Observation Quotes by Marshall B. Rosenberg, Lennon Parham, Solomon Northup, John Burroughs, Alfred Richard Orage, Tom Rath and many others.
In NVC, no matter what words others may use to express themselves, we simply listen for their observations, feelings, needs, and requests.
It’s pretty simple to me: we come from a really grounded world where anything you say could be the thing that the scene becomes about. We’re always treating it as if we would treat it in real life. It’s all observation.
I can speak of slavery only so far as it came under my own observation – only so far as I have known and experienced it in my own person.
Naturalists, like poets, are born and then made only by years of painstaking observation.
The observation of others is coloured by our inability to observe ourselves impartially. We can never be impartial about anything until we can be impartial about our own organism.
Washington is not a city that takes great pride in being a healthy place, necessarily. Now, I have no data. That’s just my own observation.
It’s likely that only vibrations of love and gratitude appear in nature, and observations of nature shows this to be true.
I seem to have a natural tendency to want to share my own observations and feelings with other people, and writing seems to be the way I’m best equipped to do that.
Observation made in the cloister or in the desert will generally be as obscure as the one and as barren as the other; but he that would paint with his pencil must study originals, and not be over-fearful of a little dust.
Facts have to be discovered by observation, not by reasoning
I made observations for three hours last night, and am almost ill today from fatigue; still I have worked all day, trying to reduce the places, and mean to work hard again tonight.
Recalibration of the mind means clearing our perceptions and recovering our capacity for pure observation.
What is science but the pursuit of the truth? What is Buddhism but 2500 years of observation as to the nature of mind?
A European says: I can’t understand this, what’s wrong with me? An American says: I can’t understand this, what’s wrong with him? I make no suggestion that one side or other is right, but observation over many years leads me to believe it is true.
She drinks pints of coffee and writes little observations and ideas for stories with her best fountain pen on the linen-white pages of expensive notebooks. Sometimes, when it’s going badly, she wonders if what she believes to be a love of the written word is really just a fetish for stationery.
In awareness there is no becoming, there is no end to be gained. There is silent observation without choice and condemnation, from which there comes understanding.
The idea that the universe is running down comes from a simple observation about machines. Every machine consumes more energy than it renders.
Surely it is time to examine into the meaning of words and the nature of things, and to arrive at simple facts, not received upon the dictum of learned authorities, but upon attentive personal observation of what is passing around us.
Women are always most observed when they seem themselves least to observe, or to lay out for observation.
I’ve only been three years in the industry – but I would say from my observations, my personal opinions, that the world in Hollywood and all the big movies has been built up as just white.
Matters of fact, which as Mr Budgell somewhere observes, are very stubborn things.
The greater part of our daily actions are the result of hidden motives which escape our observation.
There are chemical and other explanations for addictions, but speaking from my own observations (and I am a shamanic type), there is always some sort of disembodied spirit causing some of the addiction, riding your energy field, trying to impose their needs and addictions onto you.
I have no idea why, and this is others’ observations of me – I tend to be in the realm of these very complicated personalities. I guess I enjoy corralling that.
…separation of the observer from the phenomenon to be observed is no longer possible.
Teachers support evaluations based on multiple measures: student growth, classroom observation and feedback from peers and parents.
Thus the man who is responsive to artistic stimuli reacts to the reality of dreams as does the philosopher to the reality of existence; he observes closely, and he enjoys his observation: for it is out of these images that he interprets life, out of these processes that he trains himself for life.
It has been my observation that the happiest of people, the vibrant doers of the world, are almost always those who are using – who are putting into play, calling upon, depending upon-the greatest number of their God-given talents and capabilities.
I wouldn’t even dare read the Torah, let alone attempt a witty observation on the Torah.
I love making observations. That one is a classic example.
Well, there’s just some universal truths in a way that I’ve just observed to be true. You read Voltaire. You read modern literature. Anywhere you go, there’s these observations about romantic love and what it does people, and these rotten feelings that rarely are people meaning to do that to each other.
In the moment of making films, I want to share my observations of life, not of other films.
It is a commonplace executive observation that businesses exist to make money, and the observation is usually allowed to go unchallenged. It is, however, a very limited statement about the purposes of business
Acting’s always felt like a kind of creature that lays dormant and collects observations when I’m not working. And then when I’m actually doing it, it just rises up. But everything I do is more about curiosity and investigation than it is about performance.
The scientists are really scared. Their [global warming] observations over the past two or three years suggest that everything is happening a lot faster than their climate models predicted.
In the great debates of early-nineteenth century geology, catastrophists followed the stereotypical method of objective science-empirical literalism. They believed what they saw, interpolated nothing, and read the record of the rocks directly.
Poets, we know, are terribly sensitive people, and in my observation one of the things they are most sensitive about is money.
The essence of a quote is the compression of a mass of thought and observation into a single saying.
Every commonplace or trite observation is not a truism.
An ideologue – one who thinks ideologically – can’t lose. He can’t lose because his answer, his interpretation and his attitude have been determined in advance of the particular experience or observation. They are derived from the ideology, and not subject to the facts.
Art demands persistent work, work in spite of everything, and continuous observations. By persistent, I mean not only continuous work, but also not giving up your opinion at the bidding of such and such a person.
The morning wind forever blows, the poem of creation is uninterrupted; but few are the ears to hear it.
Excellence is never granted to man but as the reward of labor. It argues no small strength of mind to persevere in habits of industry without the pleasure of perceiving those advances, which, like the hand of a clock, whilst they make hourly approaches to their point, yet proceed so slowly as to escape observation.
For liberals, the observation that ‘the peasants are revolting’ is a pun. For conservatives, it is cause for uncharacteristic optimism. No matter how far the ideological pendulum swings in the short term, in the end the bedrock common sense of the American people will prevail.
I am inspired by many mediums and use them to express varied aspects of my philosophies and life observations.
[The internet] ought to be like clay, rather than a sculpture that you observe from a distance.
Obervation is a passive science, experimentation is an active science.
Of all the systems of morality, ancient or modern which have come under my observation, none appears to me so pure as that of Jesus….I am a real Christian, that is to say, a disciple of the doctrines of Jesus.
[An engineer’s] invention causes things to come into existence from ideas, makes world conform to thought; whereas science, by deriving ideas from observation, makes thought conform to existence.
From my observation, the older you get, the more you like the word cozy.
That’s why most of the elderly wear pants with elastic waistbands. If they wear pants at all. This may explain why grandparents are in love with buying grand kids pajamas and bathrobes.
That’s why most of the elderly wear pants with elastic waistbands. If they wear pants at all. This may explain why grandparents are in love with buying grand kids pajamas and bathrobes.
Nothing has such power to broaden the mind as the ability to investigate systematically and truly all that comes under thy observation in life.
But I have been watching the crows since childhood. I loved the colour on its face. It can count up to seven – number seven it can count. They have made an observation. They are very clever birds.
In matters of observation chance favors only the prepared mind. (not literal translation) – Dan’s les champs de observation le hasard ne favorise que les esprits prepares.
Even scientific knowledge, if there is anything to it, is not a random observation of random objects; for the critical objectivity of significant knowledge is attained as a practice only philosophically in inner action.
The bearings of this observation lays in the application of it.
The telephone, which interrupts the most serious conversations and cuts short the most weighty observations, has a romance of its own.
Observation always involves theory.
I was so furious I was actually dizzy with it. There were so many bitchy, sarcastic observations to make, I was having a sarcasm stroke. “My God! You people! You’re – you’re so stupid you’re making my eyeballs throb. They’re throbbing, dammit!
I’m really more prolific than most stand-ups. My act changes. I do fold in new experiences, new observations, whatever you want to call it.
It is a lamentable observation that because of the way our laws are skewed toward the plaintiff, London has become the libel capital of the world.
I am not a pessimist but a pejorist (as George Eliot said she was not an optimist but a meliorist); and that philosophy is founded on my observation of the world, not on anything so trivial and irrelevant as personal history.
There is always some basic principle that will ultimately get the Republican party together. If my observations are worth anything, that basic principle is the cohesive power of public plunder.
Congress should not establish a religion, and enforce the legal observation of it by law, nor compel men to worship God in any Manner contrary to their conscience.
It’s my observation that gardeners and gardening for a very long time have had to take a back seat. Architects are very famous; they’ve got huge projects. What goes on in and around them has been relegated to a very minor role.
Education perverts the mind since we are directly opposing the natural development of our mind by obtaining ideas first and observations last. This is why so few men of learning have such sound common sense as is quite common among the illiterate.
But my observation has been, certainly in the news business, you’ve got to give 110 percent.
Do not allow yourself to suppress your thoughts. Instead, let the thoughts come before you and become a sort of observer. Start observing your own mind. Do not try to escape; do not be afraid of your thinking.
The gods are partial to no era, but steadily shines their light in the heavens, while the eye of the beholder is turned to stone.There was but the sun and the eye from the first. The ages have not added a new ray to the one, nor altered a fibre of the other.
Nature has from the first expanded the minute blossoms of the forest only toward the heavens, above men’s heads and unobserved bythem. We see only the flowers that are under our feet in the meadows.
…learning chiefly in mathematical sciences can so swallow up and fix one’s thought, as to possess it entirely for some time; but when that amusement is over, nature will return, and be where it was, being rather diverted than overcome by such speculations.
A bachelor May thrive by observation on a little, A single life’s no burthen: but to draw In yokes is chargeable, and will require A double maintenance.
Observations of the sickening effect of programmed environments show that people in them become indolent, impotent, narcissistic and apolitical. The political process breaks down, because people cease to be able to govern themselves; they demand to be managed.
I act by observation.
Science progresses best when observations force us to alter our preconceptions.
True wisdom is plenty of experience, observation, and reflection. False wisdom is plenty of ignorance, arrogance, and impudence.
For the truth of the conclusions of physical science, observation is the supreme Court of Appeal.
The great extension of our experience in recent years has brought light to the insufficiency of our simple mechanical conceptions and, as a consequence, has shaken the foundation on which the customary interpretation of observation was based.
I don’t think I can do this – painting under observation. It’s the worst thing there is, worse than being in the hospital.
Men who have excessive faith in their theories … make poor observations, because they choose among the results of their experiments only what suits their object, neglecting whatever is unrelated to it and carefully setting aside everything which might tend toward the idea they wish to combat
Have you ever noticed that idiots have a lot of friends? It’s just an observation.
We must consider not only why the classical theory of democracy appears to be in contradiction with the observed practice, but also why the many different responses to this observation, though mutually incompatible, all share the belief that democracy is the best form of political organization.
First of all, I should preface this by the observation that artists are not the best judges of what they’ve done and the word definitive does not belong, in my opinion, in any conversation about art. When somebody says it’s the “definitive” something, I’m always recoiling.
It is my observation that 98% of the people are spending 98% of their time focusing on the 98% of things that don’t matter. Stopping meditation is one of the easiest, quickest and most powerful forms of meditation. It is virtually effortless and its power relative to the effort is remarkable.
Eratosthenes declares that it is no longer necessary to inquire as to the cause of the overflow of the Nile, since we know definitely that men have come to the sources of the Nile and have observed the rains there.
I have learned the truth of the observation that the more one approaches great men the more one finds that they are men.
There was a time when ‘science’ meant the systematic pursuit of knowledge through experimentation and observation. But it’s rapidly becoming a synonym for progressive politics and materialist philosophy.
To acquire knowledge, one must study; but to acquire wisdom, one must observe.
Observation is like a muscle. It grows stronger with use and atrophies without use. Exercise your observation muscle and you will become a more powerful decoder of the world around you.
A battle lost or won is easily described, understood, and appreciated, but the moral growth of a great nation requires reflection, as well as observation, to appreciate it.
My observations of Japanese naval fighting men, their abilities and equipment led me to believe that they gave a better account of themselves than we did.
It’s a great mistake, I think, to put children off with falsehoods and nonsense, when their growing powers of observation and discrimination excite in them a desire to know about things.
[Documentary photography] is unwittingly literary, because it is nothing other than an observation of contemporary life apprehended at the right moment by an artist capable of seizing it. (1928)
I think that technology is much more mysterious to the people using it than, say, the automobile was. This isn’t an original observation, but a lot of the smart devices people rely on now really do feel like magic to a lot of us.
Observation, very general and wide-spread, has shown that small children are endowed with a special psychic nature. This shows us a new way of imparting education!
Censure is willingly indulged, because it always implies some superiority: men please themselves with imagining that they have made a deeper search, or wider survey than others, and detected faults and follies which escape vulgar observation.
Can you define “plan” as “a loose sequence of manifestly inadequate observations and conjectures, held together by panic, indecision, and ignorance”? If so, it was a very good plan.
Science is not infallible, but it has something religion lacks: a process of testing claims against real-world observations.
The observation that money changes induce output changes in the same direction receives confirmation in some data sets but is hard to see in others. Large-scale reductions in money growth can be associated with large-scale depressions or, if carried out in the form of a credible reform, with no depression at all.
I am a firm believer, that without speculation there is no good and original observation.
Who is respectable when thinking himself alone and free from observation will be so before the eye of all the world.
Very often I hear talk about female literature, or femininity in literature. It’s a categorization I am not sure about. Maybe there are a few elements that distinguish women’s observations from men’s, like the ability to notice some fine details.
Taking experimental results and observations for granted and putting the burden of proof on the theory means taking the observational ideology for granted without having ever examined it.
As the prerogative of Natural Science is to cultivate a taste for observation, so that of Mathematics is, almost from the starting point, to stimulate the faculty of invention.
The stumbling way in which even the ablest of the scientists in every generation have had to fight through thickets of erroneous observations, misleading generalizations, inadequate formulation, and unconscious prejudice is rarely appreciated by those who obtain their scientific knowledge from textbooks.
The day is coming when a single carrot, freshly observed, will set off a revolution.
From the standpoint of observation, then, we must regard it as a highly probable hypothesis that the beginnings of the mental life date from as far back as the beginnings of life at large.
With each passing year, experimental observations further undermine the claim of a large positive feedback from water. In fact, observations suggest that the feedback is close to zero and may even be negative.
An atom is a hierarchy of different states of information that define the statistical likelihood of finding a particle here or there at the time of observation.
We must trust to nothing but facts: these are presented to us by nature and cannot deceive. We ought, in every instance, to submit our reasoning to the test of experiment, and never to search for truth but by the natural road of experiment and observation.
An actor rides in a bus or railroad train; he sees a movement and applies it to a new role. The whole garment in which the actor hides himself is made of small externals of observation fitted to his conception of a role.
By no amount of reasoning can we altogether eliminate all contingency from our world. Moreover, pure speculation alone will not enable us to get a determinate picture of the existing world. We must eliminate some of the conflicting possibilities, and this can be brought about only by experiment and observation.
Hence, even in the domain of natural science the aid of the experimental method becomes indispensable whenever the problem set is the analysis of transient and impermanent phenomena, and not merely the observation of persistent and relatively constant objects.
They (teenage boys)don’t really listen to speeches or talks. They absorb incrementally, through hours and hours of observation.
Medical practice is not knitting and weaving and the labor of the hands, but it must be inspired with soul and be filled with understanding and equipped with the gift of keen observation . . .
If Lacan presumes that female homosexuality issues from a disappointed heterosexuality, as observation is said to show, could it not be equally clear to the observer that heterosexuality issues from a disappointed homosexuality?
My observation is China is thinking more as a global player than regionally, in both politics and economics.
Knowledge is the intellectual manipulation of carefully verified observations.
In the end, they pardoned me and packed me off to a home for the shell-shocked. Shortly before the end of the war, I was discharged a second time, once again with the observation that I was subject to recall at any time.
It is a shock to us in the twentieth century to discover, from observations science has made, that the fundamental mechanisms of life cannot be ascribed to natural selection, and therefore were designed. But we must deal with our shock as best we can and go on.
observation of realities has never, to put it mildly, been one of the strengths of economic development theory.
Tis a common observation here that our cause is the cause of all mankind, and that we are fighting for their liberty in defending our own.
Observation: It would be awesome to fly in a superfast airplane that could chase the sunrise around the world for a while.
We cannot empty the mind by thinking. Only by observation.
If science were nothing more than the best means of teaching the love of the simple fact, the indispensable need of verification, of careful and accurate observation and statement, its value would be of the highest order.
If I wished to see a mountain or other scenery under the most favorable auspices, I would go to it in foul weather, so as to be there when it cleared up; we are then in the most suitable mood, and nature is most fresh and inspiring. There is no serenity so fair as that which is just established in a tearful eye.
To be able to observe with a stranger’s eye helps one to see with an artist’s eye. What alienates us inspires.
You should not only have attention to everything, but a quickness of attention, so as to observe at once all the people in the room–their motions, their looks and their words–and yet without staring at them and seeming to be an observer.
Observation, not old age, brings wisdom.
She wrote to him fairly regularly, from a paradise of triple exclamation points and inaccurate observations.
I love astute observations and really great wordplay. I love the way that Louis C.K. observes life, and I love the way Patton Oswalt talks about it.
None of us was born knowing or wise; but men become wise by consideration, observation, experience.
Nature is not made after such a fashion as we would have her. We piously exaggerate her wonders, as the scenery around our home.
Observation and study are necessary to achieve mastery of light and form
If you really look at my lyrics, nobody’s exempt. Nobody’s exempt from observation, criticism or what I think is correction.
I think I have a very detailed sense of observation. I am interested in the details of people’s lives and what information these details give.
An artist needs knowledge and the power of observation only so that he can tell from what he is abstaining, and to be sure that his abstention will not appear artificial or false.
Cultivate an ever-continuous power of observation. Wherever you are, be always ready to make slight notes of postures, groups and incidents.
We have seen that no religion stands on the basis of things known; none bounds its horizon within the field of human observation; and, therefore, as it can never present us with indisputable facts, so must it ever be at once a source of error and contention.
I’m not an expert on Islam, but I think there are lots of noble religions whose basic principles could stand considerably more observation in the world of business.
I therefore concluded, and decided unhesitatingly, that there are three stars in the heavens moving about Jupiter, as Venus and Mercury about the Sun; which at length was established as clear as daylight by numerous other observations.
All observations of life are harsh, because life is. I lament that fact, but I cannot change it.
Art is born of the observation and investigation of nature.
Look slowly and hard at something subtle and small.
Already published reports, as well as our own observations indicate that smallpox vaccination sometimes produces manifestations of leukemia. In children and adults observed in the clinics of Cracow, smallpox vaccination has been followed by violent local and general reactions and by leukemia.
It is now possible to quantify people’s levels of happiness pretty accurately by asking them, by observation, and by measuring electrical activity in the brain, in degrees from terrible pain to sublime joy.
Rhetoric and dialectics can’t change what I have learned from observation and experience.
Reading, reflection and time have convinced me that the interests of society require the observation of those moral precepts only in which all religions agree.
Let me run over the principal steps. We approached the case, you remember, with an absolutely blank mind, which is always an advantage. We had formed no theories. We were simply there to observe and to draw inferences from our observations.
I always made up my own acts; built them out of my knowledge and observation of real life. I’d had wonderful opportunities to study people; and every time I went out on the stage I tried to show the audience some bit of true human nature.
The ability to make witty observations is commonly refered to as “cynism” by people who lack it.
No one trusts a model except the man who wrote it; everyone trusts an observation, except the man who made it.
In one word, to draw the rule from experience, one must generalize; this is a necessity that imposes itself on the most circumspect observer.
[W]hen the empirical investigator glories in his refusal to go beyond the specialized observation dictated by the traditions of his discipline, be they ever so inclusive, he is making a virtue out of a defense mechanism which insures him against questioning his presuppositions.
RATIONAL, adj. Devoid of all delusions save those of observation, experience and reflection.
The lower classes of men, though they do not think it worthwhile to record what they perceive, nevertheless perceive everything that is worth noting; the difference between them and a man of learning often consists in nothing more than the latter’s facility for expression.
Because God is perfect, his handiwork functions in accord with immutable principles. By the full use of our God-given powers of reason and observation, it ought to be possible to discover these principles.
These were the crucial ideas that explain why science arose in Christian Europe and no where else.
These were the crucial ideas that explain why science arose in Christian Europe and no where else.
It is a common observation that any fool can get money; but they are not wise that think so.
The materials of the novelist must be real; they must be gathered from the field of humanity by his actual observation.
Experiment is fundamentally only induced observation.
No matter what a woman’s appearance may be, it will be used to undermine what she is saying and taken to individualize – as her personal problem – observations she makes about the beauty myth in society.
I made a promise to keep a watch over myself, to remain master of myself, so that I might become a sure observer.
The artist must scorn all judgment that is not based on an intelligent observation of character. He must beware of the literary spirit which so often causes a painting to deviate from its true path – the concrete study of nature – to lose itself all too long in intangible speculations.
Ignorant people see life as either existence or non-existence, but wise men see it beyond both existence and non-existence to something that transcends them both; this is an observation of the Middle Way.
It is expected that there will be discrepancies between models and observations. However, why these arise and what one should conclude from them are interesting and more subtle than most people realize. Indeed, such discrepancies are the classic way we learn something new.
Tax dollars intended for science education must not be used to teach creationism as any sort of real explanation of nature, because any observation or process of inference about our origin and the nature of the universe disproves creationism in every respect.
I saw, in looking over Cooper, elements of a comet of 1825 which resemble what I get out for this, from my own observations, but I cannot rely upon my own.
There is a wisdom in this beyond the rules of physic: a man’s own observation what he finds good of and what he finds hurt of is the best physic to preserve health.
You know, like, real paying attention and real observation and deep thought and deep consideration can be a bit, you know, miserable-making.
Vipassana meditation is an ongoing creative purification process. Observation of the moment-to-moment experience cleanses the mental layers, one after another.
Inventive man has invented nothing — nothing from scratch. If he has produced a machine that in motion overcomes the law of gravity, he learned the essentials from the observation of birds.
It was astonishing that for some considerable distance around the mould growth the staphococcal colonies were undergoing lysis. What had formerly been a well-grown colony was now a faint shadow of its former self…I was sufficiently interested to pursue the subject.
I’m always saying something that’s just the edge of something more.
From the very commencement the student should set out to witness the progress and effects of sickness and ought to persevere in the daily observation of disease during the whole period of his studies.
The soul is a fire that darts its rays through all the senses; it is in this fire that existence consists; all the observations and all the efforts of philosophers ought to turn towards this ME, the centre and moving power of our sentiments and our ideas.
How then can we change being? By applying the knowledge of the Work through self-observation to ourselves. And remember that you do not change by being told what to do. You only change through seeing what you have to do when you realize what your being is like.
If I correctly understand the sense of this succinct observation, our poet suggests here that human life is but a series of footnotes to a vast obscure unfinished masterpiece.
At the last dim horizon, we search among ghostly errors of observations for landmarks that are scarcely more substantial. The search will continue. The urge is older than history. It is not satisfied and it will not be oppressed.
My observation is that my dealings with the president on some of the most important issues that the president Donald Trump has to face are as professional and as thoughtful as the American people deserve. The president’s handling these duties in a way that I’m incredibly proud of to be part of his team.
Reason, observation, and experience; the holy trinity of science.
Under observation, we act less free, which means we effectively are less free.
It’s a great mistake, I think, to put children off with falsehoods and nonsense, when their growing powers of observation and discrimination excite in them a desire to know about things.
Certain periods in history suddenly lift humanity to an observation point where a clear light falls upon a world previously dark.
Econometrics may be defined as the quantitative analysis of actual economic phenomena based on the concurrent development of theory and observation, related by appropriate methods of inference.
It has been said that self-respect is the gate of heaven, and the most cursory observation shows that a degree of reserve adds vastly to the latent force of character.
I think when you practice photography or observation, you’re on high alert. You polish up your antenna and stick up your head, and you’re out there. You’re receptive, appreciative of details. It heightens reality. You’re trying to step into your alertness.
We fail in even the simplest of all scientific observations-nobody looks up anymore.
As in the experimental sciences, truth cannot be distinguished from error as long as firm principles have not been established through the rigorous observation of facts.
I want the brain to intervene between the observation and the mark.
Wrong hypotheses, rightly worked from, have produced more useful results than unguided observations.
Just as the senses require sensible objects to stimulate them, so our powers of observation, recollection, and imagination do not work spontaneously, but are set in motion by the demands set up by current social occupations.
Flannery O’Connor’s brief life and slim output were nonetheless marked by piercing powers of observation.
Our conviction that green cheese makes up a negligible fraction of the Moon’s interior comes not from direct observation but from the gross incompatibility of that idea with other things we think we know.
The very nature of the quantum theory … forces us to regard the space-time coordination and the claim of causality, the union of which characterizes the classical theories, as complementary but exclusive features of the description, symbolizing the idealization of observation and description, respectively.
Things of which there is sight, hearing, apprehension, these I prefer.
When we play, we sense no limitations. In fact, when we are playing, we are usually unaware of ourselves. Self-observation goes out the window. We forget all those past lessons of life, forget our potential foolishness, forget ourselves. We immerse ourselves in the act of play. And we become free.
Conclusions from observations are unreliable, only the mind can come nearer to to the truth. Thus, in some ways, philosophy is more important than science.
To find out what happens to a system when you interfere with it you have to interfere with it (not just passively observe it).
To voice something you’re feeling and put observations into words with another person who is totally present is a creative act embodying soul and love.
But when we observe, we are forced to pay attention. We have to move from passive absorption to active awareness. We have to engage.
I always tell the adults at my dance school, ‘Men, you are going to have to do something that you are absolutely not used to: you have got to take command and be the boss.’ Because – and this is just an observation – women get their way.
You can’t just be reactive to the things going on in your life. You have to imagine, and you have to plunder other people’s work, books, poems, ideas, observations.
A stander-by may sometimes, perhaps, see more of the game than he that plays it.
My observation of Christendom is that most of us tend to base our relationship with God on our performance instead of on His grace.
My own view, which does not rely solely on religious faith or even on an original idea, but rather on ordinary common sense, is that establishing binding ethical principles is possible when we take as our starting point the observation that we all desire happiness and wish to avoid suffering.
A scientist is only a human being, a particle in the whole universe. How can the observations and logic of a particle measure the life and size of a phenomenon that is limitless?
Belonging. Togetherness. These words are as complicated and confusing as the word love. It’s probably all the same thing. Or it would be if we let it be. I can only guess from observation.
I did have an occasion in 1951 to have two days of observation of many flights of them, they were of different sizes, flying in fighter formation, generally from east to west over Europe.
Invention despoils observations, insinuation invalidates memory. A stewpot of bad habits, all of it – so that imaginative writers wind up, by and large, a shifty crew, sunk in distortion, misrepresentation, illusion, imposture, fakery.
I find, by close observation, that the mothers are the levers which move in education. The men talk about it . . . but the women work most for it.
The eyes of a man in the jaundice make yellow observations on everything; and the soul tinctured with any passion diffuses a false color over the appearance of things.
I’ve spent more time than many will believe [making microscopic observations], but I’ve done them with joy, and I’ve taken no notice those who have said why take so much trouble and what good is it?
“I see nobody on the road,” said Alice. “I only wish I had such eyes,” the King remarked in a fretful tone. “To be able to see Nobody! And at that distance too! Why, it’s as much as I can do to see real people, by this light.”
A single observation that is inconsistent with some generalization points to the falsehood of the generalization, and thereby ‘points to itself’.
When we want to sink a convoy, we send out an observation plane first… Of course, to observe is not its real duty, we already know exactly where the convoy is. Its real duty is to be observed…Then, when we come round and sink them, the Germans will not find it suspicious.
As a sick kid, I always looked out the window. The objects of my observation were the sun, the seasons, the wind, crazy people, and my grandfather’s death. During my long period of observation, I felt that something like poems were filling up my body.
I’m one of the many people who has said that the Hillary Clinton we know in private was effective, strong, courageous, and funny. And the campaigner we saw was less so, more scripted. Many people have made that observation, and it was my observation, too, but I’m grateful for what she did.
I’m pretty old-fashioned. I feel most people – and this is purely from observation; I’m not an expert – but I think most people want to get married, whatever one might say about the institution of marriage, especially if you are in a long relationship.
If a man cannot see a church, it is preposterous to take his opinion about its altar-piece or painted window.
It don’t take a genius to spot a goat in a flock of sheep.
It may be that there is such a thing as racial memory, and it is supported by the undeniable observation that the goblins will get you if you don’t watch out.
We ‘rid ourselves of conceptual thought’ when, by persistent observation, we recognize the unreality of our self-centered thoughts. Then we can remain dispassionate and fundamentally unaffected by them. That does not mean to be a cold person. Rather, it means not to be caught and dragged around by circumstances.
My choice of colors does not rest on any scientific theory, it is based on observation, on feeling, on the experience of my sensibility.
The faith of scientists in the power and truth of mathematics is so implicit that their work has gradually become less and less observation, and more and more calculation…. But the facts which are accepted by virtue of these tests are not actually observed at all.
It seems a shallow observation, but… the Tory Conference are not an attractive lot, are they? I mean, if all those people were born in the same village, you’d blame pollution, wouldn’t you?
When you make an observation, you have an obligation.
The observations that have developed over the years have given us perspective about where we fit in. We are newcomers, really recent arrivals on a planet that is four and a half billion years old.
The free market opens the way for men to operate at their moral best, and all observation confirms that the poor fare better under these circumstances than when the way is closed, as it is under socialism.
My observation on most people in national governments is that they have very little interest in and very little knowledge of the multinational institutions.
All of the directors I work with have their own unique gifts. My particular segment deals with online dating. It’s a very interesting take on it, and a great observation of what goes on there.
That the divided but contiguous particles of bodies may be separated from one another is a matter of observation; and, in the particles that remain undivided, our minds are able to distinguish yet lesser parts, as is mathematically demonstrated.
I blog; therefore, I am.
One hour of life, crowded to the full with glorious action, and filled with noble risks, is worth whole years of those mean observances of paltry decorum, in which men steal through existence, like sluggish waters through a marsh, without either honor or observation.
Physics tells us observations can’t be predicted absolutely. Rather, there’s a range of possible observations each with a different probability.
There is a fundamental difference between religion, which is based on authority, [and] science, which is based on observation and reason. Science will win because it works.
Perhaps there is a degree of perception at which what is real and what is imagines are one: a state of clairvoyant observation, accessible or possibly accessible to the poet or, say, the acutest poet.
I don’t bill myself as an atheist but as a naturalist. Naturalism is a belief system. A lot of scientists bristle at that. We all have to believe we can find the truth. Evidence is my guide. I rely on observation, experimentation and verification.
All perceiving is also thinking, all reasoning is also intuition, all observation is also invention.
Nothing in Scientology is true for you unless you have observed it and it is true according to your observation.
It’s on the strength of observation and reflection that one finds a way. So we must dig and delve unceasingly.
Yet in this my stars were not Mercury as morning star in the angle of the seventh house, in quartile with Mars, but they were Copernicus, they were Tycho Brahe, without whose books of observations everything which has now been brought by me into the brightest daylight would lie buried in darkness.
I think that the expectation on parents has changed from giving your children shelter and love and support and guidance to this idea that observation and structure and sort of watching them all the time – that that’s what a good parent does.
Certain periods in history suddenly lift humanity to an observation point where a clear light falls upon a world previously dark.
Only listen to the observations of the enlightened because everyone else is self-centered, egocentric and bound by the net of desire.
The issue of racism and racial prejudice. It is very, very difficult to discuss. It is difficult to discuss the issue of apartheid. Many have made the observation that it is very difficult to find anyone in SA who ever supported apartheid because everyone was opposed, it was against our will and so on.
Having said that, what I think we found, in doing the show, and in life, generally, is that the more you try to separate sex from everything else, it’s impossible. You can’t. The act of observation affects the actual experiment, and we see that in this.
I know not anything more pleasant, or more instructive, than to compare experience with expectation, or to register from time to time the difference between idea and reality. It is by this kind of observation that we grow daily less liable to be disappointed.
Even the most meticulous historians work subjectively. The historian’s point of view, his or her selection of subject and sources, the emphasis, the tone – all of these lead to subjective history, inevitably so. I do not say this as a criticism, merely as an observation.
The first, or theoretic branch, that which explains the nature, production, and distribution of wealth, will be found to rest on a very few general propositions, which are the result of observation, or consciousness.
Wherein we discover that many of the “rules” for good writing and good sex are the same: Keep your hand moving, lose control, and don’t think.
I cannot resist making the observation that some people use statistics as a drunk uses a lamppost – more to lean on than for illumination.
The amount of relief and comfort experienced by the sick after the skin has been carefully washed and dried, is one of the commonest observations made at a sick bed.
Science is simply common sense at its best.
Film is so much about that intensity of focus that there always needs to be some tension and some forward motion. The novel goes into a series of lovely observations about the world, but you’ve got to find the story.
The overly-verbal artist is led by his understanding of things–rather than by direct observation of things as they are.
In fact, we will have to give up taking things for granted, even the apparently simple things. We have to learn to understand nature and not merely to observe it and endure what it imposes on us. Stupidity, from being an amiable individual defect, has become a social crime.
Passion makes the best observations and the sorriest conclusions.
Eros will have naked bodies; Friendship naked personalities.
As, however, the port in reality lies in thirty-two degrees thirty-four minutes, according to the observations that have been made, they went much beyond it, thus making the voyage much longer than was necessary.
The two fulcra of medicine are reason and observation. Observation is the clue to guide the physician in his thinking.
This isn’t a particularly novel observation, but the world is full of people who think they can manipulate the lives of others merely by getting a law passed.
To me, photography is an art of observation. It’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place… I’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them.
I believe that my observations have always led me to find that the so-called realist moves about the world with a closed mind, ringed as it were with concrete and cement, and that the so-called romantic is like an unfenced garden in and out of which truth can wander at will.
I get quiet joy from the observation of anyone who does his job well.
Moral truth, resting entirely upon the ascertained consequences of actions, supposes a process of observation and reasoning.
All data are filtered, observation is necessarily ‘theory-laden’.
There are at bottom but two possible religions–that which rises in the moral nature of man, and which takes shape in moral commandments, and that which grows out of the observation of the material energies which operate in the external universe.
Crafty men condemn studies; Simple men admire them; And wise men use them: For they teach not their own use: but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by observation.
To learn by observation is traveling, people must also bring knowledge with them.
What do you think of this” he asked, indicating the painting nearby. She gave him an odd look. “I think it’s an enormous painting of a dog.” He made a show of considering the picture and nodded seriously. “An astute observation.
Genius is but fine observation strengthened by fixity of purpose.
Being at NASA and having the access to both computing capability and satellite observation capability is kind of the ideal research situation to try to understand global climate change.
Laws and customs may be creative of vice; and should be therefore perpetually under process of observation and correction: but laws and customs cannot be creative of virtue: they may encourage and help to preserve it; but they cannot originate it.
Every 12 years Jupiter returns to the same position in the sky; every 370 days it disappears in the fire of the Sun in the evening to the west, 30 days later it reappears in the morning to the east…[Observation in 4th century B.C.]
I was writing poems as I was walking. I was able to take that restlessness, that nomadic distraction, and use that distraction in the world and turn that distraction into observations and then into poems.
An amazing observation: it is precisely for feelings that one needs time, not for thought. … Feelings, obviously, are more demanding than thought.
Whenever I work on a part, I look at the world through the filter of the character and I pick things they might use through my observations of real life.
That extremes beget extremes is an apothegm built on the most profound observation of the human mind.
The schizophrenic is drowning in the same waters in which the mystic swims with delight. Edgar Cayce made the same observation in his readings
The trouble with Westerners is that they want to witness their own enlightenment.
True observation begins when devoid of set patterns; freedom of expression occurs when one is beyond system.
Presence of mind, penetration, fine observation, are the sciences of women; ability to avail themselves of these is their talent.
Scientists are convinced that they, as scientists, possess a number of very admirable human qualities, such as accuracy, observation, reasoning power, intellectual curiosity, tolerance, and even humility.
Paradox is the sharpest scalpel in the satchel of science. Nothing concentrates the mind as effectively, regardless of whether it pits two competing theories against each other, or theory against observation, or a compelling mathematical deduction against ordinary common sense.
A heightened sense of the observation of nature is one of the chief delights that have come to me through trying to paint.
Thus science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths; neither with the collection of observations, nor with the invention of experiments, but with the critical discussion of myths, and of magical techniques and practices.
All through Latin America, there’s sharp condemnation of the criminal atrocities of Sept. 11. But it’s qualified by the observation that although these are horrible atrocities, they are not unfamiliar.
Since science’s competence extends to observable and measurable phenomena, not to the inner being of things, and to the means, not to the ends of human life, it would be nonsense to expect that the progress of science will provide men with a new type of metaphysics, ethics, or religion.
That sounds almost practiced, James Carstairs. How many girls have you made swoon with that observation?” “There is only one girl I care to make swoon,” he said. “The question is, does she?” She smiled at him. “She does.
Sir,”she said,”you are no gentleman!” An apt observation,”he answered airily.”And, you, Miss, are no lady.
When I went to the Association [ National Association for the Advancement of Colored People] I learned a few things by observation. One of the things that used to strike me was [Walter White] need to impress people, even just people who came into the office.
Imagination should give wings to our thoughts but we always need decisive experimental proof, and when the moment comes to draw conclusions and to interpret the gathered observations, imagination must be checked and documented by the factual results of the experiment.
Those writers who lie on the watch for novelty can have little hope of greatness; for great things cannot have escaped former observation.
Part of the experience of enjoying a tennis match on TV is listening to the observations of an expert commentator — one who knows the sport, has a genuine passion for the game, respects the viewers’ intelligence, knows when to talk and when to keep quiet, can make you laugh and is not afraid to call a spade a spade.
If you’ve got a religious belief that withers in the face of observations of the natural world, you ought to rethink your beliefs – rethinking the world isn’t an option.
The goal of scientific physicians in their own science … is to reduce the indeterminate. Statistics therefore apply only to cases in which the cause of the facts observed is still indeterminate.
Observation and experiment for gathering material, induction and deduction for elaborating it: these are are only good intellectual tools.
One of the things I’m excited about is the observation that gamers are creators and creators are gamers too. We used to think of creators as workstation customers and think of gamers as consumers.
We are now at the point in the age of global warming hysteria where the IPCC global warming theory has crashed into the hard reality of observations.
Our social relationships are limited, most of the time, to gossip and criticizing people’s behavior. This observation slowly pushed me to isolate from the so-called social life. My days pass by in solitude.
Sin is a basilisk whose eyes are full of venom. If the eye of thy soul see her first, it reflects her own poison and kills her; if she see thy soul, unseen, or seen too late, with her poison, she kills thee: since therefore thou canst not escape thy sin, let not thy sin escape thy observation.
In the printed page the only real things are the paper and the ink; the white spaces play the same part in aiding the eye to take in the meaning of the print as do the black letters.
There’s more to life than making shallow, fairly obvious observations.
The greatest poets are those with memories so great that they extend beyond their strongest experiences to their minutest observations of people and things far outside their own self-centeredness.
Natural phenomena undisturbed by man point the way to the realization of a new technique. One needs a keen sense of observation. We must understand Nature before we can adapt its way of working to our needs.
The manner in which things exist and take place, constitutes what is called the nature of things; and a careful observation of the nature of things is the sole foundation of all truth.
What we observe is not nature itself but nature exposed to our method of questioning. Our scientific work in physics consists in asking questions about nature in the language that we possess and trying to get an answer from experiment by the means that are at our disposal.
The impulse to paint comes neither from observation nor from the soul (which is probably blind) but from an encounter: the encounter between painter and model: even if the model is a mountain or a shelf of empty medicine bottles.
Images have been reproached for being a way of watching suffering at a distance, as if there were some other way of watching.
Rationalism doesn’t require “belief,” only observation. The real, measurable world doesn’t care what you believe.
Those who cannot themselves observe can at least acquire the observation of others.
We may take it to be the accepted idea that the Mosaic books were not handed down to us for our instruction in scientific knowledge, and that it is our duty to ground our scientific beliefs upon observation and inference, unmixed with considerations of a different order.
In natural science the principles of truth ought to be confirmed by observation.
We ought to observe that practice which is the hardest of all – especially for young physicians – we ought to throw in no medicine at all – to abstain – to observe a wise and masterly inactivity.
I would teach the world that science is the best way to understand the world and that for any set of observations, there is only one correct explanation. Also, science is value-free, as it explains the world as it is. Ethical issues arise only when science is applied to technology – from medicine to industry.
Science is composed of laws which were originally based on a small, carefully selected set of observations, often not very accurately measured originally; but the laws have later been found to apply over much wider ranges of observations and much more accurately than the original data justified.
Let observation with observant view,
Observe mankind from China to Peru.
Observe mankind from China to Peru.
Trying to coach kindergarteners in soccer is like trying to herd cats.
The idea of making a fault a subject of study and not an object to be merely determined has been the most important step in the course of my methods of observation. If I have obtained some new results it is to this that I owe it.
Intelligent thinking means an increment of freedom in action-an emancipation from chance and fatality. ‘Thought’ represents the suggestion of a way of response that is different from that which would have been followed if intelligent observation had not effected an inference as to the future.
When I listen to the public debates about climate change, I am impressed by the enormous gaps in our knowledge, the sparseness of our observations and the superficiality of our theories.
One’s lover is one’s partner in observing and understanding the world. Marriage is a place where joint narratives are composed. If the lover is a liar then all your joint observations are unreliable. You will have to start all over again.
Nothing comes out more clearly in astronomical observations than the immense activity of the universe.
Let your observations and comparisons produce in your mind an abhorrence of domination and power, the parent of slavery, ignorance, and barbarism, which places man upon a level with his fellow tenants of the woods.
Were Patrick Henry to return to earth and look around on the vast economic order of the day, he might revise his observation and merely say вЂGive me death’-the alternative being manifestly impossible under modern conditions.
In fact, evolution became in a sense a scientific religion; almost all scientists have accepted it and many are prepared to “bend” their observations to fit in with it.
I like things that have to do with what is real, elegant, well presented and without excessive style. In other words, just fine observation.
In all common ordinary cases, we see intuitively at first view what is out duty, what is the honest part. This is the ground of the observation, that the first thought is often the best. In these cases, doubt and deliberation is itself dishonesty; as it was in Balaam upon the second message.
Man, being the servant and interpreter of Nature, can do and understand so much and so much only as he has observed in fact or thought of the course of nature; beyond this he neither knows anything nor can do anything.
The process of discovery is very simple. An unwearied and systematic application of known laws to nature, causes the unknown to reveal themselves. Almost any mode of observation will be successful at last, for what is most wanted is method.
When Kepler found his long-cherished belief did not agree with the most precise observation, he accepted the uncomfortable fact. He preferred the hard truth to his dearest illusions, that is the heart of science.
Individuality in opinion, or, what is more, in thinking, is simply one with thinking at all; for he who thinks thereby looks at the thing or the fact itself and takes its measure by observation directly, not content with the measures of others.
I sought in political reporting what Galsworthy in another context had called “the significant trifle” – the bit of dialogue, the overlooked fact, the buried observation which illuminated the realities of the situation.
Criticism is not construction, it is observation.
It will afford me unfeigned satisfaction if my kingdom can add its quota toward the successful accomplishment of the most important astronomical observation of the present century and assist, however humbly, the enlightened nations of the earth in these costly enterprises .
You folks like TV, you watch a lot of TV? There’s a show right here on CBS, it’s a huge hit. It’s called the “Mentalist.” And it’s about this guy who has a heightened sense of observation. It’s miraculous; he’s the only guy in the world who can tell the difference between Sarah Palin and Tina Fey.
Error, never can be consistent, nor can truth fail of having support from the accurate examination of every circumstance.
In my experience and observation, senior appointments are rarely based entirely on merit.
Anthropologists are great at novelistic observations. I would be thrilled if this novel would encourage anthropologists to write what they see in fictional form.
Thus with most careful devotion Thus with precise attention To detail, interfering preparation Of that which is already prepared Men lighten the knot of confusion Into perfect misunderstanding, Reflecting a pocket-torch of observation.
The stories are not autobiographical, but they’re personal in that way. I seem to know only the things that I’ve learned. Probably some things through observation, but what I feel I know surely is personal.
We create truths by describing, or by re-describing , our beliefs and observations. Our task, and the task of every artist and scientist, is to re-describe our inherited assumptions and invented fictions in order to create new paradigms for the future.
People often assume that the same approach will work for everyone, that the same habits will work for everyone, and that everyone has the same aptitude and appetite for forming habits, but from my observation, that’s not true.
To become an academic expert takes years of studying. Academic experts are experts in how and what others have done. They use case studies and observation to understand a subject.
A careful analysis of the process of observation in atomic physics has shown that the subatomic particles have no meaning as isolated entities, but can only be understood as interconnections between the preparation of an experiment and the subsequent measurement.
Experimental observations are only experience carefully planned in advance, and designed to form a secure basis of new knowledge.
For my own part, I commonly attend more to nature than to man, but any affecting human event may blind our eyes to natural objects. I was so absorbed in him as to be surprised whenever I detected the routine of the natural world surviving still, or met persons going about their affairs indifferent.
Conversation is interesting in proportion to the originality of the central ideas which serve as pivots and the fitness of the little facts and observations which are contributed by the talkers.
Less is only more where more is no good.
Modesty and taste are questions of latitude and education; the more people know,–the more their ideas are expanded by travel, experience, and observation,–the less easily they are shocked. The narrowness and bigotry of women are the result of their circumscribed sphere of thought and action.
A vacuum is a hell of a lot better than some of the stuff that nature replaces it with.
There is a legitimate argument over whether the death penalty effectively deters violent crime, although my personal observation is that not one of the criminals who have been executed over the years has ever killed again.
It is the close observation of little things which is the secret of success in business, in art, in science, and in every pursuit of life.
When general observations are drawn from so many particulars as to become certain and indisputable, these are jewels of knowledge.
The first observation of cancer cells in the smear of the uterine cervix gave me one of the greatest thrills I ever experienced during my scientific career.
The true spirit of conversation consists in building on another man’s observation, not overturning it.
Man is aware; he perceives and interprets the world around him. When he uses logic as a tool for interpretation, it becomes science; when he uses feelings for interpretation, it becomes poetry; when he takes a longer view of his observations, it becomes wisdom.
The observation of human blindness and weakness is the result of all philosophy, and meets us at every turn, in spite of our endeavours to elude or avoid it.
I am not accustomed to saying anything with certainty after only one or two observations.
I keep plastering it until it comes around to what I want, in terms of all I know and think about painting now, as well as in terms of the initial observation.
If there’s one observation that rings true in today’s changing world, it is that freedom and peace go hand in hand.
An intelligent observation of the facts of human existence will reveal to shallow-minded folk who sneer at the use of coincidence in the arts of fiction and drama that life itself is little more than a series of coincidences.
The observation of nature is part of an artist’s life.
Permaculture is a philosophy of working with, rather than against nature; of protracted and thoughtful observation rather than protracted and thoughtless labor; and of looking at plants and animals in all their functions, rather than treating any area as a single product system
It is of great importance to note these meteors, even the small ones, as very little is yet known of them; and every observation, if carefully made, will some day help to show what they are.
In collecting evidence upon any medical subject, there are but three sources from which we can hope to obtain it; viz. from observation on medical the living subject; from examination of the dead; and from experiments upon living animals.
[Mathematics] unceasingly calls forth the faculties of observation and comparison; one of its principal weapons is induction: it has frequent recourse to trial and verification; and it affords a boundless scope for the exercise of the highest efforts of imagination and invention.
The observation of nature is part of an artist’s life, it enlarges his form [and] knowledge, keeps him fresh and from working only by formula, and feeds inspiration.
You learn to do your best writing on story rather than off story. Very often at the beginning of their careers, writers including me do their best dialogue writing off story – the best lines, the best observations – but they haven’t got enough to do with the plot to stay in.
She’s one of those third year girls who gripe my liver… You know, American college kids. They come over here to take their third year and lap up a little culture… They’re officious and dull. They’re always making profound observations they’ve overheard.
It is indeed a matter of great difficulty to discover, and effectually to distinguish, the true motions of particular bodies from the apparent because the parts of that immovable space, in which those motions are performed, do by no means come under the observation of our senses.
Either we have hope within us or we don’t It is a dimension of the soul, and is not essentially dependent on some particular observation of the World or observation of the situation. Hope is not prognostication. It is an orientation of the spirit, an orientation of the heart.
I am turned into a sort of machine for observing facts and grinding out conclusions.
Every man who observes vigilantly, and resolves steadfastly, grows unconsciously into genius.
My work is not so much a direct commentary as it is an open-ended observation of the absurdities around us.
It has been my observation that parents kill more dreams than anybody.
…he who has seen the intimate beauty of nature cannot tear himself away from it again. He must become either a poet or a naturalist and, if his eyes are keen and his powers of observation sharp enough, he may well become both.
A maxim is a conclusion upon observation of matters of fact, and is merely speculative; a “principle” carries knowledge within itself, and is prospective.
children are made of eyes and ears, and nothing, however minute, escapes their microscopic observation.
The central idea in The Black Swan is that: rare events cannot be estimated from empirical observation since they are rare.
It is my observations, though, that happiness limits the amount of suffering one is willing to inflict upon others
If there is anything the nonconformist hates worse than a conformist, it’s another nonconformist who doesn’t conform to the prevailing standard of nonconformity.
An aphorism is an extreme synthesis of thesis and antithesis, theory and practice, it’s a mixture of intuition and observation, hypothesis and illusions of certainty and probability, history and stupidity.
One finds the truth by making a hypothesis and comparing observations with the hypothesis.
He who thinks all mankind is vile is a pessimist who mistakes his introspection for observation; he looks into his own heart and thinks he sees the world.
[Isaiah] Berlin’s observation is accurate enough, and applies at home as well, and even more harshly for the reasons already mentioned: the apparatchiks and commissars could at least plead fear in extenuation.
It has been my observation that most people get ahead during the time that others waste.
It is a great pity but tis certain from every day’s observation of man, that he may be set on fire like a candle, at either end provided there is a sufficient wick standing out.
If you try to observe the precepts, that is not true observation of precepts. When you observe the precepts without trying to observe the precepts, that is true observation of the precepts.
My Ph.D. thesis problem was to determine if the DNA content of rat tissues increased if there was B12 in the diet. This problem was suggested by my adviser based on the observation that thymine could replace vitamin B12 in a lactobacillus.
That observation which is called knowledge of the world will be found much more frequently to make men cunning than good.
How pathetically scanty my self-knowledge is compared with, say, my knowledge of my room. There is no such thing as observation of the inner world, as there is of the outer world.
The result was that, if it happened to clear off after a cloudy evening, I frequently arose from my bed at any hour of the night or morning and walked two miles to the observatory to make some observation included in the programme.
A person who is too nice an observer of the business of the crowd, like one who is too curious in observing the labor of bees, will often be stung for his curiosity.
Even one well-made observation will be enough in many cases, just as one well-constructed experiment often suffices for the establishment of a law.
I think there’s value in experience and observations that link past to present.
Another observation, in a former letter of yours, has not escaped my remembrance – the three lessons which a minister has to learn: 1. Humility. 2. Humility. 3. Humility. How long are we learning the true nature of Christianity!
I think the fashion industry, as a result of globalization, has undergone a uniformity. I’m not saying that’s good or that’s bad but that is my observation.
I think most people see drawing as subservient to the subject, a sort of meditation, a studying, a searching observation, in my case, for its own sake.
The proverb says that ‘The answer to a fool is silence’. Observation, however, indicates that almost any other answer will have the same effect in the long run.
Today we no longer ask what really goes on in an atom; we ask what is likely to be observed-and with what likelihood-when we subject atoms to any specified influences such as light or heat, magnetic fields or electric currents.
The true method of discovery is like the flight of an aeroplane. It starts from the ground of particular observation; it makes a flight in the thin air of imaginative generalization; and it again lands for renewed observation rendered acute by rational interpretation.
Through my observations, it became clear that most of society’s rules and customs are rooted in fear and superstition!
We every day and every hour say things of another that we might more properly say of ourselves, could we but apply our observations to our own concerns.
I think the secret is really observation. Well, if you observe what’s going on and try to figure out how people are thinking, I think you can always write something that people will understand.
Dissent is the mark of freedom, as originality is the mark of independence of mind. … No one can be a scientist … if he does not have independence of observation and of thought.
It is my observation that all human hearts are the same and that their ultimate desire is also the same. This soul wants happiness, perfect and pure happiness, because only then will all desires end. As long as desire exists misery exists, because with desire there can be no peace.
Tell a man that he is putting on a stage performance in order to get what he wants, and he will irritably reject your observation. Why? Because most people go through life as cunning actors with a permanent horror of getting found out.
The judge should not be young, he should have learned to know evil, not from his own soul, but from late and long observation of the nature of evil in others.
A novel is no mere assemblage of gears; it is a wild and living being. And how are you to discern the intentions of a creature – to discover its true nature – other than by close and respectful observation?
[It] may be laid down as a general rule that, if the result of a long series of precise observations approximates a simple relation so closely that the remaining difference is undetectable by observation and may be attributed to the errors to which they are liable, then this relation is probably that of nature.
I am convinced, by repeated observation, that marbles, lime-stones, chalks, marls, clays, sand, and almost all terrestrial substances, wherever situated, are full of shells and other spoils of the ocean.
What really matters for me is … the more active role of the observer in quantum physics … According to quantum physics the observer has indeed a new relation to the physical events around him in comparison with the classical observer, who is merely a spectator.
Redundancy of language is never found with deep reflection. Verbiage may indicate observation, but not thinking. He who thinks much says but little in proportion to his thoughts.
At present, the novels which we owe to English ladies form no small part of the literary glory of our country. No class of works is more honorably distinguished for fine observation, by grace, by delicate wit, by pure moral feeling.
Early in life I learned, just through observation, that right always wins out over wrong. If a person has good intentions in his heart and wants to do the right thing, then there are certain ways that any obstacle can be overcome.
There is going to come a day when everyone here is going to need keen observation and wit to ridicule George W. Bush. But when that day comes, all we’re going to have are tired puns and goofy looks. Because as you would say, we’re suffering from the soft bigotry of low expectorations.
Get growing. Back yourself and make mistakes. It’s your mistakes and observations that are your greatest tutors.
I’m a good teacher and am great at observation and picking out what’s wrong and fixing it.
My observation is that whenever one person is found adequate to the discharge of a duty… it is worse executed by two persons, and scarcely done at all if three or more are employed therein.
Something about photography is tied to a very specific relationship with the material world. It doesn’t have to be, but the way I practice it, it is. So there’s an act of observation, but it’s not an act of objective recording. It’s about framing something and seeing it and understanding that it’s relational.
it is a curious subject of observation and inquiry, whether hatred and love be not the same thing at bottom.
Sometimes it takes the better part of a lifetime to find out what your passion is, but in my observation, if you do, it might be the best part of your life.
Shortly after this, I placed my command on our extreme left, to watch and fight the enemy should he make another attack, and went to Cemetary Hill for observation.
In brief, we have the new paradigm where simulation and programs have replaced theory and observation, where government largely determines the nature of scientific activity, and where the primary role of professional societies is the lobbying of the government for special advantage.
It is what you choose not to observe in your life that controls your life.
It is the true office of history to represent the events themselves, together with the counsels, and to leave the observations and conclusions thereupon to the liberty and faculty of every man’s judgment
An independant reality in the ordinary physical sense can neither be ascribed to the phenomenon nor to the agencies of observation.
Association with human beings lures one into self-observation.
There is no more difficult art to acquire than the art of observation, and for some men it is quite as difficult to record an observation in brief and plain language.
Cuvier had preceded Lamarck in specifying the kinds and degrees of variation, which his own observations and critical judgment of the reports of others led him to admit.
Bad writing is more than a matter of (expletive deleted) syntax and faulty observation; bad writing usually arises from a stubborn refusal to tell stories about what people actually do to face the fact, let us say, that murderers sometimes help old ladies cross the street.
Perceptual reality is different for different species. In certain species it is a mode of observation, so what we call scientific fact is actually not ultimate truth, it is perceptual experience, and it’s a mode of observation.
I thought of the analyst Winnicott’s observation: ‘It is a joy to be hidden but disaster not to be found’.
… yet there is a difference between scientific and artistic observation. The scientist observes to turn away and generalize; the artist observes to seize and use reality in all its individuality and peculiarity.
The person who observes a clock, sees in it not only the pendulum swinging to and fro, and the dial-plate, and the hands moving, for a child can see all this; but he sees also the parts of the clock, and in what connexion the suspended weight stands to the wheel-work, and the pendulum to the moving hands.
Some people come up to be directors by coming through the camera department and there’s not a lot of women in the camera department. The ones that are have to kind of prove they’re one of the boys, I think. I don’t want to get into trouble with generalisations but I think it’s a fair observation.
It is inherent in any definition of science that statements that cannot be checked by observation are not really saying anything or at least they are not science.
If you make listening and observation your occupation you will gain much more than you can by talk.
We must turn to nature itself, to the observations of the body in health and in disease to learn the truth.
Rhetoric and dialectics can’t change what I have learned from observation and experience.
Children have very sharp powers of observation – probably sharper than adults – yet at the same time their emotional reactions are murky and much more primitive.
The reports of the eclipse parties not only described the scientific observations in great detail, but also the travels and experiences, and were sometimes marked by a piquancy not common in official documents.
I started off believing all men were equal. I now know that’s the most unlikely thing ever to have been… But by observation, reading, watching, arguing, asking, that is the conclusion I’ve come to.
By sight and observation and thought, with the help of the camera, and the addition of the date of the year, we can hold fast the history of the world.
Writing is how I communicate my deepest beliefs, and what I hope are helpful observations about our dual citizenship, as children of God, as regular old mixed-up, worried, flawed, precious human beings.
It is a misfortune for a science to be born too late when the means of observation have become too perfect. That is what is happening at this moment with respect to physical chemistry; the founders are hampered in their general grasp by third and fourth decimal places.
Some scientists find, or so it seems, that they get their best ideas when smoking; others by drinking coffee or whisky. Thus there is no reason why I should not admit that some may get their ideas by observing, or by repeating observations.
Several country towns, within my observation, have at least a dozen taverns. Here the time, the money, the health and the modesty, of most that are young and of many old, are wasted. Here diseases, vicious habits, bastards and legislators are frequently spawned.
If you play an audiotape of a yawn to blind people, they’ll yawn too.
Photography is the power of observation, not the application of technology.
It doesn’t take many observations to think you’ve spotted a trend, and it’s probably not a trend at all.
Trust not my reading, nor my observations, Which with experimental seal do warrant The tenor of my book.
We learn this by the precepts that Jesus left. He observed that the people were looking outward, and assured them that the kingdom of God cometh not with outward observation; and for this reason, that it was only to be known in man.
[Sherlock Holmes:] The temptation to form premature theories upon insufficient data is the bane of our profession.
Observing humans and observing oneself yields a clear-minded starting point for literature.
In the realm of scientific observation, luck is granted only to those who are prepared.
It is surely a matter of common observation that a man who knows no one thing intimately has no views worth hearing on things in general.
If I want to understand something, I must observe, I must not criticize, I must not condemn, I must not pursue it as pleasure or avoid it as non-pleasure. There must merely be the silent observation of a fact.
By means of microscopic observation and astronomical projection the lotus flower can become the foundation for an entire theory of the universe and an agent whereby we may perceive Truth.
Common observation and a plain understanding is the source of all art.
Her interest in natural history was confined to observation of the crows’ feet gathering around her eyes.
I think that for thousands of years people have made the observation that there are certain kinds of extreme depressive states that seem to be more likely to produce philosophers, people in the arts, unusually brilliant scientists.
Strategy requires thought, tactics require observation.
Is there any point to which you would wish to draw my attention?’ To the curious incident of the dog in the night-time.’ The dog did nothing in the night-time.’ That was the curious incident,’ remarked Sherlock Holmes.
One of the first observations to make in conversation is the state, or the character, and the education of the person to whom we speak.
And this thesis is somewhat connected with general social and political observations, because it establishes the fact that the number of consumers is considerably larger than the number of producers, a fact which exercises a not inconsiderable social and political pressure.
The only way someone can be of help to you is in challenging your ideas. If you’re ready to listen and if you’re ready to be challenged, there’s one thing that you can do, but no one can help you. What is this most important thing of all? It’s called self-observation.
Any observations from the Moon or a sense of realising this or that about the greater meaning of things wasn’t as influential for me as the experience of coming back and dealing with being a person who’s been to the Moon.
My observation is that the bias against female child is deeply ingrained, especially in certain parts of India and that it’s not just the poor or the uneducated who have this bias, the well-read and the well-to-do also share it.
Breath is the vehicle of consciousness and so, by its slow measured observation and distribution, we learn to tug our attention away from external desires toward a judicious, intelligent awareness.
Ignorant people see life as either existence or non-existence, but wise men see it beyond both existence and non-existence to something that transcends them both; this is an observation of the Middle Way.
LIFE is that existence that is given to man to live for a purpose, to live to his own satisfaction and pleasure, providing he forgets not the God who created him and who expects a spiritual obedience and observation of the moral laws that He has inspired.
Accuracy of observation is the equivalent of accuracy of thinking.
A mind at liberty to reflect on its own observations, if it produce nothing useful to the world, seldom fails of entertainment to itself.
The forming of general maxims from particular observation is a very nice operation; and nothing is more usual, from haste or a narrowness of mind, which sees not on all sides, than to commit mistakes in this particular.
Guantanamo Bay can be and has been visited repeatedly by the International Red Cross and other human-rights groups for observation in an open, regular, and transparent manner. Detainees receive the same medical care as the guard force and are able to participate in their daily prayer sessions.
It is not a question of observation which propels mankind forward as if toward a looking glass of great magnitude; it is an instance of aggrandized reflection that insinuates the human psyche to the inhuman.
But I make the observation that no one of us would do things exactly alike.
Every man is a valuable member of society, who, by his observations, researches, and experiments, procures knowledge for men.
When you’re drawing from observation and experience, whether you intend to or not, you’ll create a more relatable cartoon.
An old pop music producer once said that there are really only four kinds of song a person can write: “I love you/I hate you/go away/come back!” That’s a funny observation.
(An unhappy childhood was not) an unsuitable preparation for my future, in that it demanded a constant wariness, the habit of observation, and the attendance on moods and tempers; the noting of discrepancies between speech and action; a certain reserve of demeanour; and automatic suspicion of sudden favours.
Seeing artistically does not happen automatically. We must constantly develop our powers of observation.
Dance has been transformed from an involuntary motor discharge, a ceremonial rite, into a work of art, conscious of, intended for, observation.
In the philosophic sense, observation shows and experiment teaches.
The lesson of the last year is this: foreign policy can’t be managed through the politics of personality, and our President would do well to take note of an observation John F. Kennedy made once he was in office – that all of the world’s problems aren’t his predecessor’s fault.
Imagination, which is a quality writers must have, does not mean the ability to weave pretty stories out of nothing. In the right sense, imagination is a response to what is going on — a sensitiveness to which outside things appeal. It is a composition of sympathy and observation.
It is an observation of one of the profoundest inquirers into human affairs that a revolution of government is the strongest proof that can be given by a people of their virtue and good sense.
The Artist is he who detects and applies the law from observation of the works of Genius, whether of man or Nature. The Artisan is he who merely applies the rules which others have detected.
Chimps don’t have language. Humans actively instruct others about how things should be done. Chimpanzees probably pick up cultural traditions by observation.
My observation is that women are merely waiting for their husbands to assume leadership.
I believe that mathematical reality lies outside us, that our function is to discover or observe it, and that the theorems which we prove, and which we describe grandiloquently as our “creations,” are simply the notes of our observations.
Dealing with architecture brings me very close to the state of mind required to make pictures. One also needs an old seeing eye, appropriate reflexes which embrace sensitive observations coupled with appropriate emotional responses.
Science is not a body of knowledge nor a system of belief; it is just a term which describes humankind’s incremental acquisition of understanding through observation. Science is awesome.
Good men, whether they be Christians or rationalists, do not desire to discriminate between races, but the distinctions implanted by Nature are too conspicuous to escape the observation of our senses.
It is a misfortune to pass at once from observation to conclusion, and to regard both as of equal value; but it befalls many a student.
My observation continues to confirm me more and more in the opinion, that to experience religion is to experience the truth of the great doctrines of Divine grace.
I will say only that all a writer has to work with is the material he has gathered as the result of his own endeavor and observations, and he cannot be denied the right to use it. Condemn, but not deny.
Photography is an art of observation – it’s about creating something extraordinary out of the ordinary. You choose a frame and then wait until the right time for something magical to come along and fill it.
There’s certainly nothing original about the observation that conscious experience poses a hard problem.
There’s certainly a portion of my brain that is always tuned to making wry observations about the world, but that portion of my brain was alive and well before Twitter.
I can’t control what people think. I’m not trying to manipulate people’s thoughts or sentiments. I write all the time. You have to experience life, make observations, and ask questions. It’s machine-like how things are run now in hip-hop, and my ambitions are different.
The main reason I write the daily observations is because I want to know where I’m wrong. So lots of times if somebody points something out it helps me, and I want to have a diversified bet of uncorrelated bets.
Our mind, by virtue of a certain finite, limited capability, is by no means capable of putting a question to Nature that permits a continuous series of answers. The observations, the individual results of measurements, are the answers of Nature to our discontinuous questioning.
My songs are based on my keen observation. I have picked these situations from my surrounding and have presented a real situation about the youth and their mindset.
I need to write down my observations. Even the tiniest ones; they’re the most important.
One question about a joke is, how well is the strangeness of the situation resolved? At ‘The New Yorker’, we retain a lot of incongruity, tapping the playful part of the mind – Monty Python-type stuff. We also try to use humor as a vehicle for communicating ideas. Not editorial comment, but observation.
I don’t think anyone who’s had a casual observation of the Trump administration will suggest that their priority is going to be environment, Indigenous and other things like that.
The observer listens to nature: the experimenter questions and forces her to reveal herself.
An aphorism is a personal observation inflated into a universal truth, a private posing as a general.
In the end, color combinations come down to our personal preferences, which we must discover through observation and experiment.
Strategy requires thought, tactics require observation
It’s a morbid observation, but if every one on earth just stopped breathing for an hour, the greenhouse effect would no longer be a problem.
Judgment can be acquired only by acute observation, by actual experience in the school of life, by ceaseless alertness to learn from others, by study of the activities of men who have made notable marks, by striving to analyze the everyday play of causes and effects, by constant study of human nature.
But when reflexion begins to play upon these objects… like some trick of magic each object is loosed into a group of impressions – colour, odour, texture… And if we continue to dwell in thought on this world… the whole scope of observation is dwarfed into the narrow chamber of the individual mind.
[John] Ruskin believed that everyone had visual as well as verbal capacities that needed to be developed in order to become a complete human being, and that the apprehension of truth depended on the power of observation.
The power of accurate observation is commonly called cynicism by those who have not got it.
Self-expression is a hallmark of an artist, of art, to get something off one’s chest, to sing one’s song. So that element is present in all art. It is the key to even standing up and saying, “Hey, listen to me.” Self-expression can be based on looking at the world and making observations about it.
There are few defects in our nature so glaring as not to be veiled from observation by politeness and good-breeding.
It is increasingly clear to me that my art relates more and more to a sublimation of my closeness to the natural world, it’s events, light itself, and the positive it is a personal expression based on observation and reaction, that I am not able to define except in terms of the work itself.
Healthy scepticism is the basis of all accurate observation.
Expose every belief to the light of reason, discourse, facts, scientific observations; question everything, be sceptical because this is the only chance at life you will ever get.
To rescue from oblivion even a fragment of a language which men have used and which is in danger of being lost -that is to say, one of the elements, whether good or bad, which have shaped and complicated civilization -is to extend the scope of social observation and to serve civilization.
A true critic ought to dwell upon excellencies rather than imperfections, to discover the concealed beauties of a writer, and communicate to the world such things as are worth their observation.
In the same way that Shakespeare was writing very much for his time, he was also unearthing observations that would last for generations beyond him.