Existential Quotes - Page 12

• I also think that we [Americans] are operating out of fear in our country. It's not that terrorism is not a threat, but it's not an existential threat. It is not the preeminent threat facing most Americans on any given day, and yet the power of nightmares is so strong.

  Jeremy Scahill

  Country, Strong, Thinking

  Source: collider.com

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• People without plants are in a state of perpetual neurosis, a state of existential wanting.

  Terence McKenna

  People, Neurosis, Plant

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• What I'm talking about is actually is the Mystery of Being as existential fact. That there is something that haunts this world that can take apart and reduce every single one of us to a mixture of terror and ecstasy, fear and trembling. It is not an idea, that's the primary thing to bear in mind. It's an experience.

  Terence McKenna

  Talking, Ideas, Mind

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• I think we should be very careful about artificial intelligence. If I had to guess at what our biggest existential threat is, it's probably that. So we need to be very careful...With artificial intelligence we're summoning the demon.

  Elon Musk

  Thinking, Needs, Demon

  "Elon Musk: artificial intelligence is our biggest existential threat" by Samuel Gibbs, www.theguardian.com. October 27, 2014.

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• ...Erich Fromm wondered why most people did not become insane in the face of the existential contradiction between a symbolic self, that seems to give man infinite worth in a timeless scheme of things, and a body that is worth about 98¢.

  Ernest Becker

  Men, Self, People

  "The Denial of Death". Book by Ernest Becker, 1973.

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• I came to the conclusion that there is an existential moment in your life when you must decide to speak for yourself; nobody else can speak for you.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Speak, Moments, Conclusion

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• I consulted a therapist at Mass. General. After about 20 minutes, he stopped me and said, 'You're just a big existential garbage pail. Go home and relax.'

  Spalding Gray

  Home, Relax, Garbage

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• Few understand that procrastination is our natural defense, letting things take care of themselves and exercise their antifragility; it results from some ecological or naturalistic wisdom, and is not always bad - at an existential level, it is my body rebelling against its entrapment. It is my soul fighting the Procrustean bed of modernity.

  Nassim Nicholas Taleb

  Procrastination, Fighting, Exercise

  Nassim Nicholas Taleb (2012). “Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder”, p.122, Random House

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• If you ask me, the hypothetical zenith of gaming technology is direct neural interface - no body to hamper you and your brain is in whatever you want it to be in. Plus it leads to existential uncertainty, which could be entertaining.

  Yahtzee Croshaw

  Technology, Brain, Zenith

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• I reject the idea that there is some sort of existential "clash of civilizations." I am an interventionist, but not a militarist. War should always be a last resort.

  Bernard-Henri Levy

  War, Civilization, Ideas

  Source: www.spiegel.de

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• From the Israeli perspective, the fear is that if pressure is off of Iran, Israel would be left having to accept the balance of power in the region significantly shifting toward Iran. It's not an existential threat, but it would definitely be a problem for Israel.

  Trita Parsi

  Israel, Iran, Perspective

  Source: www.motherjones.com

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• True, we must dare look things in the face before we dare think, speak, act, or assume responsibility. If we dare not even look, what else are we good for?

  Lu Xun

  Responsibility, Thinking, Looks

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• The world is changing from day to day; it is high time for our writers to take off their masks, look frankly, keenly, and boldly at life, and write about real flesh and blood. It is high time for a brand-new arena for literature, high time for some bold fighters to charge headlong into battle!

  Lu Xun

  Real, Writing, Blood

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• True fighters dare face the sorrows of humanity, and look unflinchingly at bloodshed. What sorrow and joy are theirs! But the Creator's common device for ordinary people is to let the passage of time wash away old traces leaving only pale-red bloodstains and a vague pain; and he lets men live on ignobly and amid these, to keep this quasi-human world going.

  Lu Xun

  Pain, Men, People

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• Men who have not known the horror of death are not likely to be awed by it.

  Lu Xun

  Men, Horror, Known

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• Optimism....is neither weak nor naive. It can be tough and pure and earned just as clearly as any brooding existential despair.

  Charlie Pierce

  Optimistic, Optimism, Despair

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• Why should young people look for guides who hang out gided placards to advertise themselves? They would do better to look for friends, unite with them, and advance together towards some quarter where it seems possible to survive.

  Lu Xun

  People, Together, Looks

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• I could not blot out hope, for hope belongs to the future.

  Lu Xun

  Lu Xun (2014). “Call to Arms”, p.9, Simon and Schuster

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• The ability to forget the past enables people to free themselves gradually from the pain they once suffered; but it also often makes them repeat the mistakes of their predecessors.

  Lu Xun

  Pain, Mistake, Past

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• And desires are never here and now - they are non-existential. They are just mental, in the mind. And they cannot be fulfilled because their very nature is to move into the future.

  Rajneesh

  Moving, Mind, Desire

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• People are searching for reasons for believing, searching for answers to the big existential questions of "Why am I here?" and "What is life all about?" I find that people are able to accept the teaching of the Gospel when it's presented to them in both a rational and positive way.

  Jonathan Morris

  Believe, Teaching, People

  "Father Jonathan Morris talks about working with Mel Gibson, Fox News, self-help books and running The Cat". Interview with John W. Kennedy, www.beliefnet.com. June 2012.

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• There've been times when I have existential conversations with myself, and I've thought about leaving and trying to apply my education better. But ultimately it doesn't really matter. Learning how to write, learning how to write papers and structure, that's been very helpful for writing.

  Rashida Jones

  Writing, Leaving, Trying

  "Keeping Up with Rashida Jones". Interview with Emma Brown, www.interviewmagazine.com. August 2, 2012.

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• ather than Eisenstein's fast and hard cutting, I like to hold the shot very still and for longer than we're accustomed to. For me personally as a viewer, this technique invariably causes me to have waves of emotions that I think arise from a profound form of mindful awareness and the feelings that go along with that. I am frequently brought to tears by this kind of existential cinematic technique.

  Jenni Olson

  Cutting, Thinking, Profound

  Source: blogs.indiewire.com

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• My films require that the spectator ask the big existential questions. If you're not interested of turning inwards for answers, my films won't fulfill their whole purpose.

  Lisa Langseth

  Purpose, Answers, Film

  Source: blogs.indiewire.com

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• We, the great American nation, decided that we've got 138 military bases around the world and we've now figured out that we can buy these drones from the Israelis, and we've decided that the way to proceed is to use this new technology to go and kill anybody that we don't like or who disagrees with us or who we might perceive as making an existential threat.

  Roger Waters

  Military, Technology, Drones

  Source: thequietus.com

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