Quotes & Sayings About Improving The World

Through scientific discovery and technological innovation, we enlist the forces of the natural world to solve many of the uniquely human problems we face - feeding and providing energy to agrowing population, improving human health, taking responsibility for protecting the environment and the global ecosystem, and ensuring our own Nation's security. Scientific discoveries inspire and enrich us, teaching us about the mysteries of life and the nature of the world. — William J. Clinton

To improve the world start by improving yourself. — Matshona Dhliwayo

Every country in the world is battling the rising cost of health care. No community anywhere has demonstrably lowered its health-care costs (not just slowed their rate of increase) by improving medical services. They've lowered costs only by cutting or rationing them. — Atul Gawande

Odd as I am sure it will appear to some, I can think of no better form of personal involvement in the cure of the environment than that of gardening. A person who is growing a garden, if he is growing it organically, is improving a piece of the world. He is producing something to eat, which makes him somewhat independent of the grocery business, but he is also enlarging, for himself, the meaning of food and the pleasure of eating. — Wendell Berry

We're so young. We're so young. We're twenty-two years old. We have so much time. There's this sentiment I sometimes sense, creeping in our collective conscious as we lie alone after a party, or pack up our books when we give in and go out - that it is somehow too late. That others are somehow ahead. More accomplished, more specialized. More on the path to somehow saving the world, somehow creating or inventing or improving. That it's too late now to BEGIN a beginning and we must settle for continuance, for commencement. — Marina Keegan

Libraries store the energy that fuels the imagination. They open up windows to the world and inspire us to explore and achieve, and contribute to improving our quality of life. Libraries change lives for the better. — Sidney Sheldon

Schools are not intended to moralize a wicked world, but to impart knowledge and develop intelligence, with only two social aims in mind: prepare to take on one's share in the world's work, and perhaps in addition, lend a hand in improving society, after schooling is done. — Jacques Barzun

Philosophy is then nothing more than properly directed questions made in an attempt to better understand the world in which we live as a means of improving the quality of one's life. — Chris Matakas

Where was the use, originally, in rushing this whole globe through in six days? It is likely that if more time had been taken in the first place, the world would have been made right, and this ceaseless improving and repairing would not be necessary now. But if you hurry a world or a house, you are nearly sure to find out by and by that you have left out a towhead, or a broom-closet, or some other little convenience, here and there, which has got to be supplied, no matter how much expense or vexation it may cost. — Mark Twain

It's true that the original idea was mine, but what you see today is the work of probably tens of thousands of the world's best engineers, all concentrating on improving the product, reducing the cost, things of that sort. — Jack Kilby

I would like, then, to end by putting in a good word for the non-industrious poor. At least they aren't hurting anyone. Insofar as the time they are taking time off from work is being spent with friends and family, enjoying and caring for those they love, they're probably improving the world more than we acknowledge. — David Graeber

We have much to contribute to the world; ways of knowing and being that are going to be essential to everyone's survival on our planet. As true citizens of Australia, properly acknowledged in our constitution, we can look forward not only to improving our own lot, but helping Australia contribute to the well-being of all the world's peoples. — Patrick Dodson

Success is not winning the World Cup. It may be a goal in your mind but success is having a team that is improving all the time. — Berti Vogts

How do you become better tomorrow? By improving yourself, the world is made better. Be not afraid of growing too slowly. Be afraid of standing still. Forget your mistakes, but remember what they taught you. So how do you become better tomorrow? By becoming better today. — Benjamin Franklin

Philanthropy is not about the money. It's about using whatever resources you have at your fingertips and applying them to improving the world. — Melinda Gates

Today, making money is very simple. But making sustainable money while being responsible to the society and improving the world is very difficult. — Jack Ma

I am just a guy, doing my best to be the best person I can be.
And, every once in a while, I fuck up the moment I'm in.
Please. Get over it. Get over yourselves. Get over this weird need to be morally superior to me and to the other people in this world.
And let me be imperfect. I assure you, my imperfections drive me to improve.
Let me love myself. I assure you, loving myself despite my faults will only make me a better person.
Let me be my own judge. I assure you, I'll be more fair and just than you ever will.
Let me be the owner of my own intentions. I assure you, there isn't another soul on earth who knows what my real intentions are but me.
Love and acceptance despite ongoing and glaring imperfection is all I've ever tried to attain with this blog. For me. For you. For everyone. And I'll never stop. — Dan Pearce

All our theories of improving the world, while we are still asleep, merely intensify the sleep of humanity. — Maurice Nicoll

The world is hungry for the discoveries that young, leading-edge brain researchers are making in Ontario today. This collaboration will help them bring their best ideas to market, improving the quality of life for Ontarians while creating good jobs and promoting economic growth. — Brad Duguid

I want to see one of my products being taken by people across the world. I want to see them improving and leading a better life. It's like playing God. — Kallam Anji Reddy

Responding to bereavement by trying to make a difference is certainly both understandable and admirable, but it doesn't give you good reason to raise money for one specific cause of death rather than any other. If that person had died in different circumstances it would have been no less tragic. What we care about when we lose someone close to us is that they suffered or died, not that they died from a specific cause. By all means, the sadness we feel at the loss of a loved one should be harnessed in order to make the world a better place. But we should focus that motivation on preventing death and improving lives per se, rather than preventing death and improving lives in one very specific way. Any other decision would be unfair on those we could have helped more. — William MacAskill

Patriotism is about improving the lives of one's fellow citizens and improving one's country's contribution to the world. In the conservative moral hierarchy, our country is taken as simply better than other countries. This is jingoism, not true patriotism, which rests on progressive values. — George Lakoff

To actively improve the world
and change your life as well,
speak all the good you know,
and all the bad refuse to tell. — Richelle E. Goodrich

New insights fail to get put into practice because they conflict with deeply held internal images of how the world works ... images that limit us to familiar ways of thinking and acting. That is why the discipline of managing mental models - surfacing, testing, and improving our internal pictures of how the world works - promises to be a major breakthrough for learning organizations. — Peter Senge

The most poor and backward areas in the world are those in which women are subjugated and exploited. Improving the situation of the woman improves the family, the community, and by extension the whole country. — Isabel Allende

We're not saints, any of us. Maybe somebody is, but I don't know those people. But we all know people who behave very smugly and are very egotistical and put you down as a manner of improving their own place in the world or improving their own place in the world. — Heidi Julavits

It is Jesus that you seek when you dream of happiness; He is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies you; He is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is He who provoked you with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it is He who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is He who reads in your heart your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle.
It is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal. — Pope John Paul II

The cause which is blocking all progress today is the subtle scepticism which whispers in a million ears that things are not good enough to be worth improving. If the world is good we are revolutionaries, if the world is evil we must be conservatives. These essays, futile as they are considered as serious literature, are yet ethically sincere, since they seek to remind men that things must be loved first and improved afterwards. — G.K. Chesterton

The best way to avoid abuses is for the populace in general to be scientifically literate, to understand the implications of such investigations. In exchange for freedom of inquiry, scientists are obliged to explain their work. If science is considered a closed priesthood, too difficult and arcane for the average person to understand, the dangers of abuse are greater. But if science is a topic of general interest and concern - if both its delights and its social consequences are discussed regularly and competently in the schools, the press, and at the dinner table - we have greatly improved our prospects for learning how the world really is and for improving both it and us. — Carl Sagan

I don't know whether computers are improving the style of play, I know they are changing it. Chess has become a different game, one could say that computers have changed the world of chess. That is pretty clear. — Vladimir Kramnik

While the rest of the world has been improving technology, Ghana has been improving the quality of mans humanity to a man. — Maya Angelou

The downstream effects are unknown. Do your best and hope for the best. If you're improving the world-however you define that-consider your job well done. — Tim Ferriss

Improving the health & productivity of the poorest is one of the best investments you can make in the future of the world — Bill Gates

One thing people underestimate is how markets don't allow anyone to do anything except make better and better products. There's not much leeway. The world is a lot more competitive than most people think, particularly in a high-technology area. If a company takes its eye off improving its products, if it tries to do anything that would be viewed as an exercise of power, it'll be displaced very rapidly. — Bill Gates

Former secretary of state George Shultz, reflecting on forty years of United States foreign policy from 1970 to the present, said, When I think about all the money we spent on bombs and munitions, and our failures in Viet Nam, Iraq, Afghanistan and other places around the world . . . Instead of advancing our agenda using force, we should have instead built schools and hospitals in these countries, improving the lives of their children. By now, those children would have grown into positions of influence, and they would be grateful to us instead of hating us. — Daniel J. Levitin

The idea of changing or improving the world is alien to me and seems ludicrous. Society functions, and always has, without the artist. No artist has ever changed anything for better or worse. — Georg Baselitz

If the world's leaders are serious about improving collective well-being, we'd better get serious about prioritizing education in our nations and in our global discussion. — Wendy Kopp

Critics hang around and wait for others to make mistakes. But the real doers of the world have not time for criticizing others. They are too busy doing, making mistakes, improving, making progress. — Wayne Dyer

By improving yourself, the world is made better. Be not afraid of growing too slowly. Be afraid only of standing still. — Benjamin Franklin

The bonds that women share around the world, wherever we come from, they're very powerful and they have an ease of communication because we share those very important things of our families, our mothering, of improving opportunities for the next generation. — Quentin Bryce

In previous ages the word 'art' was used to cover all forms of human skill. The Greeks believed that these skills were given by the gods to man for the purpose of improving the condition of life. In a real sense, photography has fulfilled the Greek ideal of art; it should not only improve the photographer, but also improve the world. — David Hurn

These days people spend more time trying to convince the world that their life is perfect than they spend on actually improving their lives. — Saccheen Laing

The organization is "committed to improving the state of the world." In practice it is mainly a rich people's club, committed to preserving the existing world order. — John Lanchester

Making a company is a great way to improve the world while improving yourself. — Derek Sivers

The world we live in takes a multifaceted approach. To the American taxpayer: We need to be investing in improving people's lives before the terrorists try to take over. — Lindsey Graham

This is what it means to serve: improving another's life and, in turn, improving the world. — Daniel H. Pink

I personally think that we can win the World Cup. We are improving with every game. With such a young average age in the squad we can only carry on improving. — Ruud Van Nistelrooy

Honest concern for others is the key factor in improving our day-to-day lives. When you are warm-hearted, there is no room for anger, jealousy, or insecurity. A calm mind and self-confidence are the basis for happy and peaceful relations with each other. Healthy, happy families and a healthy, peaceful nation are dependent on warm-heartedness. Some scientists have observed that constant anger and fear eat away at our immune system, whereas a calm mind strengthens it. We have to see how we can fundamentally change our education system so that we can train people to develop warm-heartedness early on in order to create a healthier society. I don't mean we need to change the whole system - just improve it. We need to encourage an understanding that inner peace comes from relying on human values like love, compassion, tolerance, and honesty, and that peace in the world relies on individuals finding inner peace. - HIS HOLINESS, THE DALAI LAMA — Debra Landwehr Engle

I don't think our fiduciary duty is to put shareholders first. I say the opposite. What we firmly believe is that if we focus our company on improving the lives of the world's citizens and come up with genuine sustainable solutions, we are more in synch with consumers and society and ultimately this will result in good shareholder returns. — Paul Polman

You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end,each of us must work for our own improvement and, at the same time, share a genaral responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think can be most useful. — Marie Curie

Men and women are learning animals. If you do not see what they have learned, you're blind. They are creatures ever changing, ever improving, ever expanding their vision and the capacity of their hearts. You are not fair to them when you speak of this as the most bloody century; you are not seeing the light that shines ever more radiantly on account of the darkness; you are not. seeing the evolution of the human soul! ... ... True, what you say about war. Yes, and the cries of the dying, I too have heard them; we have all heard them, through all the decades; and even now, the world is shocked by daily reports of armed conflict. But it is the outcry against these horrors which is the light I speak of; it's the attitudes which were never possible in the past. It is the intolerance of thinking men and women in power who for the first time in the history of the human race truly want to put an end to injustice in all forms.
Marius to Akasha (The Vampire Chronicles) — Anne Rice

Let us all reaffirm our commitment to improving the well- being of families throughout the world. — Kofi Annan

If only religion could be brought to take an interest in this earthly future, what a help it would be! ... Think of the appeal to the less spiritual of us, to those who never did get enthusiastic about eternity, or care so tenderly about their own souls, yet who could rise to the thought of improving this world for the children they love, and their children after them. — Charlotte Perkins Gilman

Improving the world can be a nasty and ugly and difficult and dangerous business ... because when you improve the world, you threaten the entrenched interests of evil people. — Stefan Molyneux

Now on Tines World, the Zone physics was still improving. What was it like thirty lightyears higher? Bili — Vernor Vinge

That is why the discipline of managing mental models - surfacing, testing, and improving our internal pictures of how the world works - promises to be a major breakthrough for building learning organizations. — Peter M. Senge

With medical science improving at roughly the same rate as our environmental situation worsens, the most likely scenario is that the world will become uninhabitable at the precise moment the human race becomes immortal. — Steve Toltz

With the common Iranian threat bringing the Sunni Arab world and Israel closer together, an Israeli-Palestinian peace would go a long way in improving relations and rebuffing Iran's regional ambitions. — Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

If the anti-abortion movement took a tenth of the energy they put into noisy theatrics and devoted it to improving the lives of children who have been born into lives of poverty, violence, and neglect, they could make a world shine. — Michael Jay Tucker

Knowing that life is a marathon and not a sprint is important. Conserve your energy. Understand that each battle is only one of many and that you can use it to make the next one easier. More important, you must keep them all in real perspective. Passing one obstacle simply says you're worthy of more. The world seems to keep throwing them at you once it knows you can take it. Which is good, because we get better with every attempt. Never rattled. Never frantic. Always hustling and acting with creativity. Never anything but deliberate. Never attempting to do the impossible - but everything up to that line. Simply flipping the obstacles that life throws at you by improving in spite of them, because of them. And therefore no longer afraid. But excited, cheerful, and eagerly anticipating the next round. — Ryan Holiday

Education is for improving the lives of others and for leaving your community and world better than you found it. — Marian Wright Edelman

An ethic of maternalism was central to the utopianism of 19th century feminists. I don't think that today's women see motherhood as a source of personal power, let alone political power. I don't think that women now have that same sense that their lives as mothers gives them any special power or virtue. I think women see their lives as mothers as an adjunct to their working lives - a fulfilling and important adjunct, to be sure - but something they do in addition to working in the public realm, not because being a wife and mother gives them a distinct edge in improving the world as we know it. — Clare Wright

Pessimism is reactionary because it makes the very idea of improving the world impossible. — George Orwell

That's the nature of comedy - you always want to be improving and growing and changing with what's happening in the world. That's when comedy is most effective. — Margaret Cho

We won the European Championship last September and now the world title. That is some year for French beach soccer! Now comes the hard part. We have to keep improving and that's difficult because it's tough to do better than winning a world title. — Eric Cantona

I think the world is always improving and always not improving. I think that both are simultaneously happening all the time. — Eve Ensler

I know there are those who doubt that racism is still such a big problem, but if you ask me, it's only middle-aged people who think that, those who think the world has automatically become better simply because they're old enough to shape it now, but without any of them having made the slightest contribution to improving it. — Katarina Bivald

After Iyman Faris's foiled plot to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge, however, most of the al-Qaeda central command had either been killed or captured, and there were no more major incidents.85 But just as the situation seemed to be improving, in March 2003, the United States, Britain, and their allies invaded Iraq, despite considerable opposition from the international community and strong protests throughout the Muslim world. The reasons for this invasion were allegations that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction and had furnished support for al-Qaeda, both of which eventually proved to be groundless. — Karen Armstrong