Edgar Wallace? Aldous Huxley? Paul Larmer? Russell Lynes? Katharine Whitehorn? Wayne C. Booth? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Human thoughts are often focused on relationships and intimacy. Yet, other cerebral pursuits may predominate when the mind shifts focus. Here are three closely related versions of a humorous definition: A highbrow is a person who has found …
Author Archives: quoteresearch
Quote Origin: Secrecy: The Art of Telling a Thing To Only One Person At a Time
University of Oxford? Theresa Russell? Edna Worthley Underwood? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: I have been told with the highest level of confidentiality that the following comical definition has been employed at the University of Oxford: Secret: You may tell it to only one person at a time. Would you please explore the provenance of …
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If Builders Built Buildings the Way Programmers Wrote Programs, Then the First Woodpecker That Came Along Would Destroy Civilization
Gerald Weinberg? Conrad Schneiker? Arthur Bloch? Clifford Stoll? Dennis Hall? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Computer programs are not resilient. Small errors can cause a program to malfunction. In the 1960s a spacecraft bound for Venus quickly veered off course because a single character in the guidance program was accidentally omitted. This dangerous situation necessitated a …
Quote Origin: Absence of Evidence Is Not Evidence of Absence
Carl Sagan? Martin Rees? William Wright? William Housman? W. J. Sollas? Dugald Bell? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: The existence or non-existence of intelligent extraterrestrial life is a highly contentious subject. Some thinkers who are open to the possibility of interstellar aliens also believe that the current evidence is inadequate; hence, they advocate using radio …
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Hurt People Hurt People
Rick Warren? Will Bowen? Yehuda Berg? Charles Eads? Oprah Winfrey? Helen Boyd? Doug Manning? Emotions Anonymous? Barbara Johnson? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: People who have been hurt or damaged in life sometimes respond by striking out and hurting the people who are around them. A concise adage expresses this viewpoint: Hurt people hurt people. This …
Behold the Turtle. He Makes Progress Only When His Neck Is Out
James B. Conant? Atomic Scientist? Anonymous Cartoonist? Leslie Groves? G. B. Carter? P. C. Keith? Dear Quote Investigator: Making headway in life requires taking significant risks. This thought has been presented with a homespun aquatic analogy. Here are three versions: Behold the turtle! He makes progress only when his neck is out. Behold the turtle. …
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The Mystery of Human Existence Lies Not In Just Staying Alive, But In Finding Something To Live For
Fyodor Dostoevsky? Andrew H. MacAndrew? Constance Garnett? Max Tegmark? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: The famous Russian novelist Fyodor Dostoevsky contended that simply staying alive would not make a person content. A person must find something to live for. Strictly speaking, this viewpoint was articulated by a character in a story by Dostoevsky and not by …
One Had To Accept the Art of Our Day As It Was a Living Thing
Peggy Guggenheim? Ilya Ilyich Oblomov? Samuel Beckett? Dear Quote Investigator: Peggy Guggenheim was one of the most powerful and influential collectors of modern art in the twentieth century. Yet, her initial tastes in art were classical. She preferred the works of old masters. Her viewpoint changed dramatically during a tempestuous love affair with an author …
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The Eighth Wonder of the World Is Compound Interest
Albert Einstein? Napoleon Bonaparte? Baron Rothschild? Paul Samuelson? John D. Rockefeller? Advertising Copy Writer? Apocryphal? Dear Quote Investigator: Salespeople and advertisers invoke the name of the scientific genius Albert Einstein when they wish to impress gullible individuals. The following grandiose statement has been attributed to Einstein: Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. …
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Beware of Fishing for Compliments—You Might Come Up with a Boot
Carol Weston? Anonymous? Dear Quote Investigator: Displaying false modesty is sometimes intended to elicit praise. This type of behavior is called “fishing for compliments”. Yet, according to a well-known comical scenario an unlucky individual may reel in a fishing line and discover a useless boot attached to the hook. Would you please explore the provenance …
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