Tracing Quotations
John Stuart Mill? Henry George? H. L. Mencken? C. Palfrey? J. E. Jennings? Adam Coaldigger? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Recent progress in artificial intelligence and robotics has led some to believe that work hours will shrink and leisure will grow. However, history suggests a different possibility. Brilliant inventors have created a series of remarkable …
Continue reading “Saying Origin: Labor-Saving Devices Don’t Save Labor. They Increase It”
Gardner Dozois? Isaac Asimov? Robert Heinlein? Cory Doctorow? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: A competent science-fiction (SF) author can use the knowledge of automobiles and movie theaters to predict the creation of drive-in movie theaters. But an ingenious SF author can predict the dramatic shift in sexual behavior caused by these changes in mobility and …
Ralph Waldo Emerson? W. Taylor? Karl Blind? Carolyne Larrington? Poetic Edda? Hávamál? Scandinavian Proverb? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: A friendship endures when it is nurtured and periodically renewed. Silence and distance cause a friendship to decay. The following adage expresses this viewpoint: Go often to the house of thy friend, for weeds soon choke …
Tyler Cowen? Joshua Rothman? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: Currently, the training of advanced artificial intelligence (AI) systems requires vast quantities of text, pictures, and videos. Most of this data is unlicensed. Hence, this training has become controversial, and the backlash against such systems has been growing. Numerous creators wish to exclude their creative output …
Dorothy Parker? Lillian Day? Alexander Woollcott? Apocryphal? Question for Quote Investigator: U.S. poet, critic, and fiction writer Dorothy Parker was famous for her witticisms. When discussing a prom, she said something like the following: If all the young women who attended were laid end to end, I wouldn’t be at all surprised. Would you please …
Roberto Alazar? Pasi Kuoppamaki? Richard M. Scammon? Ben Wattenberg? John Kenneth Galbraith? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Economics is a complex and contentious discipline. Sharp disagreements between economists inspired the following quip: Economics is the only field in which two people can share a Nobel Prize for saying opposing things. Would you please help me …
Winston Churchill? William Arthur Ward? Googey Bince? Carl Hermann Voss? George W. Norris? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: It takes courage to stand up and speak, but it also takes courage to sit down and listen. This notion has been attributed to U.K statesman Winston Churchill, but I have never seen a solid citation, and …
Fred Allen? John Florence Sullivan? St. Martin’s Review? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Meetings are often ineffective time-wasting exercises. Here are two versions of a popular comical criticism: (1) A committee is a body of people who individually can do nothing but collectively they may decide that nothing can be done. (2) A conference is …
Robert Frost? George William Curtis? Arthur Deerin Call? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Everyone encounters difficult problems and arduous tasks. When avoidance is impossible it becomes necessary to face these challenges directly. Here are four versions of a pertinent adage: (1) The only way out is through.(2) The best way out is always through.(3) No …
Continue reading “Adage Origin: The Only Way Out Is Through”
Will Rogers? Eddie Cantor? Benjamin Franklin? Anonymous? Question for Quote Investigator: Risky investments offer high returns, but the money invested may be completely lost. A family of statements uses wordplay to express a memorable warning. Here are three instances: (1) I learned to worry about the return of my money instead of the return on …