Elite universities [in the twentieth century] nudged science out of the liberal arts undergraduate curriculum—and out of the minds of many young people, who, as the new academic establishment, so marginalized themselves that they are no longer within shouting distance of the action.
—John Brockman
I believe that there is a quasi-religious theory of human nature prevalent among pundits and intellectuals... The theory has three parts: The Blank Slate—that we have no talent or temperaments because the mind is shaped completely by the environment (parenting, culture, and society). The second is the myth of the Noble Savage—that evil motives are not inherent in people but spring from corrupting social institutions. The third is the Ghost in the Machine—that the most important part of us is somehow independent of our biology, so that our ability to have experiences and make choices can't be explained by our physiological makeup and evolutionary history.
—Steven Pinker
To seek the causes of poverty... is to enter an intellectual dead end because poverty has no causes. The great cold of poverty and economic stagnation is merely the absence of economic development. It can be overcome only if the relevant economic processes are in motion.
—Jane Jacobs
Simple rules build complex structures, and complex structures deconstruct into simple rules.
--Benoit Mandelbrot
From before Copernicus to the present, change in the way we see the world has never occurred by getting the people in charge to say, "Gee, sorry—I guess we've been wrong all our lives." Change is accomplished by the non-professionals, the young, the people who are not as professionally committed to maintaining the status quo as the "experts" are.
—Dr. Rick Boettger, The Deficit Lie
Americans celebrated the end of the Cold War with a mixture of relief and satisfaction. The people of the United States hoped to enjoy a peace dividend, as U.S. spending on national security was cut following the end of the Soviet military threat.
—The 9/11 Commission Report
What shall we do about the board of directors? ... The board was elected to act in place of the owners. The board's responsibility is to sit in judgment on the management, especially on the performance of the chief executive, and to reward, punish, or replace the management as the board, in its wisdom, sees fit. That is what is supposed to happen. That is what may appear to happen. But it doesn't.
—Harold Geneen
I think those people who say they believe in a gold standard are fundamentally being very anti-libertarian because what they mean by a gold standard is a governmentally fixed price for gold.
—Milton Friedman
On January 24, 1961 ... a B-52, mainstay of the strategic nuclear bomber force, crashed near Goldsboro, North Carolina. The plane carried two 24-megaton nuclear weapons... [One bomb] fell into a field where it was found intact. According to Ralph Lapp, former head of the nuclear physics branch of the Office of Naval Research, five of the six interlocking safety mechanisms on the recovered bomb had been triggered by the fall. A single switch prevented the accidental explosion over North Carolina of a nuclear weapon more than a thousand times as powerful as the bomb that leveled Hiroshima.
—Lloyd J. Dumas, Lethal Arrogance
I would much rather have my children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren have to deal with the problem of global warming than with the problem of a huge economic difference between rich and poor countries.
—William W. Lewis, The Power of Productivity
