Provocative Quotes - Page 8

• Few realize that the world of modern mathematics is rich with vivid images and provocative ideas.

  Ivars Peterson

  Math, Ideas, Vivid

  Ivars Peterson (1998). “The Mathematical Tourist: New and Updated Snapshots of Modern Mathematics”, p.6, Macmillan

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• The script was classic Joe Eszterhas, intelligent, steamy and provocative. At one time, Eszterhas was Hollywood's highest paid writer, illiterate rock and roll bad boy whose 14 films glorified sex, drugsa nd cigarettes. Eszterhas also fought publicly with producers and politicians. In 1995 he argued that some of the misdeeds of the Nixon, Reagan and Bush administrations were more obscene than anything in an "R" rated movie.

  David Shuster

  Sex, Boys, Intelligent

  Source: www.nbcnews.com

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• I'm part of what I consider the entertainment industry. For my photos to be entertaining, they have to be provocative and new.

  David LaChapelle

  Entertainment, Entertaining, Industry

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• Alexander McQueen was one of the greatest fashion designers of his generation. His genius, sometimes provocative, admired and saluted by all, constantly opened new perspectives. Visionary and avant-garde, his creations took their inspiration from both tradition and timeless hyper-modernity.

  Francois-Henri Pinault

  Fashion, Inspiration, Perspective

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• That's what's provocative to me - that we can victimize people, we can torture and traumatize people with no consciousness that it is a shameful thing to do.

  Bryan Stevenson

  People, Consciousness, Torture

  Source: www.progressive.org

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• I used to get made fun of for being either too provocative or too eccentric, so I started to tone it down. I didn't fit in, and I felt like a freak.

  Lady Gaga

  Fun, Eccentric, Tone

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• Michel Houellebecq is the most interesting, provocative and important European novelist of my generation. Period. No one else comes close. He has written two or maybe three great books, and his latest, The Map and the Territory, is one of them.

  Bret Easton Ellis

  Book, Two, Interesting

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• Why is there such passion for any sort of gossipy, provocative sensual stuff? It sells!

  John Densmore

  Passion, Sensual, Stuff

  Source: www.hollywoodreporter.com

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• I want to engage people in an honest, enlightened, and provocative conversation about the nature of erotic desire and the intricacies of intimacy and sexuality. The object of my game is to bring nonjudgmental, multicultural understanding to the challenges and choices of modern relationships.

  Esther Perel

  Games, People, Choices

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• We played all that rhetoric, all of the thing - the provocative inflammatory things [Donald Trump] said over the last year, does that all add up to buying him enough wiggle room with his base that he can get out and change his position like that?

  Steve Kornacki

  Years, Lasts, Rooms

  Source: www.msnbc.com

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• It's still the White House exploding [in "Independence Day"]. It was just so provocative, and no one had ever done it before. I remember when we shot it, how everyone was excited.

  Roland Emmerich

  White, House, Independence

  Source: www.bullz-eye.com

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• I'm drawn to provocative characters that find themselves in extreme situations. And I think I'm drawn to that consistently.

  Kathryn Bigelow

  Character, Thinking, Situation

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• The use of military force against Iran would be very dangerous. It would be very provocative. The only thing worse would be Iran being a nuclear power.

  Rudy Giuliani

  Military, Iran, Would Be

  Rudy Giuliani's speech at the MSNBC's Republican first presidential candidates debate at the Ronald Reagan Library in Simi Valley, California, www.nytimes.com. May 3, 2007.

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• I'm proud of 'Black Hawk Down' because I think it told a provocative story and it was honest. It could have had more opportunity to tell both sides of the story, but I'm still proud of it.

  Josh Hartnett

  Opportunity, Thinking, Black

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• My second record I used a producer, which was frustrating in a way, because I think a lot of the punky spirit and provocative nature of the lyrics didn't come across - the music was pretty.

  Jewel

  Thinking, Records, Way

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• Read the editorial page of your local paper. It introduces you to opinion and can be terrifically provocative and perhaps a great motivating force for you to get involved in your community, regardless of your political ideology.

  Sarah Jessica Parker

  Community, Political, Paper

  "Why Don't You? Sarah Jessica Parker" by Laura Brown, www.harpersbazaar.com. February 4, 2009.

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• Some candidates need to say provocative things that make noise to break through the media muffle and get themselves noticed.

  John Podhoretz

  Media, Break Through, Needs

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• History proves that all dictatorships, all authoritarian forms of government are transient. Only democratic systems are not transient. Whatever the shortcomings, mankind has not devised anything superior.

  Vladimir Putin

  Government, Human Rights, Form

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• To my mind there is nothing so beautiful or so provocative as a secondhand book store...To me it is astonishing and miraculous to think that any one of us can poke among the stalls for something to read overnight--and that this something may be the sum of a lifetime of sweat, tears, and genius that some poor, struggling, blessed fellow expended trying to teach us the truth.

  Lionel Barrymore

  Beautiful, Struggle, Book

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• People think pop is rock, and the lines are getting blurred. Now Rihanna's wearing f-ckin' leather jackets, and it's really annoying . . . (My style is) high-class hooker. I dress for myself. Clearly, it's provocative, but it makes me feel good. And if the only reason it makes someone uncomfortable is because I'm 17, then that person's a scumbag because it shouldn't matter.

  Taylor Momsen

  Thinking, Rocks, Leather Jackets

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• The Playtex Secrets survey truly uncovered some thought-provoking and provocative secrets of real American housewives. In fact, many of the findings would make great fodder for a storyline on the show!

  Alfre Woodard

  Real, Thought Provoking, Secret

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• I remember saying to myself those things are very, very important to hear, but there must be another way to say them so that they will truly be heard. I mean, that's what art is. Art is about being provocative. Art is also about beauty. And if you leave the latter out, the former doesn't matter.

  Nikky Finney

  Art, Mean, Important

  "The Beauty And Difficulty Of Poet Nikky Finney". "Weekend Edition Sunday" with Rachel Martin, www.npr.org. April 8, 2012.

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• This is a major, wide-ranging, and comprehensive book. A philosophical investigation that is also a literary and historical study, Truth and Truthfulness asks how and why we have come to think of accuracy, sincerity, and authenticity as virtues. Bernard Williams' account of their emergence is as detailed and imaginative as his defense of their importance is spirited and provocative. Williams asks hard questions, and gives them straightforward and controversial answers. His book does not simply describe and advocate these virtues of truthfulness; it manifests them.

  Alexander Nehamas

  Book, Philosophical, Thinking

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• I'd been to Memphis before, but we stayed out of Memphis early on in the late 70s for obvious reasons. People were very sensitive about Elvis Presley, and my stage name obviously would be provocative to some people in that area at that time.

  Elvis Costello

  Names, People, Would Be

  "Interview about The Delivery Man". Interview with Brian Wise, www.elviscostello.info. April 10, 2004.

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• To say that war is madness is like saying that sex is madness: true enough, from the standpoint of a stateless eunuch, but merely a provocative epigram for those who must make their arrangements in the world as given.

  John Updike

  Funny, Sex, War

  Self-Consciousness ch. 4 (1989)

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