“Of all men’s miseries the bitterest is this: to know so much and to have control over nothing.” ~ Herodotus, The Histories
Tag: Philosophy
May 31
Nyota wa Kilimanjaro
The last couple of years, life has had some sad hardships which I will not recount here. Travel has not been a priority. In fact: I’ve struggled to find the usual enthusiasm for something that is normally such a passion. I’m confident I’ll find heart for it again. But for now, I have my photos …
Apr 27
March 2024 – Quote of the Month
“There is something infantile in the presumption that somebody else has a responsibility to give your life meaning and point… The truly adult view, by contrast, is that our life is as meaningful, as full and as wonderful as we choose to make it.” ~ Richard Dawkins, The God Delusion
Feb 28
January 2024 – Quote of the Month
“The human race is a monotonous affair. Most people spend the greatest part of their time working in order to live, and what little freedom remains so fills them with fear that they seek out any and every means to be rid of it.” ~ Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, The Sorrows of Young Werther
Oct 22
Hell Hitler
The King James version of the Bible has a fair amount to say about Hell. A single case in point: “And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them. And I saw the …
Sep 19
August 2023 – Quote of the Month
“His grief he will not forget; but it will not darken his heart, it will teach him wisdom.” ~J.R.R. Tolkien, (Aragorn), The Return of the King
Jul 09
June 2023 – Quote of the Month
“Nothing is permanent in this wicked world, not even our troubles.” ~ Charlie Chaplin
Apr 26
March 2023 – Quote of the Month
“None are so old as those who have outlived enthusiasm.” ~Henry David Thoreau
Mar 26
February 2023 – Quote of the Month
“That which isn’t good for the hive, isn’t good for the bee.” ~Marcus Aurelius
Feb 26
January 2023 – Quote of the Month
“Whenever you are about to find fault with someone, ask yourself the following question: What fault of mine most nearly resembles the one I am about to criticize? ~Marcus Aurelius
Jan 30
December 2022 – Quote of the Month
“Nobody can bring you peace but yourself.” ~Ralph Waldo Emerson
Dec 26
November 2022 – Quote of the Month
“I think it’s perfectly possible to explain how the universe came about without bringing God into it, but I don’t know everything, and there may well be a God somewhere, hiding away. Actually, if he is keeping out of sight, it’s because he’s ashamed of his followers and all the cruelty and ignorance they’re responsible …
Oct 20
September 2022 – Quote of the Month
“Fairy tales are more than true: not because they tell us that dragons exist, but because they tell us that dragons can be beaten.” ~Neil Gaiman, Coraline
Sep 27
August 2022 – Quote of the Month
“Fantasy, if it’s really convincing, can’t become dated, for the simple reason that it represents a flight into a dimension that lies beyond the reach of time.” ~Walt Disney
Jul 01
June 2022 – Quote of the Month
“You cannot run away from weakness; you must some time fight it out or perish; and if that be so, why not now, and where you stand?” ~ Robert Louis Stevenson
Jun 01
May 2022 – Quote of the Month
“Think of the life you have lived until now as over and, as a dead man, see what’s left as a bonus and live it according to Nature.” ~Marcus Aurelius
Jan 22
December 2021 – Quote of the Month
“The summit is what drives us, but the climb itself is what matters.” ~Conrad Anker
Dec 02
November 2021 – Quote of the Month
“Nothing in life is to be feared, it is only to be understood. Now is the time to understand more, so that we may fear less.” ~ Marie Curie
Oct 20
September 2021 – Quote of the Month
“It is said an Eastern monarch once charged his wise men to invent him a sentence, to be ever in view, and which should be true and appropriate in all times and situations. They presented him the words: “And this, too, shall pass away.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
Sep 13
August 2021 – Quote of the Month
“Men fear thought as they fear nothing else on earth – more than ruin, more even than death. Thought is subversive and revolutionary, destructive and terrible, thought is merciless to privilege, established institutions, and comfortable habits; thought is anarchic and lawless, indifferent to authority, careless of the well-tried wisdom of the ages. Thought looks into …
May 18
April 2021 – Quote of the Month
“We are no longer happy so soon as we wish to be happier.” ~ Walter Savage Landor
Sep 18
August 2020 – Quote of the Month
“The way of fortune is like the milkyway in the sky; which is a number of small stars, not seen asunder, but giving light together: so it is a number of little and scarce discerned virtues, or rather faculties and customs, that make men fortunate.” ~ Francis Bacon
Aug 04
July 2020 – Quote of the Month
“We should always be asking ourselves: ‘Is this something that is, or is not, in my control?’” ~ Epictetus, Enchiridion
Jul 22
June 2020 – Quote of the Month
“A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone.” ~ Henry David Thoreau
Apr 26
March 2020 – Quote of the Month
“Yet do not cast all hope away. Tomorrow is unkown. Rede oft is found at the rising of the Sun.” ~LegolasThe Two TowersThe Lord of the RingsJRR Tolkien
Mar 28
February 2020 – Quote of the Month
“Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not; nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with talent. Genius will not; unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not; the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan “press on” has solved and always …
Dec 30
November 2019 – Quote of the Month
“How long are you going to wait before you demand the best for yourself?” ~Epictetus
Oct 17
September 2019 – Quote of the Month
“Change. How do you change yourself?… It’s easy to lose yourself or never find yourself. The older you get, the heavier that baggage becomes that you haven’t sorted through, so you run. I’ve done a lot of that kind of running. I’ve spent 35 years trying learn how to let go of the destructive parts …
Sep 27
August 2019 – Quote of the Month
“The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.” ~Isaac Asimov
Aug 09
July 2018 – Quote of the Month
“Many religions now come before us with ingratiating smirks and outspread hands, like an unctuous merchant in a bazaar. They offer consolation and solidarity and uplift, competing as they do in a marketplace. But we have a right to remember how barbarically they behaved when they were strong and were making an offer that people …
May 17
April 2018 – Quote of the Month
“The most common way people give up their power is by thinking they don’t have any.” ~Alice Walker
Feb 08
January 2018 – Quote of the Month
“There is no charm equal to tenderness of heart.” ~Jane Austen
Jan 09
December 2017 – Quote of the Month
“National boundaries are not evident when we view the Earth from space. Fanatical ethnic or religious or national chauvinisms are a little difficult to maintain when we see our planet as a fragile blue crescent fading to become an inconspicuous point of light against the bastion and citadel of the stars.” ~ Carl Sagan, Cosmos
Dec 30
A Rainbow of Stone
I wanted to write a post expressing my frustration and outrage at the train wreck of modern conservative politics, but I just finished a long post on my password protected Friends and Family section and I’m out of steam. These things need said: flares of distress need sent up. Spotlights of attention must be shone. …
Dec 03
November 2017 – Quote of the Month
“Every man is guilty of all the good he did not do.” ~ Voltaire
Nov 13
October 2017 – Quote of the Month
“Nationalism is an infantile disease. It is the measles of mankind.” ~ Albert Einstein
Sep 13
August 2017 – Quote of the Month
“I think some of the funniest and most artistic people I know are the ones who had a hard time at school. They often have humility and artistry. So, as much as I feel bad for kids who have to go through a rough childhood, I believe that if they can turn it around, it’s …
Aug 09
July 2017 – Quote of the Month
“The crucial test of ethical values is whether they apply to strangers, and those afar, not just in our midst.” ~ Bernard Crick, Essays on Citizenship, 2000
Jul 17
June 2017 – Quote of the Month
“Broken by it, I, too, may be; bow to it I never will. The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just; it shall not deter me.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
May 01
April 2017 – Quote of the Month
“Belief can be manipulated. Only knowledge is dangerous.” ~ Frank Herbert
Apr 07
March 2017 – Quote of the Month
“Besides, as the vilest Writer has his Readers, so the greatest Liar has his Believers; and it often happens, that if a Lie be believ’d only for an Hour, it has done its Work, and there is no farther occasion for it. Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when Men …
Nov 08
October 2016 – Quote of the Month
“The trouble is that we have a bad habit, encouraged by pedants and sophisticates, of considering happiness as something rather stupid. Only pain is intellectual, only evil interesting. This is the treason of the artist; a refusal to admit the banality of evil and the terrible boredom of pain.” ~ Ursula K. Le Guin, The …
Oct 12
September 2016 – Quote of the Month
“Compassion, in which all ethics must take root, can only attain its full breadth and depth if it embraces all living creatures and does not limit itself to mankind.” ~ Albert Schweitzer
Sep 01
August 2016 – Quote of the Month
“The very concept of objective truth is fading out of the world. Lies will pass into history.” ~George Orwell
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