Explanation Quotes - Page 24

• Hopefully we are emerging from an era of fantasy explanations for real phenomena. The authors certainly have to face a community of therapists who are obsessionally committed to explanations for disease and for therapy unsupported by a scrap of evidence except for their claimed therapeutic success.

  Patrick David Wall

  Pain, Real, Community

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• The apostles suffered incredible persecution and died horrible deaths in the Christian cause. The only possible explanation for their zeal was that they had actually seen, talked with and eaten with the resurrected Lord Jesus Christ. If Christ had not really risen and had not appeared to the apostles, would they all have died for a lie?

  Fritz Ridenour

  Christian, Jesus, Lying

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• One could dismiss the zombie trend as merely feeding a mass public that craves the strange and bizarre. Such an explanation would be only skin-deep. Popular culture often provides a window into the subliminal or unstated fears of citizens, and zombies are no exception. Some cultural commentators argue that the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks are a primary cause for renewed interest in the living dead, and the numbers appear to back up this assertion.

  Daniel Drezner

  Numbers, September 11, Zombie

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• The theory of politics that emerges from the political literature of the pre-Revolutionary years rests on the belief that what lay behind every political scene, the ultimate explanation of every political controversy, was the disposition of power.

  Bernard Bailyn

  Years, Political, Literature

  Bernard Bailyn (2012). “The Ideological Origins of the American Revolution”, p.55, Harvard University Press

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• Creativity can never be explained by appeal to reason alone. Like the birth of a child, creativity compels us not to explanation but to wonder and awe.

  George Vaillant

  Children, Creativity, Birth

  George E. Vaillant (1995). “The Wisdom of the Ego”, p.230, Harvard University Press

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• The scientific method is the ultimate elegant explanation. It is the ultimate foundation for anything worthy of the name "explanation". It makes no sense to talk about explanations without having a process for deciding which are right and which are wrong, and in a broad sense that is what the scientific method is about. All of the other wonderful explanations celebrated here owe their origin and credibility to the process by which they are verified-the scientific method.

  Nathan Myhrvold

  Names, Scientific Method, Foundation

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• Reality is far more complex and messy than many of the grander themes and explanations would have us believe.

  Peter Dicken

  Believe, Reality, Theme

  Peter Dicken (2003). “Global Shift: Reshaping the Global Economic Map in the 21st Century”, p.14, SAGE

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• I've always wondered where explanations end and excuses begin.

  Errol Morris

  Excuse, Ends

  "New Morris Film Traps McNamara in a Fog of War" by Ron Rosenbaum, observer.com. September 29, 2003.

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• The transcendent and the numinous can be accessible to the most materialistic of scientists, without positing the supernatural. At the same time, there is no reason to mistrust the same experiences in believers simply because they posit a supernatural source. The question is not, "Does God exist?" It's irrelevant. The question is whether believers and nonbelievers can rejoice in the same experiences and not denigrate the other's explanation as to the origins of very powerful human responses.

  Norman Cota

  Powerful, Unity, Doe

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• As for the Jews, their explanation of anti-Semitism is more characteristic yet. In addition to the usual cliche, "with hatred and savagery" - naturally with no motive, they do not care to discuss motives - according to them, anti-Semitism is a madness, an intellectual degeneration, an affliction of the spirit.

  A. C. Cuza

  Hatred, Intellectual, Usual

  "Ştiinţa antisemitismului ("The Science of Anti-Semitism")". "Apararea Nationala" ("The National Defense") No. 16, Nov. 15, 1922.

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• a great man always knows better than to explain unless an explanation is demanded. To rush into explanations and excuses is always a sign of weakness.

  Agatha Christie

  Men, Weakness, Excuse

  Agatha Christie (1959). “Murder at the manor: The Seven dials mystery, Crooked House, Ordeal by innocence”

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• Although my view is a world-wide one and my area of observation is Europe, the nation closest to my heart is, understandably, my homeland. And it is a fortunate coincidence, fortunate in terms of the explanation of the world, that it is this country which is the clearest example of the playground of destructive development in the whole world.

  Pentti Linkola

  Country, Heart, Views

  "Can Life Prevail?: A Radical Approach to the Environmental Crisis". Book by Pentti Linkola, 2004.

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• It appears, from all that precedes, reasonably certain that if there be any relative motion between the earth and the luminiferous ether, it must be small; quite small enough entirely to refute Fresnel's explanation of aberration.

  Albert A. Michelson

  Aberration, Earth, Enough

  "On the Relative Motion of the Earth and the Luminiferous Ether". Article by by Albert A. Michelson and Edward W. Morley. American Journal of Science, 1887, 34 (203), p. 341, en.wikisource.org. 1887.

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• Without the Christian explanation of original sin, the seemingly silly story of Adam and Eve and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, there was no explanation of conflict. At all.

  Donald Miller

  Christian, Silly, Evil

  Donald Miller (2012). “Blue Like Jazz: Movie Edition: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality”, p.32, Thomas Nelson Inc

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• You can assume that if a writer's work has survived for centuries, there are reasons why this is so, explanations that have nothing to do with a conspiracy of academics plotting to resuscitate a zombie army of dead white males.

  Francine Prose

  Army, White, Zombie

  Francine Prose (2009). “Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them”, p.15, Harper Collins

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• Death is not regarded as a natural affair by primitive man. Death is believed to be due to the intervention of some malevolent or at least not well disposed power. Normally it should not take place. So we have all through history crude explanations of death, as e.g., the influence of the serpent, the devil, sin.

  Joseph Alexander Leighton

  Men, Primitive Man, Devil

  Joseph Alexander Leighton (1918). “The Field of Philosophy: An Outline of Lectures on Introduction to Philosophy”

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• Writing about race and crime was not new territory for me. But it can be treacherous. So here are my rules: No stereotypes. No generalizations. No explanations. No apologies. Just the facts, ma'am.

  Colin Flaherty

  Writing, Apology, Race

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• Work/Loaf Ratio”...I have spent fourteen years perfecting... I won't bore you with a long-winded explanation of the “W/LR” save to say that it is an algebraic formula of such complex numeric subtlety that it can be understood only by mathematicians and hobos.

  Gary Reilly

  Years, Bores You, Long

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• If a large number of people who are convinced alien abductions are real are hypnotising even larger numbers of others who suspect they might be, then it is likely there will be many alien abduction narratives flying around, as, indeed, there are. Of course, this is not proof they are not true, but it does provide a persuasive context for a simple psychosocial explanation. Hypnotism is a technique that triggers a mass storytelling project in which all the stories are linked.

  Bryan Appleyard

  Real, Simple, Numbers

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• I have shown that those who deplore Artificial Intelligence are also those who deplore the evolutionary accounts of human mentality: if human minds are non-miraculous products of evolution, then they are, in the requisite sense, artifacts, and all their powers must have an ultimately mechanical explanation. We are descended from macros and made of macros, and nothing we can do is beyond the power of huge assemblies of macros.

  Daniel Dennett

  Mind, Evolution, Assembly

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• Changing ideas is a strain not to be lightly incurred, particularly when these ideas are intimately related to one's self-esteem ... men have elaborated an explanation for their situation in life... Their rationales are endowed with moral qualities.

  Robert E Lane

  Self Esteem, Men, Ideas

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• Of course the theory of evolution would be vacuous if it offered a glib explanation for every inexplicable act.

  Steven Pinker

  Theory Of Evolution, Atheism, Would Be

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• Science needs the intuition and metaphorical power of the arts, and the arts need the fresh blood of science ... Interpretation is the logical channel of consilient explanation between science and the arts. The arts ... also nourish our craving for the mystical.

  E. O. Wilson

  Art, Blood, Intuition

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• Well, one thing that I like to do is treat the audience as if they're already kind of at the table - they're already a part of the conversation. They don't need the 101 explanation. It's as if bringing a stranger to the table to sit down with these people who are already acting as peers or friends and opening up and just sharing their stories.

  Rhys Ernst

  People, Acting, Kind

  Source: www.ew.com

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• As an explanation of the world materialism has a sort of insane simplicity. It has the quality of a madman's arguments; we have at once the sense of it covering everything and the sense of it leaving everything out.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Simplicity, Leaving, Insane

  Gilbert K. Chesterton (2013). “The Essential Gilbert K. Chesterton”, p.15, Simon and Schuster

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