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Don't ask the barber whether you need a haircut.
Don't ask the barber whether you need a haircut.
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at read more
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.
A society that refuses to strive for superfluities is likely to end up lacking in necessities.
A society that refuses to strive for superfluities is likely to end up lacking in necessities.
How much easier is self-sacrifice than self-realization.
How much easier is self-sacrifice than self-realization.
This strange disease of modern life, with its sick hurry, its divided aims.
This strange disease of modern life, with its sick hurry, its divided aims.
People do not cooperate under the division of labor because they love or should love one another. They cooperate because read more
People do not cooperate under the division of labor because they love or should love one another. They cooperate because this best serves their own interests. Neither love nor charity nor any other sympathetic sentiments but rightly understood selfishness is what originally impelled man to adjust himself to the requirements of society, to respect the rights and freedoms of his fellow men and to substitute peaceful collaboration for enmity and conflict.
The process of evolution may be described as differentiation of structure and integration of function. The more differentiated and specialized read more
The process of evolution may be described as differentiation of structure and integration of function. The more differentiated and specialized the parts, the more elaborate co-ordination is needed to create a well-balanced whole. The ultimate criterion of the value of a functional whole is the degree of its internal harmony or integratedness, whether the "functional whole" is a biological species or a civilization or an individual. A whole is defined by the pattern of relations between its parts, not by the sum of its parts; and a civilization is not defined by the sum of its science, technology, art and social organization, but by the total pattern which they form, and the degree of harmonious integration in that pattern.
General jackdaw culture, very little more than a collection of charming miscomprehensions, untargeted enthusiasms, and a general habit of skimming.
General jackdaw culture, very little more than a collection of charming miscomprehensions, untargeted enthusiasms, and a general habit of skimming.
...most scientific problems are far better understood by studying their history than their logic.
...most scientific problems are far better understood by studying their history than their logic.
