TRVTH

Books

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 04:56:00 +0000

Books say: She did this because. Life says: She did this. Books are where things are explained to you; life is where things aren't. I'm not surprised some people prefer books. Books make sense of life. The only problem is that the lives they make sense of are other people's lives, never our own.

-- Julian Barnes (19 January 1946-) British novelist and short story writer, Flaubert's Parrot, p 168

No Moral Precept

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 05:37:00 +0000

There is no moral precept that does not have something inconvenient about it.

-- Denis Diderot (1713 - 1784), French philosopher and chief editor of the historic project to produce L'Encyclopidie, as quoted in Dictionary of Foreign Quotations (1980) by Mary Collison, Robert L. Collison, p. 235

Amateurs

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 05:32:00 +0000

Software is an incredibly young discipline. Everything in software is so new and so frequently being reinvented that almost nobody really knows what they are doing. It is amateurs who make all the progress.

-- Jeff Atwood, 29 May 2008, Coding Horror Blog,
http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/001124.html

Crosses The Line

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 04:48:00 +0000

When it works, it's amazingly impactful, but when it doesn't work, it's not only creepy but off-putting. What a marketer might think is endearing, by knowing a little bit about you, actually crosses the line pretty easily.

-- Tim Hanlon of Riverview Lane Associates of Chicago, on advertising aimed at Facebook users, New York Times, 4 March 2010

Worst Sin

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 05:42:00 +0000

The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them: that's the essence of inhumanity.

-- George Bernard Shaw (1856-1950), Irish literary critic, playwright and essayist, 1925 Nobel Laureate in Literature, The Devil's Disciple, Act II (1901)

Aladdin's Lamp

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Wed, 03 Mar 2010 04:36:00 +0000

Yes! Ready money is Aladdin's lamp.

-- Lord George Gordon (Noel) Byron, 6th Baron Byron 22 January 1788 - 19 April 1824), Anglo-Scottish poet and leading figure in Romanticism, Don Juan (canto XII, st. 12), 1823

What People Want

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 02 Mar 2010 04:58:00 +0000

When you're young, you look at television and think, "There's a conspiracy. The networks have conspired to dumb us down." But when you get a little older, you realize that's not true. The networks are in business to give people exactly what they want. That's a far more depressing thought. Conspiracy is optimistic! You can shoot the bastards! We can have a revolution! But the networks are really in business to give people what they want. It's the truth.

-- Steve Jobs (24 February 1955-), Chairman and CEO of Apple Inc., Interview in WIRED magazine, February 1996

Wolves

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 05:27:00 +0000

We have the greatest opportunity the world has ever seen, as long as we remain honest -- which will be as long as we can keep the attention of our people alive. If they once become inattentive to public affairs, you and I, and Congress and Assemblies, judges and governors would all become wolves.

-- Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826), third US president, architect and author, in a letter to Edward Carrington

Another Flaw

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Thu, 25 Feb 2010 04:58:00 +0000

Another flaw in the human character is that everybody wants to build and nobody wants to do maintenance.

-- Kurt Vonnegut, Hocus Pocus

Ethics v Morals

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 05:22:00 +0000

Ethics versus Morals. Ethical behavior may be defined as acting after thinking about what would produce the greatest good for the greatest number affected. Morals are a codification of prior ethical decisions, simplified into easy-to-grasp rules. Morals exist because most people are very uncomfortable with the uncertainties of attempting to figure out what the right course of action might be, and most and are reluctant to take responsibility for having made mistakes. Being ethical means making decisions based on inadequate data and acting anyway. Ethical actions frequently work out badly; the actor has no one to blame for the results but themselves. Acting ethically while still desiring certainties means being uncomfortable. Moral acts also often work out badly. The apparent advantage to being moral is that when a moral act works out badly no one is to blame because the actor did what was supposed to be done. Being moral is comfortable because a moral person always knows what should be done, did it and is not to blame for the outcomes.

-- Steve Solomon, "The Wisdom of Solomon",
www.soilandhealth.org/05steve'sfolder/0502wisdomofsol.html

Theater

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 02:47:00 +0000

It's a kind of theater. Sometimes, a car will fly by in the air.

-- Juma Gul, who works beside a mountainous stretch of the Afghan national highway that is famous for accidents, New York Times, 8 February 2010

Any Little Change

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Sat, 20 Feb 2010 04:18:00 +0000

Anything you put in that book, any little change you make, has huge implications not only for psychiatry but for pharmaceutical marketing, research, for the legal system, for who's considered to be normal or not, for who's considered disabled.

-- Dr. Michael First, professor of psychiatry at Columbia, on proposed changes to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, New York Times, 10 February 2010

Something Different

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 05:40:00 +0000

I saw it written once that the definition of insanity is repeating the same process over and over and expecting the outcome to suddenly be different. I am finally ready to stop this insanity. Well, Mr. Big Brother IRS man, let's try something different; take my pound of flesh and sleep well.

The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.

The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed.

Joe Stack (1956-2010)
02/18/2010

-- Closing paragraphs of a blog entry posted by Joseph Andrew Stack III just before he crashed an aircraft into the Austin office of the IRS, 18 February 2010

A House Of One Room

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Thu, 18 Feb 2010 05:38:00 +0000

How hard to realize that every camp of men or beast has this glorious starry firmament for a roof! In such places standing alone on the mountaintop it is easy to realize that whatever special nests we make -- leaves and moss like the marmots and birds, or tents or piled stone -- we all dwell in a house of one room -- the world with the firmament for its roof -- and are sailing the celestial spaces without leaving any track.

-- John Muir (1838-1914) American environmentalist, naturalist, traveler, writer, and scientist, John of the Mountains: The Unpublished Journals of John Muir (1938)

Thing That Unifies

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 05:04:00 +0000

The one thing that unifies men in a given age is not their individual philosophies but the dominant problem that these philosophies are designed to solve.

-- Jacques Barzun (b. 1907-11-30), French-born American scholar, historian, critic, teacher and editor, Classic, Romantic, Modern (1961), ch. I: Romanticism -- Dead or Alive?"

I Do Not Love Congress

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 05:48:00 +0000

After all these years, my passion for service to my fellow citizens is undiminished, but my desire to do so by serving in Congress has waned. For some time, I have had a growing conviction that Congress is not operating as it should. There is too much partisanship and not enough progress -- too much narrow ideology and not enough practical problem-solving. Even at a time of enormous challenge, the peoples' business is not being done.

... All of this and much more has led me to believe that there are better ways to serve my fellow citizens, my beloved state, and our nation than continued service in Congress.

To put it in words most people can understand: I love working for the people of Indiana, I love helping our citizens make the most of their lives, but I do not love Congress. I will not, therefore, be a candidate for election to the Senate this November.

-- Senator Evan Bayh (D-IN), announcing his retirement from the Senate, 15 February 2010

Fastball

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 04:10:00 +0000

Death ain't nothing but a fastball on the outside corner.

-- August Wilson (1945-2005), American playwright, Pulitzer Prize winner, "Fences", Act I, scene 1, character Troy Maxson, a former Negro League slugger

DF

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 05:03:00 +0000

Act

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 04:34:00 +0000

Act as if what you do makes a difference. It does.

-- William James (1842-1910), American Psychologist, Professor, Author

A Moral

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 05:50:00 +0000

Everything's got a moral, if only you can find it.

-- Lewis Carroll (Charles Lutwidge Dodgson), (1832 - 1898), British author, mathematician, Anglican clergyman, and logician, the Mock Turtle speaking to Alice, in Alice in Wonderland

Paranoiac In Reverse

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 05:58:00 +0000

I am a kind of paranoiac in reverse. I suspect people of plotting to make me happy.

-- J. D. Salinger (1 January 1919 - 27 January 2010), American author, Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters (1955)

RIP Howard Zinn

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 04:42:00 +0000

If those in charge of our society -- politicians, corporate executives, and owners of press and television -- can dominate our ideas, they will be secure in their power. They will not need soldiers patrolling the streets. We will control ourselves.

-- Howard Zinn (24 August 1924 - 27 January 2010), American historian, political scientist, playwright and activist, Declarations of Independence: Cross-Examining American Ideology (1991): "American Ideology"

A Very Small Stage

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 05:38:00 +0000

The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds.

-- Carl Sagan (1934-1996), astronomer and writer

Pre For Me

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 05:49:00 +0000

Palm Pre+ (Verizon) for me today. I've been carrying a Palm Centro as my combination cell phone/calendar/contacts/clock/music system/data caddy for the past year and a half or so. From the little I've played with it so far, the Pre does *not* feel like a Palm. It does feel like a slick high-tech device.

I've spent over 7 years learning all the Palm OS applications that are useful for the types of things I like to do. I hope it's quicker (and cheaper) to find and learn to use the best Pre software.

Compassion

noreply@blogger.com (Don Appleman) — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 05:02:00 +0000

If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.

-- Dalai Lama Jetsun Jamphel Ngawang Lobsang Yeshe Tenzin Gyatso (1935-), quoted in Meditations for Living In Balance: Daily Solutions for People Who Do Too Much (2000) by Anne Wilson Schaef