Theoretical Quotes - Page 3

• After some minor pieces of theoretical study that I worked on, a student in my statistical mechanics class brought to my attention a problem in polyelectrolytes.

  Rudolph A. Marcus

  Class, Attention, Pieces

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• I used to refer to myself as a 'theoretical anorexic,' just as crazy when it came to body image, but saved by a lack of self-discipline. My daughters do everything better than I do - they're smarter, more beautiful, happier. What if they end up better at anorexia, too?

  Ayelet Waldman

  Beautiful, Daughter, Mother

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• The ultimate arbiter of truth is experiment, not the comfort one derives from one's a priori beliefs, nor the beauty or elegance one ascribes to one's theoretical models.

  Lawrence M. Krauss

  Truth, Comfort, Belief

  Lawrence M. Krauss (2012). “A Universe From Nothing”, p.16, Simon and Schuster

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• This kind of overall way of thinking is not only a fertile source of new theoretical ideas: it is needed for the human mind to function in a generally harmonious way, which could in turn help to make possible an orderly and stable society.

  David Bohm

  Thinking, Ideas, Mind

  David Bohm (2005). “Wholeness and the Implicate Order”, p.16, Routledge

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• Mine is an enthusiastic and dionysian pessimism, like a flame that sets my vital exuberance ablaze, that mocks at any theoretical, scientific or moral prison.

  Renzo Novatore

  Flames, Moral, Prison

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• Carlsen came with a line that was not very theoretical, trying to challenge the World Champion to play chess. [...] But Anand proved that even this obscure line is something he has studied before, and it was Carlsen that was set back.

  Alejandro Ramirez

  Play, Challenges, Champion

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• Names and theoretical things don't occur to me. If they do, I'm not doing my real playing mode.

  Lee Konitz

  Real, Names, Doing Me

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• Let us, rather, gather facts, all the facts, regardless of aesthetic appeal or theoretical social worth, and spread those facts before us not as the soothsayer spreads the innards of a turkey but as a newspaper spreads its columns. Let us be journalists, then. And like all good journalists, we shall present our facts in an order that will satisfy the famous five W's: wow, whoopee, wahoo, why-not and whew.

  Tom Robbins

  Order, Turkeys, Why Not

  Tom Robbins (2003). “Even Cowgirls Get the Blues”, p.139, Bantam

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• Economics was like psychology, a pseudoscience trying to hide that fact with intense theoretical hyperelaboration. And gross domestic product was one of those unfortunate measurement concepts, like inches or the British thermal unit, that ought to have been retired long before.

  Kim Stanley Robinson

  Long, Psychology, Trying

  Kim Stanley Robinson (2003). “Blue Mars”, p.105, Spectra

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• One of the goals of philosophy is wage theoretical battle. That is why we can say that every thesis is always, by its very nature, an antithesis. A thesis is only ever put forward in opposition to another thesis, or in defence of a new one.

  Louis Althusser

  Philosophy, Goal, Battle

  Louis Althusser, François Matheron, Olivier Corpet (2006). “Philosophy of the Encounter: Later Writings, 1978-87”, p.268, Verso

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• Mental illness, of course, is not literally a "thing" - or physical object - and hence it can "exist" only in the same sort of way in which other theoretical concepts exist.

  Thomas Szasz

  Bipolar, Way, Mental Illness

  "The Myth of Mental Illness" by Thomas Szasz in "American Psycholigist", Volume 15 (pp. 113-118), psychclassics.yorku.ca. 1960.

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• The kissed surprised him because it had been so long since he'd kissed anyone but Elspeth. It surprised Valentina because she had hardly ever kissed anyone that way - to her, kissing had always been more theoretical than physical. Afterwards she stood with her eyes closed, lips parted, face tilted. Robert thought, She's going to break my heart and I'm going to let her.

  Audrey Niffenegger

  Eye, Heart, Kissing

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• In mysticism, knowledge cannot be separated from a certain way of life which becomes its living manifestation. To acquire mystical knowledge means to undergo a transformation; one could even say that the knowledge is the transformation. Scientific knowledge, on the other hand, can often stay abstract and theoretical. Thus most of today’s physicists do not seem to realize the philosophical, cultural and spiritual implications of their theories.

  Lois McMaster Bujold

  Spiritual, Philosophical, Mean

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• An open mind, in questions that are not ultimate, is useful. But an open mind about the ultimate foundations either of Theoretical or of Practical Reason is idiocy. If a man's mind is open on these things, let his mouth at least be shut. He can say nothing to the purpose. Outside the Tao there is no ground for criticizing either the Tao or anything else.

  C. S. Lewis

  Men, Mind, Foundation

  C. S. LEWIS (1947). “THE ABOLITION OF MAN”

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• The spirit of rebellion can only exist in a society where a theoretical equality conceals great factual inequalities. The problem of rebellion, therefore, has no meaning except within our own Western society.

  Albert Camus

  Spirit, Problem, Rebellion

  Albert Camus (2012). “The Rebel: An Essay on Man in Revolt”, p.20, Vintage

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• Is it needy? It's not. We don't need each other. We just really, really enjoy each other. And we're good together. We're good people together. And I have the funniest feeling. I can really, truly touch this all, this happiness and the sadness too, I can trace all of it with my fingers. It isn't theoretical or distant. This feels like me. This is me. I love him, and, for the first time in a relationship, I also like me. Every time he says "I love you," I answer, "I believe you.

  Emma Forrest

  Believe, Love You, Sadness

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• If we analyse the supernova data by assuming the Copernican principle is correct and get out something unphysical, I think we should start questioning the Copernican principle…. Whatever our theoretical predilections, they will in the end have to give way to the observational evidence.

  George F. R. Ellis

  Thinking, Data, Giving

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• Because of recent improvements in the accuracy of theoretical predictions based on large scale ab initio quantum mechanical calculations, meaningful comparisons between theoretical and experimental findings have become possible.

  Yuan T. Lee

  Meaningful, Improvement, Predictions

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• The life of theoretical philosophy is the best and happiest a man can lead. Few men are capable of it and then only intermittently. For the rest there is a second-best way of life, that of moral virtue and practical wisdom.

  Aristotle

  Philosophy, Men, Words Of Wisdom

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• From it genesis twelve hundred years ago to today, Islamic philosophy (al-hikmah; al-falsafah) has been one of the major intellectual traditions within the Islamic world, and it has influenced and been influenced by many other intellectual perspectives, including Scholastic theology (kalam) and doctrinal Sufism (al-ma'rifah or al-tasawwuf al-'ilmi) and theoretical gnosis ('irfan-i nazari).

  Seyyed Hossein Nasr

  Philosophy, Islamic, Years

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• When I made my theoretical model, I could not have guessed that people would try to realise it with Molotov cocktails.

  Theodor Adorno

  Molotov Cocktail, People, Trying

  "The Dialectical Imagination: A History of the Frankfurt School and the Institute of Social Research, 1923-1950". Book by Martin Jay, p. 279, 1973.

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• I would be lying, however, if I claimed that I could always formulate worthwhile hypotheses on the basis of my theoretical framework. Sometimes there were no reflexive processes to be found; sometimes I failed to find them; and, what was the most painful of all, sometimes I got them wrong. One way or another, I often invested without a worthwhile hypothesis and my activities were not very different from a random walk.

  George Soros

  Lying, Different, Would Be

  George Soros (1994). “The Alchemy of Finance: Reading the Mind of the Market”, p.14, John Wiley & Sons

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• Why does it have to be politics? Is there a dynamism to that world and a theoretical capacity to do things that draws many talented people? Absolutely. Are there other ways to be involved and lead an interesting life? Of course.

  Eliot Spitzer

  People, Interesting, Doe

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• The panorama-city is a 'theoretical' (that is, visual) simulacrum, in short a picture, whose condition of possibility is an oblivion and a misunderstanding of practices.

  Michel de Certeau

  Practice, Cities, Oblivion

  Michel de Certeau (2011). “The Practice of Everyday Life”, p.93, Univ of California Press

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• Now, it is the view of the Ministry that a theoretical knowledge will be more than sufficient to get you through your examination, which, after all, is what school is all about.

  J. K. Rowling

  School, Views, Ministry

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