Theory Quotes - Page 40

• My theory is that I decided to be a writer when I was about seven, but of course it is not as simple as that. Like most writers, I had to work at other things to earn a living and wrote mainly in the evenings, often very late at night, for many years.

  Margaret Mahy

  Simple, Night, Years

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• If a theory of justice is to guide reasoned choice of policies, strategies or institutions, then the identification of fully just social arrangements is neither necessary nor sufficient.

  Amartya Sen

  Justice, Choices, Strategy

  Amartya Sen (2011). “The Idea of Justice”, p.15, Harvard University Press

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• All significant concepts of the modern theory of the state are secularized theological concepts.

  Carl Schmitt

  Modern, Significant, States

  Carl Schmitt (2010). “Political Theology: Four Chapters on the Concept of Sovereignty”, p.41, University of Chicago Press

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• Scientists explore the physical world for REPRODUCIBLE PATTERNS, which they represent by MODELS and organize into THEORIES according to LAWS.

  David Hestenes

  Law, World, Patterns

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• Conspiracy theory is the ultimate refuge of the powerless. If you cannot change your own life, it must be that some greater force controls the world.

  Roger Cohen

  World, Conspiracy, Force

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• Conspiracy theories are the refuge of the disempowered.

  Roger Cohen

  Conspiracy, Conspiracy Theory, Refuge

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• If x is the population of the United States and y is the degree of imbecility of the average American, then democracy is the theory that x times y is less than y

  H. L. Mencken

  Average, Democracy, United States

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• I have resisted the term sociolinguistics for many years, since it implies that there can be a successful linguistic theory or practice which is not social.

  William Labov

  Successful, Years, Practice

  William Labov (1972). “Sociolinguistic Patterns”, p.13, University of Pennsylvania Press

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• On the spiritual theory, man consists essentially of a spiritual nature or mind intimately associated with a spiritual body or soul, both of which are developed in and by means of a material organism

  Alfred Russel Wallace

  Spiritual, Mean, Men

  Alfred Russel Wallace (2004). “Writings on evolution, 1843-1912”, Thoemmes Pr

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• The facts will eventually test all our theories, and they form, after all, the only impartial jury to which we can appeal.

  Louis Agassiz

  Tests, Facts, Form

  Louis Agassiz (1873). “Geological Sketches”, p.234

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• If the Government gets into business on any large scale, we soon find that the beneficiaries attempt to play a large part in the control. While in theory it is to serve the public, in practice it will be very largely serving private interests. It comes to be regarded as a species of government favor and those who are the most adroit get the larger part of it.

  Calvin Coolidge

  Government, Practice, Play

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• The big bang theory requires a recent origin of the Universe that openly invites the concept of creation.

  Fred Hoyle

  Bangs, Creation, Bigs

  Fred Hoyle (1983). “The Intelligent Universe”

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• It is ironic that the scientific facts throw Darwin out, but leave William Paley, a figure of fun to the scientific world for more than a century, still in the tournament with a chance of being the ultimate winner... Indeed, such a theory is so obvious that one wonders why it is not widely accepted as being self-evident. The reasons are psychological rather than scientific.

  Fred Hoyle

  Fun, Self, Ironic

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• It seems that scientists are often attracted to beautiful theories in the way that insects are attracted to flowers — not by logical deduction, but by something like a sense of smell.

  Steven Weinberg

  Beautiful, Flower, Smell

  Physics Today, November 2005.

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• Premature as the question may be, it is hardly possible not to wonder whether we will find any answer to our deepest questions, any signs of the workings of an interested God, in a final theory. I think that we will not.

  Steven Weinberg

  Thinking, Atheism, Finals

  Steven Weinberg (2010). “Dreams Of A Final Theory: The Search for The Fundamental Laws of Nature”, p.76, Random House

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• Some string theorists prefer to believe that string theory is too arcane to be understood by human beings, rather than consider the possibility that it might just be wrong.

  Lee Smolin

  Believe, Might, Possibility

  Lee Smolin (2007). “The Trouble With Physics: The Rise of String Theory, The Fall of a Science, and What Comes Next”, p.269, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

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• I’ve spent something like 17 years working on a theory for which there is essentially no direct experimental support.

  Brian Greene

  Years, Support, Direct

  "A Conversation With Brian Greene". NOVA PBS, www.pbs.org. October 28, 2003.

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• There are many of us thinking of one version of parallel universe theory or another. If it's all a lot of nonsense, then it's a lot of wasted effort going into this far-out idea. But if this idea is correct, it is a fantastic upheaval in our understanding.

  Brian Greene

  Thinking, Ideas, Effort

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• Despite its name, the big bang theory is not really a theory of a bang at all. It is really only a theory of the aftermath of a bang.

  Alan Guth

  Names, Bangs, Aftermath

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• Despite the unrivaled empirical success of quantum theory, the very suggestion that it may be literally true as a description of nature is still greeted with cynicism, incomprehension, and even anger.

  David Deutsch

  Suggestions, May, Cynicism

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• Sense data are much more controversial than qualia, because they are associated with a controversial theory of perception - that one perceives the world by perceiving one's sense-data, or something like that.

  David Chalmers

  Data, Perception, World

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• Thinking about how disturbingly herdlike people become in so many different contexts - mimetic theory forces you to think about that, which is knowledge that's generally suppressed and hidden. As an investor-entrepreneur, I've always tried to be contrarian, to go against the crowd, to identify opportunities in places where people are not looking.

  Peter Thiel

  Opportunity, Thinking, People

  "No Death, No Taxes". Interview with George Packer, www.newyorker.com. November 28, 2011.

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• At this time on a weekday morning, the library was refuge to the retired, the unemployed, and the unemployable. ... 'I'm not always this gabby,' the librarian said. 'It's just so nice to talk to someone who isn't constructing a conspiracy theory or watching videos of home accidents on YouTube.

  Myla Goldberg

  Morning, Nice, Home

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• Nature first, then theory. Or, better, Nature and theory closely intertwined while you throw all your intellectual capital at the subject. Love the organisms for themselves first, then strain for general explanations, and, with good fortune, discoveries will follow. If they don't, the love and the pleasure will have been enough.

  E. O. Wilson

  Discovery, Intellectual, Firsts

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• My theory of characterization is basically this: Put some dirt on a hero, and put some sunshine on the villain, one brush stroke of beauty on the villain.

  Justin Cronin

  Hero, Sunshine, Dirt

  "Justin Cronin, author of The Passage, on book two of his vampire trilogy". Interview with Todd VanDerWerff, www.avclub.com. November 1, 2012.

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