Thursday, January 25, 2007
 

(3089/898) I. Asimov

491) I have never, in all my life, not for one moment, been tempted toward religion of any kind. The fact is that I feel no spiritual void. I have my philosophy of life, which does not include any aspect of the supernatural and which I find totally satisfying. I am, in short, a rationalist and believe only that which reason tells me is so.
Isaac Asimov
I. Asimov (1994)

492) When the average man saw lightning rods rising over the steeples of the great cathedrals of Europe, he could see with his own eyes that the priests themselves trusted in science rather than in their own holiness [to protect them against the universe], and the battle [between science and religion] was over right there. In the last two centuries, religion has retreated steadily before science.
Isaac Asimov
"Essay 400 - A Way of Thinking" in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (12/94)

493) Any attempt to introduce sex education classes into the school curriculum is always met with fierce opposition. The feeling among those who oppose it [...] is that learning about sex will encourage youngsters to experiment with it and lead to unwanted pregnancies and disease. To me, this seem ridiculous. Nothing on earth can stop youngsters from experimenting with sex, unless they are kept so brutally in ignorance and captivity that their lives are distorted and ruined. By stripping away the mysteries of sex and treating it openly, the act is robbed of its illegality, of its attraction as "forbidden fruit." In my opinion, good knowledge of all aspects of sex, including proper methods of contraception and hygiene, will actually reduce unwanted pregnancies and disease.
Isaac Asimov
I. Asimov (1994)

494) [I]f I were not an atheist, I would believe in a God who would choose to save people on the basis of the totality of their lives and not the pattern on their words. I think he would prefer an honest and righteous atheist to a TV preacher whose every word is God, God, God, and whose every deed is foul, foul, foul.
Isaac Asimov
I. Asimov (1994)

495) It seems to me that people who believe in immortality through transmigration of souls have a tendency to believe that they were all Julius Caesar or Cleopatra in the past and that they will be equally prominent in the future. Surely, that can't be so, Since some 90 percent of the human race lives (and has always, in time past, lived) in various degrees of poverty and misery, the chances are weighted against any transmigrating personalities ending up in happiness.
Isaac Asimov
I. Asimov (1994)

496) I'm sure that science can't ever explain everything and I can give you my reasons for that decision [...] I believe that scientific knowledge has fractal properties; that no matter how much we learn, whatever is left over, however small it may seem, is just as infinitely complex as the whole was to start with. That, I think, is the secret of the Universe.
Isaac Asimov
remarks made c. 1988
quoted in I. Asimov (1994)

497) There is a difference between fiction and ignorance.
Isaac Asimov
"Essay 400 - A Way of Thinking" in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (12/94)

498) Uncertainty that comes from knowledge (knowing what you don't know) is different from uncertainty coming from ignorance.
Isaac Asimov
"Essay 400 - A Way of Thinking" in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (12/94)

499) My thesis [...] is not doubt-for-doubt's-sake, but doubt as a necessary barrier which the valid can overcome and the non-valid cannot. The more a finding seems to destroy the basis of scientific structure, the higher the barrier of doubt. Of course one must remember that "doubt" is not synonymous with "refusal to listen."
Isaac Asimov
"Essay 400 - A Way of Thinking" in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (12/94)

500) In this present world, scientific illiteracy is a sin and anyone who encourages the spread of scientific illiteracy is a criminal.
Isaac Asimov
"Essay 400 - A Way of Thinking" in
The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction (12/94)

Note: "3089/898" is the designation I've given to the project of posting all my collected quotes, excerpts and ideas (3089 of them) in the remaining days of the Bush administration (of which there were 898 left when I began).

As of today, there are 726 days remaining in the administration of the worst American President ever.

Ed Fitzgerald | 1/25/2007 11:20:00 PM | | | del.icio.us | GO: TOP OF HOME PAGE







by

Ed Fitzgerald

Clowns to the left of me,
Jokers to the right,
Here I am...
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HOUSE
Democrats 230 (+27) - Republicans 205

Actual:
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SENATE
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Actual:
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ELECTION PROJECTIONS SURVEY
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Martin van Creveld - The Transformation of War

Jay Feldman - When the Mississippi Ran Backwards

Martin van Creveld - The Rise and Decline of the State

Alfred W. Crosby - America's Forgotten Pandemic (1989)
bush & company are...
absolutist
aggresive
anti-Constitutional
anti-intellectual
arrogant
authoritarian
blame-placers
blameworthy
blinkered
buckpassers
calculating
class warriors
clueless
compassionless
con artists
conniving
conscienceless
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corrupt
craven
criminal
crooked
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deadly
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ideologues
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isolated
kleptocratic
lacking in empathy
lacking in public spirit
liars
mendacious
misleading
mistrustful
non-rational
not candid
not "reality-based"
not trustworthy
oblivious
oligarchic
opportunistic
out of control
pernicious
perverse
philistine
plutocratic
prevaricating
propagandists
rapacious
relentless
reprehensible
rigid
scandalous
schemers
selfish
secretive
shameless
sleazy
tricky
unAmerican
uncaring
uncivil
uncompromising
unconstitutional
undemocratic
unethical
unpopular
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unrealistic
unreliable
unrepresentative
unscientific
unscrupulous
unsympathetic
venal
vile
virtueless
warmongers
wicked
without integrity
wrong-headed

Thanks to: Breeze, Chuck, Ivan Raikov, Kaiju, Kathy, Roger, Shirley, S.M. Dixon
recently seen
Island in the Sky (1952)

Robot Chicken

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Elliott Abrams
Steven Abrams (Kansas BofE)
David Addington
Howard Fieldstead Ahmanson
Roger Ailes (FNC)
John Ashcroft
Bob Bennett
William Bennett
Joe Biden
John Bolton
Alan Bonsell (Dover BofE)
Pat Buchanan
Bill Buckingham (Dover BofE)
George W. Bush
Saxby Chambliss
Bruce Chapman (DI)
Dick Cheney
Lynne Cheney
Richard Cohen
The Coors Family
Ann Coulter
Michael Crichton
Lanny Davis
Tom DeLay
William A. Dembski
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Leonard Downie (WaPo)
Dinesh D’Souza
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Jerry Falwell
Douglas Feith
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Alberto Gonzalez
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Philip E. Johnson
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Ken Lay
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Rush Limbaugh
Trent Lott
Frank Luntz


"American Fundamentalists"
by Joel Pelletier
(click on image for more info)


Chris Matthews
Mitch McConnell
Stephen C. Meyer (DI)
Judith Miller (ex-NYT)
Zell Miller
Tom Monaghan
Sun Myung Moon
Roy Moore
Dick Morris
Rupert Murdoch
Ralph Nader
John Negroponte
Grover Norquist
Robert Novak
Ted Olson
Elspeth Reeve (TNR)
Bill O'Reilly
Martin Peretz (TNR)
Richard Perle
Ramesh Ponnuru
Ralph Reed
Pat Robertson
Karl Rove
Tim Russert
Rick Santorum
Richard Mellon Scaife
Antonin Scalia
Joe Scarborough
Susan Schmidt (WaPo)
Bill Schneider
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Ron Silver
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Margaret Spellings
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Donald Trump
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guest-blogging
All the fine sites I've
guest-blogged for:




Be sure to visit them all!!
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Poulenc - Piano Music

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Isaac Asimov
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"Catch-22"
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Elvis Costello
Richard Dawkins
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Fela
Firesign Theatre
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Frank Herbert
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Yes
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© 2003-2008
Ed Fitzgerald

=o=

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