Christianity and Theism hardly have any effect on the public; and that freedom of thought will best be promoted by that gradual enlightening of human understanding which follows the progress of science. I have therefore always avoided writing about religion and have confined myself to science.
Compl
Eyes
Darwin
Charles
In a letter long after OTOOS was published
~1870
The Eye, to this day, gives me a cold shudder, but when I hink of the fine known graduations, my reason tells me I ought to conquer the cold shudder.
-
Compl
Materialism
Darwin
Charles
notebooks
circa 1839~40
Why is thought being a secretion of Brain more wonderful than gravity a property of matter? It is our arrogance, our admiration of ourselves.
-
Compl
Capital Science
Darwin
Charles
-
-
Geology is a capital science to begin with as it requires nothing but a little reading, thinking and hammering.
In/Compl
meaning of meme
Dawkins
Richard
[passim], October's "Focus" mag, 2000
2000
[of memes] I wanted to make the point that Darwinian selection can work wherever you have self-replicating coded information which has some power over it's own fate.
Simonyi Professor of The Public Understanding of Science
In/Compl
Treaties, girls and roses
de Gaulle
Charles
-
mid 1950s
Treaties are like girls and roses:�a dure ce que �a dure. [they last while they last]
-
Compl
ecosystems & environments
Deevy
Edward S.
in Lockley & Gillette, Dinosaur Trackways
~2000
Behind the history of every sedimentary rock there lurks an ecosystm, but what one sees first is an environment of deposition.
-
In/Compl
Posterity
Descartes
Rene
-
1600
I hope that posterity will judge me kindly, not only as to the things which I have explained but also as to those which I have intentionally omitted so as to leave to others the pleasure of discovry.
-
In/Compl
Grass
Donne
John
-
ca 1620
Why grass is green,or why our blood is red, Are mysteries which none have reach'd into,
my notes
In/Compl
Holmes - Observing
Doyle
Arthur Conan
Scandal in Bohemia
1892
You see, but you do not observe.
-
Compl
Elementary
Doyle
Arthur Conan
The Crooked Man
1894
'Excellent,' I cried. 'Elementary, ' said he.
[The traditional cry of 'Elementary, my dear Watson' appears nowhere in the canon.]
Compl
excluded impossible
Doyle
Arthur Conan
The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
1895
It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth.
-
In/Compl
imagination
Doyle
Arthur Conan
The Valley of Fear
1900
It is, I admit, mere imagination: but how often is imagination the mother of truth?
-
Compl
conclusions
Doyle
Arthur Conan
Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, The Naval Treaty
1895
[The client asked Sherlock...] "You suspect someone?" [SH] "I suspect myself" [TC] "What!" [SH] "Of coming to conclusions too rapidly."
-
In/Compl
the dog that didn't bark
Doyle
Arthur Conan
Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes
1898
Lestrade: "Is there anypoint to which you wish to draw my attention?" SH: "To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time." L: "The dog did nothing in the night-time." SH: "That was the curious incident."
-
In/Compl
ichnology
Doyle
Arthur Conan
A Study in Scarlet
1891
There is no branch of detective science so important and so much neglected as the art of tracing footsteps.
-
Compl
bigots, fools & slaves
Drummond
William
reference
17th century
He who will not reason is a bigot, He who cannot reason is a fool, And he who dare not reason is a slave.
-
In/Compl
Alexander's Feast
Dryden
John
-
-
The King grew vain; Fought all his battles o'er again; And thrice he routed all his foes; And thrice he slew the slain.
-
Compl
Education
Durrell
Gerald
My family and other animals
1935
But I like being ignorant. Everything's so much more surprising when you're ignorant! On being sent off Corfu to get a "proper" education.
-
Compl
youth
Eckermann
Johann
Diary, but in what context?
16 Aug, 1824
We must not take the faults of our youth into our old age, for old age brings it's own defects.
-
In/Compl
imbeciles
Ehrlich
Paul R.
said of Julian Simon, a conservative critic.
1970~
The one thing we'll never run out of is imbeciles.
-
In/Compl
Malicious God
Einstein
Albert
Remark at Princeton
1921
Raffiniert ist der Herrgott, aber boshaf ist er nicht (God is subtle, but he is not malicious)
Isn't that a bit early for AE at Princeton?
Compl
Mysticism
Einstein
Albert
"The world as I see it". NY Philosophical Library
1934
The most beautiful emotion we can experience is the mystical. It is the source of all true art and science. He to whom this emotion is a stranger is as good as dead.
Einstein is often associated with a degree of mysticism.
Compl
thinking
Einstein
Albert
Physics and Reality
1936
The whole of science is nothing more than the refinement of everyday thinking.
-
Compl
Authority
Einstein
Albert
Qtd by Banesh Hoffman in "Albert Einstein:Creator & Rebel", New York: Viking, 1973, p.24
1973 publ, date unkn
To punish myself for my contempt for authority, Fate made me an authority myself.
-
Compl
memorable name
Euripedes
-
Medea, ll 1073-1075
431 BCE
I understand The horror of what I am going to do; but anger, The spring of all life's horror, masters my resolve.
-
In/Compl
Social science and black holes
Ferris
Tim
The Whole Shebang
1997
Normally a black hole reveals to outside observers only three things about itself -- it's mass, rotation and electrical charge. Toss in anything you like -- encyclopedias, nuclear submarines, whole faculties of social scientists -- and the black hole, like a prisonor of war reciting only name, rank and serial number, will tell you nothing more than it's mass, it's rotation and it's electrical charge.
BUT ... you can still get information out, in a restricted sense. See the Hawking Bet.
In/Compl
Foolishness
Feynman
Richard
graduation class address, 1974, published in "Cargo Cult Science".
1974
You must not fool yourself-- and you are the easiest person [for you] to fool!
not popular!
Compl
Room at the bottom
Feynman
Richard
In a speech
1963
"There's plenty of room at the bottom"Quoted in context of nano-technology
The "foundation myth" of nanotechnology.
In/Compl
Reactor Design
Feynman
Richard
attributed
-
We already know how to build a Fusion reactor. 1- Dig a deep hole and fill it with salt (to act as a heat storage medium) and a hydrogen bomb. 2- Seal with concrete. 3- Detonate the bomb. 4- Drill down and extract the heat. 5- Repeat until the salt is unusable. 6- Use the site for storing radioactive waste and make a new hole.
-
In/Compl
Knowledge
Feynman
Richard
-
-
Scientific Knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty-- some most unsure, some nearly sure, none absolutely sure.
No biblical authority here.
In/Compl
Parkinsonism
Fox
Michael J.
A Lucky Man
1990
[My assistant] might have had a brain surgeon in the family, but I had the next best thing: a hypochondriac.
Fox on his first realisation that he'd got a significant tremor which was later diagnosed as Young Onset Parkinsons Disease.
Compl
evidence
Freud
Sigmund
-
-
Not even the most tempting probability is a protection against error.
Actually, this needs more examination. Are we talking about one experiment or several, about quantitative or qualitative examples.
In/Compl
eels
Freud
Sigmund
-
-
After the riddle of the eel's gonads, the exploration of the human psyche and the identification of the castration complex must have seemed comparatively straightforward.
Freud was a physiology postgraduate student, and attempting to find the sex organs of eels. He failed.
In/Compl
Meteorologists
Friedmann
Alexander
Quoted in Ferris "Whole Shebang" p. 42.
ca 1920
Bad mathematicians become physicists; bad physicists become meteorologists.
-
In/Compl
Earth Power
Fyfe
W.S.
Global Change: Proceedings, ICSU Gen assy, Ottawa, Cambridge University Press, 1984.
1984
The Earth is powered by an internal fission reactor and a moving external fusion reactor.
See also sunglasses company slogan about "thermonuclear ray protection"
Compl
Duct Tape
Gaherty
Geoff
quoted sig from s.a.a.
1999
Duct tape is like The Force: it has a dark side and a light side and it holds the Universe together.
-
Compl
Occams razor
Gamow
George
Physics Today Oct 1950
1950
If there is a simple curve, there must be a simple explanation.
-
Compl
insignificant
Gandhi
Mohadans
-
-
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.
-
In/Compl
painful
Gilbert & Sullivan
-
The Mikado
1870
something lingering, with boiling oil in it.
A punishment described by or to the court executioner.
In/Compl
routing
Gilmore
John
co-founder of the EFF
1993
The Net interprets censorship as damage and routes around it.
more of an aspiration than a statement, but not far from the truth
In/Compl
Star Trek aliens
Glashow
Sheldon (Nobel Laureate)
-
-
They all look like people with elephantiasis!
-
In/Compl
Mistresses
Goldsmith (moneybags)
James
reference
ca 1985
When a man marries his mistress, he creates a vacancy.
famed for having 5 wives and more mistresses
In/Compl
Laws of Nature
Goodman
Nelson
Uniformity & Simplicity, Geol. Soc. Am Sp. Paper 89
1967
whether or not Nature behaves according to law depends entirely upon whether we succeed in writing laws that describe it's behavior.
-
In/Compl
materialism
Gould
Stephen Jay
Ever since Darwin: Reflections in Natural History
1980
Matter is the ground of all existance: mind, spirit and "god" as well, are just words that express the wonderous results of neuronal complexity.
[on subject of materialism in Darwin's theory of evolution]
In/Compl
trust nobody
Graves
Robert
I, Claudius
ca 1928
Trust no one my friend, no one.Not your most trusted freedman,not your most intimate friend,not your dearest child,not the wife of your bosom,trust no one.-- not even me.
Herod's Speech to Claudius.
In/Compl
Altruism
Haldane
J.B.S.
passim
1945
I will lay down my life for two brothers or eight cousins
he seems to have used it, with polishing, several times. Also the "Beetles" quip.
In/Compl
Queer Universe
Haldane
John B. S.
-
-
The universe is not only queerer than we imagine; it is queerer than we can imagine.
Another recycled Haldanism.
In/Compl
beetle fondness
Haldane
John B. S.
passim- used seveal times
-
[What have you learned from evolution about God] An inordinate fondness for beetles.
used multiple times
In/Compl
Incontrovertable thesis
Hammerskjold
Dag
UN Secretary General
pre 1963
The madman shouted in the marketplace; no one stopped to answer him. Thus, it was confirmed that his thesis was incontestable
but of course
In/Compl
Drummer Hodge
Hardy
Thomas
Drummer Hodge
-
-
its a bitter poem about the Boer War. Wait - what. Hardy was around for the Boer War? "2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928)" Seems so.
In/Compl
witless
Hawes
James Lee
CIS PAST/ceationism forum
27 Sep 2000
I resfuse [sic] to have a battle of wits with an unarmed person.
He really did make the spelling mistake!! But it was probably a quote. Oh, very definitely so! QuoteInvestigator Lots of other uses from 1920s to recently.
In/Compl
Burning books
Heine
Heinrich
reference
1823
This was but a prelude; where books are burnt, human-beings will be burnt in the end.
Amongst other places, used in the museum at Dachau KZ.
In/Compl
Priests
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love
1974
Any priest or shaman must be presumed guilty until proved innocent.
-
In/Compl
Science or opinion
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love
1974
If it can't be expressed in figures, it's not science, it's opinion.
-
In/Compl
Theology
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love
1974
One man's theology is another man's belly laugh.
my notes
In/Compl
Mathematics
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love
1974
Anyone who cannot cope with mathematics is not fully human. At best he is a tolerable subhuman who has learned to wear shoes, bathe, and not make messes in the house.
-
Compl
Stupidity
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long, Time Enough for Love
1974
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity.
-
Compl
Capital Stupidity
Heinlein
Robert
Lazarus Long in 'Time Enough for Love'
1960~
Stupidity cannot be cured. Stupidity is the only universal capital crime; the sentance is death. There is no appeal, and the execution is carried out automatically and without pity.
my notes
In/Compl
The Hippocratic Oath
Hippocrates
(allegedly)
reference
several hundred BCE
... follow that system of regimen which, according to my ability and judgement, I consider for the benefit of my patients, and abstain from whatever is deleterious and mischevious ... with purity and holiness I will pass my life and practice my Art ...
Traditional oath of doctors on taking up the stick & snakes. No version has survived from antiquity, nor is there confidence that there ever was one. Each medical school makes up their own.
In/Compl
Propaganda
Hitler
Adolf
Mein Kampf?
1925
By the clever and continued use of propaganda, a people can even be made to mistake heaven for hell and vice versa, the most miserable life for paradise.
-
In/Compl
war-one-against-all
Hobbes
-
late Mediaeval philosopher
1500?
bellum omnium contra omnes
the war of everyone against everone
In/Compl
Ageism
Holmes
Arthur
in a letter
~1948
It is perhaps a little indelicate to ask of our Mother earth her age, but Science admits no shame.
not grounds for shame but for pride
Compl
Arguments for Lords
Home
Alexander Douglas (Lord)
The Way the Wind Blows
1976
[Annotation to a ministerial brief, allegedly read to the house by a dozy peer.] This is a rotten argument, but it should be good enough for their lordships on a hot summer afternoon.
cynical cunt
Compl
memorable name
Hood
Thomas
November Verse
1844
[...] No shade, no shine, no butterflies, no bees, No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds! November!
Flanders & Swann's inspiration?
In/Compl
memorable name
Houseman
A.E.
reference
1930 ?
What shall I do or write Against the fall of night?
inspired title for A.C.Clarke's eponymous book
Compl
Belief
Hume
David
Enq. Concrn. Human Understanding
ca 1760
[concerning miracles] "a wise man ... proportions his belief to the evidence"
my notes
In/Compl
surgery
Hunter
John
surgeon at the roots of scientific medicine
~ 1800
Surgery is like an armed savage who attempts to get that by force which a civiized man would get by strategem.
-
In/Compl
slogan
Huxley
Aldous
Brave New World
1937
Community - Identity - Stability!
-
In/Compl
dead dragons
Huxley
T. H.
following the hippocampus debate
1861 ~
Life is too short to occupy oneself with the slaying of the slain more than once.
q.v. Dryden's Alexander's Feast
In/Compl
ugly fact
Huxley
T.H.
-
c.1870
a beautiful theory, killed by a nasty, ugly little fact
said in reference to Spencer's appropriation of Darwinian Natural Selection as a justification for his social engineering theories
In/Compl
suns & earths
Huygens
Christiaan
reference
date
What a wonderful and amazing Scheme have we here of the magnificent Vastness of the Universe! So many Suns, so many Earths.
discoverer of Saturn's rings.
In/Compl
Have a nice day
Karley
Aidan
KGB
2001/01/08
May your internal demons do worse to you than your external demons!
to John Bogue
In/Compl
poem/ haiku
Karley
Aidan
unpublished, and probably just as well.
2001/03/19
Winter The cold stars sparkle Like Moon light Glistens upon the frozen snow.
-
In/Compl
revenge
Kingsbury
Donald
Man-Kzin Wars v.6, "The Heroic Myth of Lieutenant Nora Argamantine"
1994
My Father always told me that revenge was an option- but that no matter how sweet the revenge, revenge was NEVER the end of the story.
my notes
In/Compl
Finagle's Laws 1
Kingsbury
Donald
Man-Kzin Wars 6
1994
Finagle's n'th Law: reality can outbid your worst nightmare every time.
-
In/Compl
use the rich
Kingsbury
Donald
Man-Kzin Wars 6
1994
That's what rich people are for. They are very useful experimental animals for us poor types. The rich pay through the nose for all the fancy new technology when it isn't very good. They're desparate to live so they pay thousands of crazy witch-doctors to kill them in fancy new ways. When the rich people stop dying, we know the product is ready for market and can be mass produced cheaply.
In the context of boosterspice.
In/Compl
Finagle's Laws 2
Kingsbury
Donald
Man-Kzin Wars 6
1994
Let Finagle toast God's death!
-
In/Compl
Ph.D. Sense
Kirschner
Robert P.
Quarterly Jnl Royal Astronomical Society v.32 p.233-244
1991
Although the Universe is under no obligation to make sense, students in pursuit of a Ph.D. are.
-
In/Compl
cometary felines
Levy
David H.
-
1985
Comets are just like cats: they both have tails and both do just what they want to.
-
In/Compl
Inflation (really big numbers)
Linde
Andrei
in conversation with Tim Ferris (cosmologist)
198x
In conversation about INFLATION theory, Linde was asked how big an inflationary uiverse could get. He replied by writing on a scrap of paper a ten. Then raising it to the twelfth. Big? No. That's the number you raise ten to. [TF] Er, what units are you working in? [AL] Does it matter? it's cm, not light years, but it doesn't make much difference. Only 18 parts in 10^12. [TF] Errr. No significant difference between a cm and a light year. Right. Of course, combinatorial mathematicians don't use such small numbers. They invent their own notations for big numbers. After all, the universe above doesn't have enough material to write their numbers in scientific notation.
my notes
In/Compl
uniformitarianism
Lyell
Charles
Principles of Geology, v.1, p.164
1830- 33
When we are unable to explain the monuments of past changes, it is always more probable that the difficulty arises from our ignorance of all the existing agents, or all their possible effects in an indefinite lapse of time, than that some cause was formerly in operation which has ceased to act.
my notes
In/Compl
evil
Macgiavelli
Niccolo
Discorsi Supra la Prima Deca di Tito Livio
1517
It is necessary for him who lays out a state and arranges laws for it to presuppose that all men are evil and that they are always going to act according to the wickedness of their spirits when they have free scope.
as expected
Compl
flattery
Machiavelli
Niccolo
Il Principe, ch 23
1513
There is no other way for securing yourself against flatteries except that men understand that they do not offend you by telling you the truth; but when everybody can tell you the truth, you fail to get respect.
-
Compl
People
Machiavelli
Niccolo
Il Principe, ch 9
1513
He who builds on the people builds on mud.
lovely
In/Compl
Population
Malthus
Thomas
On Population
ca.1820
The order of generation proceeds by something like a geometrical progression. The increase of provisio, under circumstances even the most advantageous, can only assume the form of an arithmetic series. Whence it follows, that the population will always overtake the provision, will pass beyond the line of plenty, and will continue to increase till checked by the difficulty of procuring subsistance.
my notes
In/Compl
famous drug smuggler
Marks
Howard
Loaded mag
Dec 1998
Thank God for Viagra. Now we can all act in blue movies.
-
In/Compl
BBC political editor
Marr
Andrew
press
April 2001
Whiskey is not, properly speaking, alcohol, but a form of instant philosophy.
-
In/Compl
Cargos
Masefield
John
SALT-WATER POEMS
1902
Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir, Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine, With a cargo of ivory, And apes and peacocks, Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.
Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus, Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores, With a cargo of diamonds, Emeralds, amythysts, Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.
Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack, Butting through the Channel in the mad March days, With a cargo of Tyne coal, Road-rails, pig-lead, Firewood, iron-ware, and cheap tin trays.
-
In/Compl
media
McLuan
Marshall
-
1960s
The Medium IS the Message
advertising or art guy
In/Compl
pinstripe
McNab
Andy
Last Light
2001
Real crooks wear pinstripe.
ex-SAS author
In/Compl
Astrology idiocy
Mencken
H.L.
-
-
If you set out to think of the stupidest idea possible, you would inevitably come up with astrology.
I don't know - homeopathy gives it a good run for it's money.
In/Compl
fundamentalists
Menken
H.L.
reference
1920
Heave an egg out of a [train] window, and you willhit a Fundamentalist almost anywhere in the US today.
Obviously pre-Amtrak collapse.
In/Compl
Pelican
Dixon
Merritt
-
1910
A wonderful bird is the Pelican, His bill will hold more than his belican.
(bestiary?)
In/Compl
The Doors
Morrison
Jim
An American Prayer
1969
The Hitch-hiker stood by the side of the road And levelled his thumb In the calm calculus of reason.
Part of the 'Indian Dream' unfinished work.
In/Compl
Freedom
netannounce@deshaw.com
-
What is USENET? pt 1
1998-01-16
Freedom of the press is for those who own one.
my notes
In/Compl
Amphioxus Song
The Newcomer
a man on the Net
reference
1996
[Chorus]
It's a long way from Amphioxus,
It's a long way to us,
It's a long way from Amphioxus,
To the meanest human cuss
It's good bye, fins and gill slits,
Hello! Lungs and Hair,
It's a long, long way from Amphioxus,
But we all came from there
A fish-like thing appared among the Annelids one day,
It hadn't any parapods or setae to display.
It hadn't any eyes or jaws, or ventral nervous chord
But it had a lot of gill slits, and it had a notochord.
[Chorus]
It wasn't much to look at, and it scarce knew how to swim.
And Nereis was very sure it hadn't come from him,
The molluscs wouldn't own it, and the arthropods got sore,
So the poor thing had to burrow in the sand along the shore.
He burrowed in the sand before a crab could nip his tail.
He said "Gill slits and myotomes are all to no avail.
I've grown some metapleural folds, and sport an oral hood.
And all these fine new characters don't do me any good!"
[Chorus]
He sulked a while, down in the sand without a bit of pep.
Then he stiffend up his notochord and said "I'll beat 'em yet!
Let 'em laugh and show their ignorance; I don't mind their jeers
Just wait until they see me in a hundred milion years!"
My notochord shall turn into a chain of vertebrae
As fins, my metapleural folds will agitate the sea.
My tiny dorsal nervous chord shall be a mighty brain.
And the Vertebrates will dominate the animal domain!
[Chorus]
-
In/Compl
non-catastrophism
Newell
N.D.
GSA special paper on uniformitarianism.
1967
The adage that "anything that can happen, will happen" cannot be construed to mean that anything that might happen, has indeed happened.
Im not sure that exactly follows. At least, in a universe with a finite previous lifetime.
Compl
on the shoulders of giants
Newton
Issac
letter to Robert Hooke, 5 Feb 1676
1676
If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.
Plagiarised from Bernard of Chartres."However, Bernard of Chartres was quoted in 1159 as saying 'that we are like dwarfs on the shoulders of giants, so that we can see more than they, and things at a greater distance, not by virtue of any sharpness of sight on our part or any physical distinction, but because we are carried high and raised up by their giant size."
Compl
Indifference
Niem�ller
Martin ("Pastor")
reference
1947 +/-
First they came for the Communists, but I was not a Communist- so I said nothing.
Then they came for the Social Democrats but I was not a Social Democrat- so I said nothing.
Then came the trade unionists but I was not a trade unionist.
And then they came for the Jews but I was not a Jew- so I did little.
Then when they came for me there was no one left who could stand up for me.
the line about trade unionists is often forgotten.
In/Compl
The Abyss
Nietzsche
Friedrich
Beyond Good and Evil, Aphorism 146
1860
Whoever fights monsters should see to it that in the process he does not become a monster. And when you look long into an abyss, the abyss also looks into you.
-
In/Compl
madness
Nietzsche
Friedrich
Beyond Good and Evil
1860
Madness is rare in individuals, but in groups, parties, nations, and ages it is the rule.
He ended up in a nut house.
In/Compl
paranoia
Niven
Larry
"Flatlander" short story
1967
If you don't understand it, it's dangerous.
-
Compl
ethical contradiction
Niven
Larry
Flatlander, short story
1967
RE: Outsiders. "They have to be so far above suspicion that any species they deal with will remember their unimpeachable ethics a century later"
BUT the Outsiders are interstellar traders who travel at sub-light speeds (though they do have FTL communications and can sell FTl drives). Contrast this opinion with that of the Monks in one of the early Draco Tavern stories (4th Profession?), where the STL interstellar traders are willing to bomb suns and destroy their back route of civilisations. That universe has FTL travel too.
In/Compl
Weapons
Niven
Larry
Madness has it's Place
1990
Then again ... kinetic energy was likely to be the ultimate weapon, however the mass was moved.
Energy considerations don't lie.
In/Compl
advice accepted
Niven
Larry
The Burning City ch 67
2000
I will not answer for advice not taken.
-
In/Compl
Book profits
Niven
Larry
NivenList
2001/06/02
I get a slightly higher percentage of the hardback, which sells for a lot more than the paperback.
[re: margins on hardbacks vs softbacks]
Compl
a sword
Nixon
Richard Milhouse
Interview with David Frost
19 May 1977
I brought myself down. I gave them a sword. And they stuck it in.
my notes
Compl
Whitewash
Nixon
Richard Milhouse
Speech 30 April 1973
1973
There can be no whitewash at the White House.
No, really!
In/Compl
Americans are beyond irony
O'Rourke
P.J.
-
1980's?
America is a country where the people are too lazy to learn the facts, much less face them.
before Trump?
In/Compl
Occam's Razor
Occam
William of
-
13th C
Entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity [but] there are many things that God does with more that he could do with fewer.[Latin] entitia non sunt multiplicanda praeter necessitatum.
Cleanse my heart, Give me the ability to rage correctly.
-
Compl
Advertising
Orwell
George
Keep the aspidestra flying.
ca. 1940
Advertising- the rattling of a stick inside a bucket of swill.
Compl
Brevity
Parker
Dorothy
Aphorisms
1916
Brevity is the soul of lingerie, as the Petticoat said to the Chemise.
(cf Shakespeare in Hamlet: Brevity is the soul of wit.)
In/Compl
Adultery
Parker
Dorothy
Of the office she shared with Robert Benchley
1917
An inch smaller and it would have been adultery.
-
In/Compl
One Perfect Rose
Parker
Dorothy
R�sum�
1937
A single flow'r he sent me, since we met. All tenderly his messanger he chose; Deep-hearted, pure, with scented dew still wet -One perfect rose.I knew the language of the floweret; "My fragile leaves," it said, "his heart enclose." Love long has taken for his amuletOne perfect rose. Why is it no one ever sent me yet One perfect limousine, do you suppose? Ah no, it's always just my luck to get One perfect rose.
valentine for CMF, about 2001
In/Compl
Might as well live
Parker
Dorothy
Résumé
1937
Razors pain you; Rivers are damp; Acids stain you; And drugs cause cramp. Guns aren't lawful; Nooses give; Gas smells awful; You might as well live.
-
In/Compl
McCarthyism
Parker
Dorothy
When being investigated by FBI for looking left.
1952
Listen, I can't even get my dog to stay down. Do I look to you like someone who could overthrow the government?
-
In/Compl
Horticulture
Parker
Dorothy
Résumé
quoted 1970
You can lead a horticulture but you cannot make her think.
-
In/Compl
On the verge
Pasteur
Louis
reference
ca 1870
I feel I am on the verge of mysteries, and the veil is getting thinner and thinner.
-
In/Compl
plural nouns
Peel
John
Home Truths
1999
Plural noun for [Scots] headmasters : a lack of principles.
-
Compl
McLuhan, not
Pete-Classic
-
Slashdot sid=02/07/11/1912239
2002-07-11
Web Designers : You aren't artists and the medium isn't the message. The message is the fucking message.
-
In/Compl
Brains
Philips
Emo
American comic 1960 ?
Quoted in SciAm letters 2000/04
I used to think the brain was the most important organ in the body, until I realised who was telling me that.
Should have listened to his vagina.
In/Compl
nothing new in art
Picasso
Pablo
after visiting the gallery at Lascaux
1955
We have invented NOTHING. What has been discovered in art techniques in the last 15000 years.
-
Compl
Genetic determinism
Pinker
Stephen
quoted by Richard Dawkins
1995
[I, personally] have no desire to have children, and if my selfish genes don't like it, they can go and jump in the lake.
psychologist & linguist
In/Compl
a sparrow fall
Pope
Alexander
An Essay on Man
~1800
Who sees with equal eye, as God of all, A hero perish, or a sparrow fall, Atoms or systems into ruin hurl'd, And now a bubble burst, and now a world.
IF (big IF) that date is ccurate, that's a reference to Democritus's Classical atoms, not Dalton's chemical atoms of about 1802.
In/Compl
peace definition
Pournelle
Jerry
in interview with Geoffrey Landis
1997
Peace is a condition we deduce from the fact that there have been intervals between wars.
Despite him being a very militaristic guy.
In/Compl
haste
Pournelle & Stirling
-
The Asteroid Queen
1990
Wisdom of Thrintun, "Haste is not speed"
-
In/Compl
War fought with brains
Prachett
Terry
The Fifth Elephant, p59
1999
[Vetinari, the Patrician]"Tell me, Leonard [of Quirm, genius]," he said. "Has it ever occurred to you that one day wars will be fought with brains?" Leonard picked up his coffee cup. "Oh dear. Wouldn't that be rather messy?" he said. Vetinari sighed again. "Not perhaps as messy as the other sort."
in the run-up to the War of Koom Valley (trolls vs Dwarves, Reprise?
In/Compl
Look in the mirror
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents
2001
You pretend that rats can think and I'll pretend that humans can think.
-
In/Compl
Speciesist
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his educated rodents
2001
I don't know about intelligent species. We're dealing with humans here.
-
Compl
Talking ... Listening
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his educated rodents
2001
You're all talking? [Affirmative] So ... who's doing the listening?
-
Compl
and afterwards
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents
2001
Would killing you have made anything BETTER for us?
-
Compl
shouting
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents
2001
It's just all a lot more complicated than I ever thought it would be! Because after you've learned to shout you have to learn not to!
-
In/Compl
fixed ways
Pratchett
Pterry
The Amazing Maurice and his Educated Rodents
2001
... some minds you couldn't change with a hatchet.
-
In/Compl
Skin Rash, Continental drift
Pratchett
Terry
Equal Rites, p.188
1987
It is well known that stone can think, because the whole of electronics is based on that fact, but in some universes men spend ages looking for other intelligences in the sky without once looking at the one under their feet. That is because they've got the time-span all wrong. From stone's point of view the universe is hardly created and mountain ranges are bouncing up and down like organ-stops while continents zip backwards and forwards in general high spirits, crashing into each other from the sheer joy of momentum and getting their rocks off. It is going to be quite some time before stone notices it's disfiguring little skin disease and starts to scratch, which is just as well.
Geologist's Mantra
In/Compl
Discworld Fossils
Pratchett
Terry
Equal Rites, p. 198
1987
Fossils were quite well known on the Discworld, great spiralled shells and badly-constructed creatures that were left over from the time when the Creator hadn't really decided what he wanted to make and was, as it were, just idly messing around with the Pleistocene.
hopeful monsters
In/Compl
SCIENCE
Pratchett
Terry
Wings
1990
SCIENCE: A way of finding things out and then making them work. Science explains what is happening around us the whole time. So does RELIGION, but science is better because it comes up with more understandable excuses when it's wrong. There is a lot more science than you'd think. From "A Scientific Encyclopedia for the Enquiring Young Nome" by Angalo de Haberdasheri
-
Compl
terror1
Pratchett
Terry
Moving Pictures
1990
[1]- It looks worse than you can imagine [2]- I can imagine some pretty bad things! [1]- That's why I said worse.
-
In/Compl
terror2
Pratchett
Terry
Moving Pictures
1990
"Working with the methodical calmness of bowel-twisting terror..."
-
In/Compl
4 horsemen
Pratchett
Terry
Interesting Times
1994
The Four Horsemen of The Apocalypse are Death, War, Famine and Pestilence; The Four Horsemen of The Common Cold are Sniffles, Chesty Cough, Red Nostrils and Lack of Tissues; The Four Horsemen of Holidays are Storm, Gales, Sleet and Contra-flow. The Four Horsemen of Public Relations are Misinformation, Rumour, Gossip, and Denial.
-
In/Compl
Hostile ground
Pratchett
Terry
Interesting Times
1994
"Nothing to worry about, the ground's not hostile." Rincewind didn't believe him. He'd had the ground hit him very hard many times.
-
In/Compl
causes worth dieing for
Pratchett
Terry
Interesting Times
1994
"But there are causes worth dieing for", said Butterfly. [Rincewind]"No there aren't! Because you've only got one life but you can pick up another five causes on any street corner!" [Butterfly]"Good grief, how can you live with a philosophy like that?" [Rincewind]"Continuously."
-
In/Compl
Further Education
Pratchett
Terry
Hogsfather p142
1996
[DEATH is filling in for the Hogsfather] -The Hogsfather reached into his sack and produced . a sword. It was four feet long and glittered along the blade. -The mother took a deep breath. -'You can't give her that!' she screamed. 'It's not safe!' -IT'S A SWORD, said the Hogfather. THEY'RE NOT MEANT TO BESAFE.-'She's a child!' shouted the manager. -IT'S EDUCATIONAL. -'What if she cuts herself?' -THAT WILL BE AN IMPORTANT LESSON.
-
In/Compl
Little lies
Pratchett
Terry
Hogfather, p.422,
1996
Death to a.n.other -YOU HAVE TO START OUT LEARNING TO BELIEVE THE LITTLE LIES. - So we can believe the big ones? - YES. JUSTICE. MERCY. DUTY. THAT SORT OF THING.
-
Compl
Education
Pratchett
Terry
Hogsfather, p 40
1996
Getting an education was a bit like a communicable sexual disease. It made you unsuitable for a lot of jobs and then you had the urge to pass it on.
my notes
In/Compl
Oh Shit
Pratchett
Terry
The Fifth Elephant, p46
1999
The midden has hit the windmill, Igor.
-
Compl
morals & religion
Pratchett
Terry
The Fifth Elephant, p133
1999
Ordinary golems would not harm a human being because they had magic words inside their head that ordered them not to. Dorfl had no magic words but he didn't harm people because he'd decided that it wasn't moral.
for a single paragraph to distinguish between religion and morality, this is pretty good.
Compl
Mythology
Pratchett
Terry
reported at dinner of the Folklore Society
1999
Mythology is usually the folklore of the winning side.
-
In/Compl
Be afraid. Be very afraid.
Pratchett
Terry
Hogsfather
1996
Time. Valde time. In Latin.
"Time" was one of the nastier people of Hogsfather's assassins
In/Compl
Pets
Pratchett
Terry
Dibbler in Small Gods (or Interesting times?)
1987
Pets are always a great help in times of stress. And in times of starvation too, o'course.
(Year of the Notional Serpent), Cut-My-Own-Throat Dhblah a.k.a. Disembowel-Myself-Honorably Dibhala-san (-san?!)
In/Compl
experience
Pratchett
Terry
Sergeant Stronginthearm (Dwarf of the Watch), (Cent. Fruitbat)
1999
My bum has been a bum for a very long time, but I don't have to listen to anything it says.
-
In/Compl
agendas
Pushkin
Aleksander
-
1820 ?
Everything is on the agenda.
of the use of emotional experiences by artists.
In/Compl
Flying pigs
rcallon@baynetworks.com
Given name
The 12 Fundamental Truths of Networking
1996
(3) With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine. However, this is not necesarily a good idea. It is hard to be sure where they are going to land, and it coulld be dangerous sitting under them as they fly overhead.
self-explanatory
Compl
Principles
Richardson
Grady
sig on the Niven mailing list
1966, reused ~2000
It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them.
Very unlikely to be original- I tihnk I've seen it elsewhere. Googling, I get it as the title of an artwork by "James Gill" in 1966, with the sub-title "Alfred Adler, 1870-1937." According to the Smithsonian, "From the series Great Ideas of Western Man., 1966, oil on canvas, 40 x 30 in. (101.5 x 76.2 cm.), Smithsonian American Art Museum, Gift of Container Corporation of America, 1984.124.105"
Compl
vegetarian practices
Robinson
Kim Stanley
Icehenge, section 3
1984
He adhered to the dietary laws of his home, the asteroid Icarus, which decreed that nothing eaten should be the result of the death of any living system.
Interesting take on things. Not necessarily vegan though (dairy easily, eggs quite possibly, even easier unfertilised eggs).
Compl
Exuberation
Robinson
Kim Stanley
Icehenge, section 3
1984
"I'm on a planet! The first planet I ever stood on, and it's Pluto!" said the character doing exactly that!
-
In/Compl
Sex
Rotten (aka. Lydon)
Johnny
reference
ca 1979
"two minues of squelching"
my notes
Compl
betting
Runyon
Damon
quoted in Scientific American
1999
The battle is not always to the strong, nor the race to the swift. but that's the way to bet.
Suitably cynical.
In/Compl
Tourmaline's chemistry
Ruskin
John
in 'The elements of Dust: Ten Lectures for Little Housewives'
1891
more like a Mediaeval Doctor's prescription than the making of a respectable mineral.
Hadn't seen too many micas then, had he. Deerite, Howieite and Zussmanite were well in the future.
Compl
The Life That I Have
Sachs
Oliver
The Code Poem, apparently written for an SOE agent going into France
Those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it.
It has been quoted many times since.
In/Compl
Wake up
Scott
Ridley
Roy Batty, mutinying replicant in 'Blade Runner'
1982
Wake up- time to die!
Based, very loosely, on a PHilip K. Dick short story, then novellised. But the full quote ("tears in the rain", here) is much more interesting.
Compl
Hamlet's Soliloqy
Shakespeare
William
Hamlet, Act 3, Scene 1, l.56
1601
To be, or not to be: that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep; No more; and, by a sleep to say we end The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to, 'tis a consummation Devoutly to be wished. To die, to sleep; To sleep: perchance to dream; ay, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause. There's the respect That makes calamity of so long life; For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of disprized love, the laws delay, The insolence of office, and the spurnss That patient merit of the unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? Who would fardels bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life, But dread that something after death, The undiscovered country from whose bourn No traveller returns, puzzles the will, And makes us rather bear those ills we have, Than fly to others that we know not of? Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all; Znd thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought, And enterprises of great pith and moment With this regard their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action.
my notes
In/Compl
Maggots
Shakespeare
William
Hamlet, act 4, scene 3
1599- 1601
KING Now, Hamlet, where’s Polonius? HAMLET At supper. KING At supper where? HAMLET Not where he eats, but where he is eaten. A certain convocation of politic worms are e’en at him. Your worm is your only emperor for diet. We fat all creatures else to fat us, and we fat ourselves for maggots. Your fat king and your lean beggar is but variable service—two dishes but to one table. That’s the end. KING Alas, alas!
See also, Ilkley Moor, bar t'at.
Compl
Blastéd heath
Shakespeare
William
King Lear, Act 3, Scene 2
1605/6
Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanes, spout. Till you have drenched our steeples, drowned the cocks! You sulphurous and thought- executing fires, Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts, Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder, Strike flat the thick rotundity o'the world! Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once That make ingrateful man![...] Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! Spout, rain! Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire are my daughters: I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness; I never gave you kingdom, called you children, You owe me no subscription: then let fall Your horrible pleasure; here I stand, your slave, A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man.
Suitable for stormy hillwalking.
Compl
an ill wind
Shakespeare
William
Henry VI PArt 1, 2, 3, various scenes.
1591- 1595
[an] Ill blows the wind that profits nobody.
At least three occurrences, two in H6parts 1-3
In/Compl
sound and Fury
Shakespeare
William
Macbeth, Act 5, Scene 5
1606
She should have died hereafter. There would have been a time for such a word. Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow Creeps in this petty pace from day to day To the last syllable of recorded time. And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle. Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
Several well known phrases in that speech, by Macbeth, on hearing of Lady Macbeth's death.
In/Compl
words and wind
Shakespeare
William
The Comedy of Errors
1594
A man may break a word with you, Sir; and words are but wind; And break it in your face, so he break it not behind.
A comedy of mistaken identities.
In/Compl
personal character, DOTA
Shaw
George Bernard
Pygmalion
1913
PICKERING: Excuse the straight question, Higgins. Are you a man of good character where women are concerned? HIGGINS [moodily]: Have you ever met a man of good character where women are concerned?
Actually, Higgins is not lusting after Liza, just after her vocal naïvete.
In/Compl
Mr Doolittle, the undeserving poor
Shaw
George Bernard
Pygmalion
1913
I don't need less than a deserving man: I need more. I don't eat less hearty than him and I drink a lot more.
Doolittle has a long soliliquoy on the deserving (versus undeserving) poor.
Compl
Criminals
Simpson
Bart & Lisa
TV series
1999
Bart : "Inside every hardened criminal beats the heart of a ten year-old boy." Lisa : "And vice versa."
-
Compl
an invisible hand
Smith
Adam
The Wealth of Nations
1776
[of an actor in the world of laissez-faire economics] He generally indeed neither intends to promote the public interest, nor knows how much he is promoting it . . . He intends only his own gain, and he is in this, as in many other cases, led by an invisible hand to promote an end which was no part of his intention.
-
In/Compl
evolution
Spiegelman
Art ?
-
-
The nucleic acids invented human beings in order to be able to reproduce themselves on the Moon
Dawkins would be all "Extended Phenotype" over this.
In/Compl
Neils steensen
Steno
Nicolaus
Prodomus
1669
[translated from Latin] in Nature there is no reduction of anything to nothing.
Reprinted with commentary by John Garrett Winter, U. Mich. Humanistic Series, v.XI, part II, New York & London, Macmillan
In/Compl
Those about to die
Suetonius
-
Lives of the Caesars, Claudius
ca 100AD
Ave, Caesar, morituri te salutant! Hail Caesar, those who are about to die salute you.
[The Rincewind version is Stercus, stercus, stercus, moriturus sum! Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, I'm going to die!]
Compl
ad infinitum
Swift
Jonathan (Dean)
On Poetry
1733
So, naturalists observe, a flea Hath smaller fleas that on him prey; And these have smaller fleas to bite 'em And so proceed ad infinitum. Thus every poet in his kind, Is bit by him that comes behind.
-
Compl
Banal evil
Tax Accountant
Steve
Alt.Bin.Pratchett
2002-07-24
In terms of villany, there is an evil inherent in banality (I'm a tax accountant, so I should know!)
in discussion of the Auditors in ToT
Compl
Networking giblets
Tea & Watt
Kevin & Stuart
Virtual Access / Chatter
1999-09-23 22:20:11
KT : It [Time & Chaos] is also, apparently, networkable, but that's an arcane world to me, full of black arts, interpreting chicken giblets etc. SW : got a degree in the chicken gibs dept, robots & computers get thru a hell of a lot of chickens.
We know that feeling.
Compl
In Memoriam A.H.H.
Tennyson
Alfred (Lord)
some book of peotry
1850
Man, Who trusted God was love indeed, And love Creation's final law - Tho' Nature, red in tooth and claw With Ravine, shrieked against his creed.
Frequently mis-thought to be part of "evolutionary" writing, it's a poem that was published most of a decade before Darwin's Origin
Compl
fire
Pratchett
Terry
1991-ish
date
Give a man some fire and he's warm for the evening. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
no notes
In/Compl
dog Latin
Pratchett
Terry
in voce Gaspode
1990-ish
Semper in faecibus sumus, sole profundum variat.
We're always in the shit, only the depth varies.
In/Compl
Restraint
Theucidedes
-
idem
-500
Of all the displays of power, restraint is that which impresses men the most.
no notes
Compl
Marry in haste
Thomas
Elizabeth
A New Litany
1722
From marrying in haste, and repenting at leaisure; not liking the person, yet liking his treasure: Libera nos.
no notes
Compl
Bombs & Jesus
Thompson
Hunter S
Showdown in the Pig Palace, in Generation of Swine
1970 ?
A Democratic victory would not change the world, but it would at least slow down the berserk white-trash momentum of the bombs-and-jesus crowd. Those people have had their way long enough. Not even the Book of Revelation threatens a plague of vengeful yahoos.
46 years before the Tangerine Shitgibbon
In/Compl
Un-wisdom
Tiresias
-
amongst other, Sophocles
400 BCE
It is but sorrow to be wise when wisdom profits not ...
A blind prophet, apparently
In/Compl
Research
Twain
Mark
attributed
-
The researches of many commentators have already thrown much darkness on this subject, and it is probable that, if they continue, we shall soon know nothing at all about it.
my notes
In/Compl
randomised
Twain
Mark
-
-
There are too many stars in some places and not enough in others, but that can be remedied presently, no doubt
my notes
In/Compl
re Lenny Bruce
Tynan
Kenneth
-
1970 ?
Constant chafing and irritation produces the pearl. It is a disease of the oyster.
-
In/Compl
Democracy
Ulyanov
Vladimir Ilich (Lenin)
-
1919
No, Democracy is not identical with majority rule. Democracy is a State which recognizes the subjection of the minority to the majority, that is, an organization for the systematic use of force by one class against the other, by one part of the population against another.
Now that's one which many democrats won't like. Very uncomfortable for them.
In/Compl
Survival of the fittest
various
-
var
var
-
Many people talk about the " survival of the fittest". They miss the point that Darwin (and realities including bacterial resistance) talked about "survival of those types MOST FITTED TO SURVIVE THE CURRENT CIRCUMSTANCES". There is no absolute "fittest".
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #1
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #2
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #3
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
No soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #4
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #5
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #6
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #7
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
197
In suits at common law, where the value in controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #8
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #9
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #10
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1791
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the states, are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #11
-
-
-
1798
The judicial power of the United States shall not be construed to extend to any suit in law or equity, commenced or prosecuted against one of the United States by citizens of another state, or by citizens or subjects of any foreign state.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #12
-
-
-
1804
The electors shall meet in their respective states and vote by ballot for President and Vice President, one of whom, at least, shall not be an inhabitant of the same state with themselves; they shall name in their ballots the person voted for as President, and in distinct ballots the person voted for as Vice-President, and they shall make distinct lists of all persons voted for as President, and of all persons voted for as Vice-President, and of the number of votes for each, which lists they shall sign and certify, and transmit sealed to the seat of the government of the United States, directed to the President of the Senate;--The President of the Senate shall, in the presence of the Senate and House of Representatives, open all the certificates and the votes shall then be counted; --the person having the greatest number of votes for President, shall be the President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed; and if no person have such majority, then from the persons having the highest numbers not exceeding three on the list of those voted for as President, the House of Representatives shall choose immediately, by ballot, the President. But in choosing the President, the votes shall be taken by states, the representation from each state having one vote; a quorum for this purpose shall consist of a member or members from two-thirds of the states, and a majority of all the states shall be necessary to a choice. And if the House of Representatives shall not choose a President whenever the right of choice shall devolve upon them, before the fourth day of March next following, then the Vice-President shall act as President, as in the case of the death or other constitutional disability of the President. The person having the greatest number of votes as Vice-President, shall be the Vice-President, if such number be a majority of the whole number of electors appointed, and if no person have a majority, then from the two highest numbers on the list, the Senate shall choose the Vice President; a quorum for the purpose shall consist of two-thirds of the whole number of Senators, and a majority of the whole number shall be necessary to a choice. But no person constitutionally ineligible to the office of President shall be eligible to that of Vice-President of the United States.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #13
-
-
-
1865
() Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction. Section 2. Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #14
-
-
-
1868
Section 1 All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. Section 2 Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such state. Section 3 No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any state, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any state, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two- thirds of each House, remove such disability. Section 4 The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void. Section 5 The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment#15
-
-
T-
1870
Slaves can vote, if they have a penis. Section 1 The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude. Section 2 The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #16
-
-
-
1913
() Income tax The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several states, and without regard to any census of enumeration.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #17
-
-
-
1913
The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each state, elected by the people thereof, for six years; and each Senator shall have one vote. The electors in each state shall have the qualifications requisite for electors of the most numerous branch of the state legislatures. When vacancies happen in the representation of any state in the Senate, the executive authority of such state shall issue writs of election to fill such vacancies: Provided, that the legislature of any state may empower the executive thereof to make temporary appointments until the people fill the vacancies by election as the legislature may direct. This amendment shall not be so construed as to affect the election or term of any Senator chosen before it becomes valid as part of the Constitution.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #18
-
-
THE BILL OF RIGHTS
1919
Prohibition Section 1 After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors within, the importation thereof into, or the exportation thereof from the United States and all territory subject to the jurisdiction thereof for beverage purposes is hereby prohibited. Section 2 The Congress and the several states shall have concurrent power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation. Section 3 This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of the several states, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the states by the Congress.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #19
-
-
-
1920
Female Emancipation. The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #20
-
-
-
1933
ELection procedures. Section 1 The terms of the President and Vice President shall end at noon on the 20th day of January, and the terms of Senators and Representatives at noon on the 3rd day of January, of the years in which such terms would have ended if this article had not been ratified; and the terms of their successors shall then begin. Section 2 The Congress shall assemble at least once in every year, and such meeting shall begin at noon on the 3rd day of January, unless they shall by law appoint a different day. Section 3 If, at the time fixed for the beginning of the term of the President, the President elect shall have died, the Vice President elect shall become President. If a President shall not have been chosen before the time fixed for the beginning of his term, or if the President elect shall have failed to qualify, then the Vice President elect shall act as President until a President shall have qualified; and the Congress may by law provide for the case wherein neither a President elect nor a Vice President elect shall have qualified, declaring who shall then act as President, or the manner in which one who is to act shall be selected, and such person shall act accordingly until a President or Vice President shall have qualified. Section 4 The Congress may by law provide for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the House of Representatives may choose a President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them, and for the case of the death of any of the persons from whom the Senate may choose a Vice President whenever the right of choice shall have devolved upon them. Section 5 Section 1 and 2 shall take effect on the 15th day of October following the ratification of this article. Section 6 This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several states within seven years from the date of its submission.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #21
-
-
-
1933
Section 1 The eighteenth article of amendment to the Constitution of the United States is hereby repealed. Section 2 The transportation or importation into any state, territory, or possession of the United States for delivery or use therein of intoxicating liquors, in violation of the laws thereof, is hereby prohibited. Section 3 This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by conventions in the several states, as provided in the Constitution, within seven years from the date of the submission hereof to the states by the Congress.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #22
-
-
-
1951
Section 1 No person shall be elected to the office of the President more than twice, and no person who has held the office of President, or acted as President, for more than two years of a term to which some other person was elected President shall be elected to the office of the President more than once. But this article shall not apply to any person holding the office of President when this article was proposed by the Congress, and shall not prevent any person who may be holding the office of President, or acting as President, during the term within which this article becomes operative from holding the office of President or acting as President during the remainder of such term. Section 2 This article shall be inoperative unless it shall have been ratified as an amendment to the Constitution by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several states within seven years from the date of its submission to the states by the Congress.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #23
-
-
-
1961
Wash.DC gets enfranchised Section 1 The District constituting the seat of government of the United States shall appoint in such manner as the Congress may direct: A number of electors of President and Vice President equal to the whole number of Senators and Representatives in Congress to which the District would be entitled if it were a state, but in no event more than the least populous state; they shall be in addition to those appointed by the states, but they shall be considered, for the purposes of the election of President and Vice President, to be electors appointed by a state; and they shall meet in the District and perform such duties as provided by the twelfth article of amendment. Section 2 The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #24
-
-
-
1964
Section 1 The right of citizens of the United States to vote in any primary or other election for President or Vice President, for electors for President or Vice President, or for Senator or Representative in Congress, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state by reason of failure to pay any poll tax or other tax. Section 2 The Congress shall have power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #25
-
-
-
1967
Section 1 In case of the removal of the President from office or of his death or resignation, the Vice President shall become President. SectSection 2 Whenever there is a vacancy in the office of the Vice President, the President shall nominate a Vice President who shall take office upon confirmation by a majority vote of both Houses of Congress. Section 3 Whenever the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that he is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, and until he transmits to them a written declaration to the contrary, such powers and duties shall be discharged by the Vice President as Acting President. Section 4 Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President. Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
US Constitution Amendment #26
-
-
-
1971
Section 1 The right of citizens of the United States, who are 18 years of age or older, to vote, shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or any state on account of age. Section 2 The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.
Some of these have not had the desired (?) effect.
In/Compl
defend
Voltaire
François Marie Arquet
attributed by S.G. Tallentyre, The Friends of Voltaire, 1907
1694- 1778
I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.
often mis-quoted
In/Compl
atrocities
Voltaire
François Marie Arquet
-
1750?
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.
-
In/Compl
lowering the tone
Wagner
Mike
Mudman of Ninian South
10 Feb 2000
[response to expression of mild letchery about chanteuse]Would you crawl ten miles to eat peanuts out of her shit?
but who was the singer?
Compl
Calvin & Hobbes
Watterson
Bill
Calvin & Hobbes
1987
[Calvin to Hobbes] It says here that religion is the opiate of the masses. What do you suppose that means? [TV in corner to itself] It means Karl Marx hadn't seen anything yet.
-
In/Compl
Pointless Universe
Weinberg
Steven
Quoted in Sci Am June 2000, p 92
2000
the more the universe seems comprehensible, the more it also seems pointless
-
In/Compl
Air travel safety
Weir
Andrew
New Scientist # 2198 and a book.
07 Aug 1999
Commonly the air industry quotes a safety record of 0.03 deaths per 100M km travelled, compared to rail at 0.1. But the distances aircraft travel makes this misleading, and it ignores the takeoff/ landing concentration of deaths. Comparing JOURNEYS instead, per 100M journeys, trains kill 2.7 people, cars 4.5 people and planes 55.
from The Tombstone Imperative-- The truth about Air Safety, 1999, Simon & Schuster
In/Compl
Electron's Charge?
Wheeler
John
in conversation with Richard Feynman, recounted in Feynman's 11 Dec 1965 Nobel Lecture
originally 1940s
W : "Feynman, I know why all electrons have the same charge and the same mass. F : "Why?" W : "Because they are all the same electron!" [Suppose the world line of a particle were knotted or tangled complexly (including effects from inflation of the universe, so not limited to one light cone). Then in any one cross section through the universe on a light cone, the particle will appear in many places in the spatial time slice. Also, when the particle traverses the time plane in one sense, it will present one charge, mass, spin etc, but when travelling in the opposite sense (e.g. from past to future instead of the reverse), it will present these parameters reversed. I.E. the anti-particle.
Which raises a question for me : if this is an accurate representation, what happens when particle and anti-particle meet. Is a loop of 'particular' string formed, or a loop of the knot cut. Would the annihilation energy be the release of strain from the knot/ angle?
In/Compl
History
Wilde
Oscar
Intentions
1891
The one duty we owe to history is to rewrite it.
-
In/Compl
Democracy
Wilde
Oscar
Sebastian Melmoth
1891
Democracy means simply the bludgeoning of of the people by the people for the people.
-
In/Compl
Truth
Wilde
Oscar
The Importance of Being Earnest
1895
The truth is rarely pure, and never simple.
-
In/Compl
De Profundis
Wilde
Oscar
De Profundis
1987?
The bond of all companionship, whether in companionship or in friendship, is conversation.
-
In/Compl
dying words
Wilde
Oscar
-
1899?
Either this wallpaper has to go, or I do.
-
In/Compl
Fiction
Wilde
Oscar
The Importance of being Ernest
ca. 1890
MISSPRISM: the good ended happily and the bad unhappily. That is what Fiction means.
cynic!
In/Compl
Wilde experience
Wilde
Oscar
Lady Windemere's Fan (Act 3)
-
Experience is the name every one gives to their mistakes.
-
In/Compl
Hangovers
Wodehouse
P.G.
in voce Bertie Worcester
1930?
I woke this morning with a hangover when a cat STAMPED into the room.
-
In/Compl
Wilde ignorance
Wilde
Oscar
The Importance of Being Earnest (Act 1)
-
Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone.
In/Compl
PGP
Zimmerman
Phillip K
1994
PGP is for people who prefer to pack their own parachutes.
In/Compl
Reducto ad Absurdium
Zeno of Elea
ca 400 BC
A flying arrow must keep traversing one half of the remaining distance to it's target in order to get there, and it will take a finite time to do so. But the distance can be halved infinitely, so it will take an infinite number of finite amounts of time to get to the target. This demonstrates by "reduction to absurdity" that motion is impossible. What Zeno was actually refuting was the assertion of Pythagoras that nature is made of many things and not of one.
Compl
Be silent
Wittgenstein
Ludwig
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
1922 CE
Whereof one cannot speak thereof one must be silent.
A posh way of saying, "if you don't know (or refuse to elucidate) what your'e talking about, STFU.
Compl
Roy Battys Soliloquy
Hauer
Rutger
Blade Runner
1982
I've seen things you people wouldn't believe... Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion... I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhäuser Gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain... Time to die.
Hauer drastically re-wrote his lines form what the scriptwriter gave him - and the scriptwriter swallowed it on set. Allegedly. Since then, Hauer's version has gained screen (and tattoo) immortality. (I may have a double-entry here.)
Compl
Roy Batty's Eyes
Scott
Ridley
Blade Runner
1982
Chew, if only you could see what I've seen with your eyes
Chew is an eye designer for Tyrell Corp ; Roy is one of their replicants, back on Earth after a career as a "space marine".
Compl
mnemonic
Surname
Given name
reference
date
quote
It looks as if I''ve ve finished the baccklog, and can start adding new stuff.
Then I need to work out how to sort it. Or convert to a database.
I'd come to some conclusions about how to "relatively" easily do it. But I can't afford materials to either do it, or make jigs. The "fat and thin" rhombus method seems most approachable.
--
Tenet Square
Anon
Y. Mouse
n/a
unclear
"SATOR, AREPO, TENET Opera, Rotas" is a word puzzle sitting at the intersection of a lot of forms. It is palindromic - in two directions. It has relations to "magic squares". It has been acused of holding mystical meaning (though the Christian interpretation only dates to the 6th century). It has been known and cited throughout history, but the oldest example is from Pompeii, discovered in 1925. One translation is that "The farmer Arepo holds the wheel" - referring to the wheel on a Roman era ploughshare.
S A T O R
A R E P O
T E N E T
O P E R A
R O T A S
From Wiki : SATOR (nominative noun; from serere, 'to sow') sower, planter, founder, progenitor (usually divine); originator; literally 'seeder'.
AREPO : unknown word, perhaps a proper name, either invented to complete the palindrome or of a non-Latin origin
TENET : (verb; from tenere, 'to hold') he/she/it holds, keeps, comprehends, possesses, masters, preserves, sustains.
OPERA : (ablative [see opera] singular noun) service, pains, labor; care, effort, attention.
ROTAS : (rotās, accusative plural of rota) wheels."
