Nicholas Quotes & Sayings

For just as the Milesians believed in Oracles, Malesians believed in Bomohs. Malesian Bomohs or Dukuns, just as the Sibyls, went into convulsions or ecstatic trances to proclaim the wishes of the Gods. But Malesian Bomohs did more. They claimed to be able to capture Spirits which they kept as pets. And these pet spirits could be sold or hired out to clients, to perform minor supernatural feats or miracles.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

I'm not scared of dying . . . I'm scared that I might enjoy it. — Nicholas Black

What they call philosophy I call literature; what they call literature I call journalism; what they call journalism I call gossip; and what they call gossip I call (generously) voyeurism. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I think life's turning into an omelet and people will just have to live with that. — Nicholas Negroponte

A mistake is not something to be determined after the fact, but in light of the information available until that point — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I overlooked some obvious problems, made excuses for others. — Nicholas Sparks

Members of the Athenian assemblies were chosen by lot, a method meant to protect the system from degeneracy. Luckily, this effect has been investigated with modern political systems. In a computer simulation, Alessandro Pluchino and his colleagues showed how adding a certain number of randomly selected politicians to the process can improve the functioning of the parliamentary system. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

You can see the future best through peripheral vision. — Nicholas Negroponte

Concordances. But here, too, the effects are different. As — Nicholas Carr

Since procrastination is a message from our natural willpower via low motivation, the cure is changing the environment, or one's profession, by selecting one in which one does not have to fight one's impulses. Few can grasp the logical consequence that, instead, one should lead a life in which procrastination is good, as a naturalistic-risk-based form of decision making. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

What NYU tried to teach had no relation whatsoever with the reality of what making a film is like. You cannot teach someone aesthetics. What you can do is say, "If you were in this situation and this is the kind of story you wanted to tell, here are a couple of ways you could try to make things work." But they didn't really do that. I did my three years there, and I have said at times that besides my childhood, going to NYU was the single most destructive experience of my life. It took me eight years to recover.
~Tom Dicillo — Nicholas Jarecki

There are no authors in my genre. No one is doing what I do. — Nicholas Sparks

That in the end, people who are grieving have to want to move on
that first step, that motivating spark, has to come from within them. And when it does, it opens the door to the unexpected. — Nicholas Sparks

My principle activity is to tease those who take themselves and the quality of their knowledge too seriously. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I'd have to swing by the house first to change into something more comfortable."
"That's fine," he said. "I'm all for you changing into something more comfortable."
"I'll bet you are," she said knowingly.
"Now, don't start getting fresh," he said, feigning offense. "I don't think we know each other well enough for that. — Nicholas Sparks

I want to get more muscly. — Nicholas Hoult

The basic trouble with all long-range population projections is that they are driven by assumptions about birth levels - and there is still no reliable method for predicting fertility levels a generation from now, to say nothing of a century hence, — Nicholas Eberstadt

When we go to school, very often, we don't see that passion because the way school is run, the disciplinary nature of it and the rote learning are so, sort of, offensive actually, that children sort of lose that passion more often than not. — Nicholas Negroponte

...avoidance of small mistakes makes the large ones more severe. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

In journalism, especially, we tend to deal with large, complex systems by finding especially interesting people and story lines to focus on. — Nicholas Lemann

(J)ust as we tend to underestimate the role of luck in life in general, we tend to overestimate it in games of chance. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I had no choice. Love does funny things to people. — Nicholas Sparks

Like many people who live in the South, I'm drawn to the history of the Civil War. — Nicholas Sparks

The worst side effect of wealth is the social associations it forces on its victims, as people with big houses end up socializing with other people with big houses. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

With a Latin saying that sophistication is born out of hunger (artificia docuit fames). — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

An erudite is someone who displays less than he knows; a journalist or consultant the opposite. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

I'm in favour of religion as a tamer of arrogance. For a Greek Orthodox, the idea of God as creator outside the human is not God in God's terms. My God isn't the God of George Bush. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

He's just ... immature. He thinks every woman he meets is crazy for him, gets angry at little things, and blames other people when things go wrong. — Nicholas Sparks

But wisdom means more than being intelligent, because it encompasses understanding, empathy, experience, inner peace, and intuition, and — Nicholas Sparks

Showing someone they were amazing and worth some attention and effort could be done in a moment, but the impact could last a lifetime. — Erin Nicholas

Truth only means something when it's hard to admit. — Nicholas Sparks

Gifts of the heart can't be claimed by anyone except the giver. — Nicholas Sparks

You no more have the right to risk others by failing to vaccinate than you do by sending your child to school with a hunting knife. Vaccination isn't a private choice but a civic obligation. — Nicholas Kristof

Your reputation is harmed the most by what you say to defend it. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The mind of the experienced book reader is a calm mind, not a buzzing one. When it comes to the firing of our neurons, it's a mistake to assume that more is better. — Nicholas Carr

Sight of Dawson running on the opposite side of the street, — Nicholas Sparks

I want you to be.... happy. — Nicholas Sparks

As countries get rich they start increasing education and the very educated people tend to not like trial and error, because they think they're obligated to use the body of knowledge they have. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

And for the briefest instant, it almost feels like we're together again. — Nicholas Sparks

We should ban banks from risk-taking because society is going to pay the price. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Every year 3.1 million Indian children die before the age of 5, mostly from diseases of poverty like diarrhea. — Nicholas D. Kristof

Author discussed what he calls the "narrative fallacy." This refers to our "limited ability" to look at a sequence of facts "without weaving an explanation into them. — Nicholas Nassim Taleb

Someone with a low degree of epistemic arrogance is not too visible, like a shy person at a cocktail party. We are not predisposed to respect humble people, those who try to suspend judgement. Now contemplate epistemic humility. Think of someone heavily introspective, tortured by the awareness of his own ignorance. He lacks the courage of the idiot, yet has the rare guts to say "I don't know." He does not mind looking like a fool or, worse, an ignoramus. He hesitates, he will not commit, and he agonizes over the consequences of being wrong. He introspects, introspects, and introspects until he reaches physical and nervous exhaustion.
This does not necessarily mean he lacks confidence, only that he holds his own knowledge to be suspect. I will call such a person an epistemocrat; the province where the laws are structured with this kind of human fallibility in mind I will can an epistemocracy. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

You made me happy and you made me laugh, and if I could do it all over again, I would not hesitate. Look at our life, at the trips we took, the adventures we had. As your father used to say, we shared the longest ride together, this thing called life, and mine has been filled with joy because of you. — Nicholas Sparks

I wish I had the talent to paint the way I feel about you, for my words always feel inadequate. I imagine using red for your passion and pale blue for your kindness; forest green to reflect the depth of your empathy and bright yellow for your unflagging optimism. And still I wonder: can even an artist's palette capture the full range of what you mean to me? — Nicholas Sparks

But how a game plan came to be, what a finished plan looked like, I had no idea. I'd heard that all copies were shredded as soon as the game was over. — Nicholas Dawidoff

If Nicholas be not always found to be blameless or agreeable, he is not always intended to appear so. He is a young man of an impetuous temper and of little or no experience; and I saw no reason why such a hero should be lifted out of nature. — Charles Dickens

I'm happiest when I'm with you" - Amanda Collier — Nicholas Sparks

And each day when Poseidon & his entourage of Goddesses & Nymphs arrived, Hera would come with them. And as the amphora began to be filled with Poseidon's seed, Hera would report that her amphora would take much longer to fill, as Zeus, her husband, was not a willing donor. But she had in fact been cheating by instructing her daughters, Hebe & Eilithyia, to empty the amphora filled with their father's seed into the rivers & streams, lakes & ponds, & the springs in the woods, so that the amphora would never be full, as this was the only way she could continue to keep her husband's sex drive in check, & with good reason to do so. — Nicholas Chong

One of the basics of a good system of innovation is diversity. In some ways, the stronger the culture (national, institutional, generational, or other), the less likely it is to harbor innovative thinking. Common and deep-seated beliefs, widespread norms, and behavior and performance standards are enemies of new ideas. Any society that prides itself on being harmonious and homogeneous is very unlikely to catalyze idiosyncratic thinking. Suppression of innovation need not be overt. It can be simply a matter of peoples walking around in tacit agreement and full comfort with the status quo. — Nicholas Negroponte

America is the best half-educated country in the world. — Nicholas M. Butler

A lot of lies and misinformation has been put about by eco nuts on the back of a report by an idiot economist [Sir Nicholas Stern]. Environmental head bangers are talking nonsense when they claim that aviation is the fastest-growing source of carbon emissions. Coal-fired and oil-fired power stations are the biggest contributor of carbon but I have yet to hear any fearless eco warriors advocating nuclear power as they drive around in their SUVs to their next protest meeting. — Michael O'Leary

The bulk of the emails tend to come after a column. I can get about 2,000 after a column. — Nicholas D. Kristof

And though she didn't know it then, whenever her thoughts drifted back toward the past, she would always remember that this was how it all began. — Nicholas Sparks

You're a hero and a gentleman, you're kind and honest, but more than that, you're the first man I ever truly loved. And no matter what the future brings, you always will be, and I know that my life is better for it. — Nicholas Sparks

All the talk about virgins recently had made him secretly yearn for some of the Nectar that they produced in their young wombs.It must have been at least fifty years since he had last tasted a virgin's Nectar. And that came from the lovely Metis, the neighbour's daughter, who subsequently became his wife.
Virgins were supposed to have hymens, yet he had never seen his wife's hymen."You don't notice such things when you are young", he told himself. All his three daughters had grown up from virgins to adults without him ever noticing them having hymens. They were all happily married now, with families of their own.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

What good is honour when greed eats away at it's foundations? — Alexandra Bracken

Once she was separated from the cockles & clams, she found herself miraculously transformed into a Goddess. But she found herself different from the Goddesses & Nymphs of the sea because of the girdle. It clung to her body as a second skin, or as the shell clung to the cockle, & she had never been able to take it off. And thus, she herself had never known what she hid beneath the girdle. — Nicholas Chong

Love is in prospect or retrospect, the present is ecstasy. — Nicholas Mosley

Too many people seem to believe that silence was a void that needed to be filled, even if nothing important was said. — Nicholas Sparks

The conceit of literary intellectuals is to imagine that other people don't have ideas so that they can assume a superior status by having their own... — Nicholas Mosley

You find peace by coming to terms with what you don't know. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Comfort and familiarity were wonderful but they also dulled passion and excitement. Predictability and habit made surprises almost impossible. — Nicholas Sparks

First you will smile, and then you will cry
don't say you haven't been warned. — Nicholas Sparks

In America, we have subsidized private jets, big banks and hedge fund managers. Wouldn't it make more sense to subsidize kids? — Nicholas Kristof

Experience was the most painful of teachers. — Nicholas Sparks

Nothing is ever lost nor can be lost; the body aged, sluggish,cold ... the embers left from earlier fires shall dully flame again — Nicholas Sparks

We glorify those who left their names in history books at the expense of those contributors about whom our books are silent. We humans are not just a superficial race - we are a very unfair one. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

There has been corruption in the Belgian civil service and at government level for decades. The Royal family do what they can to hold things together, and they don't do a bad job. — Nicholas Royle

Our desire to segregate the mind's cogitations from the body's exertions reflects the grip that Cartesian dualism still holds on us. When we think about thinking, we're quick to locate our mind, and hence our self, in the gray matter inside our skull and to see the rest of the body as a mechanical life-support system that keeps the neural circuits charged. More than a fancy of philosophers like Descartes and his predecessor Plato, this dualistic view of mind and body as operating in isolation from each other appears to be a side effect of consciousness itself. Even though the bulk of the mind's work goes on behind the scenes, in the shadows of the unconscious, we're aware only of the small but brightly lit window that the conscious mind opens for us. And our conscious mind tells us, insistently, that it's separate from the body. — Nicholas Carr

Everyone has a past, but that's just it
it's in the past. You can learn from it, but you can't change it. — Nicholas Sparks

The brain's plasticity is not limited to the somatosensory cortex, the area that governs our sense of touch. It's universal. Virtually all of our neural circuits - whether they're involved in feeling, seeing, hearing, moving, thinking, learning, perceiving, or remembering - are subject to change. The received wisdom is cast aside. — Nicholas Carr

And Vicky also told her sister that all girls at the Health Centre considered that men were born crazy, if not down-right stupid.They were prepared to do crazy things & pay high prices just to prove how "macho" they were, when it came to young pretty girls. And the sisters tittered with laughter at the thought of the old men who enjoyed drinking Phyllis' urine & the young men who ate cucumber sandwiches filled with her excrement. And thus Vicky told Phyllis that although one should not take candy off children, it was quite in order to take money off crazy & stupid rich men.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

I Shall Look At The World Through Tears. Perhaps I Shall See Things That, Dry-Eyed, I Could Not See — Nicholas Wolterstorff

Her armpits were still slightly wet & she examined them one by one. No hair. This was one of her greatest assets over her sister who had underarm hair.Her slender arms & long legs were also free of hair. She had only a little bit of pubic hair, she noticed. It must be terrible to have lots of ugly underarm & thick coarse arm & leg hairs that you had to shave off daily, she thought. A bit more pubic hair, she wouldn't mind, she decided. But they tended to tickle men's nostrils & make them sneeze.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

The Lampoon was definitely quite formative. You know there's a crazy like kind of network of comedy writers from The Lampoon that are, that kind of you know like Seinfeld and The Simpsons and a lot of shows kind of had a lot of kind of Lampoon writers and so that was very formative. I mean, to me I got interested in comedy writing at an early like reading like Dave Barry. — Nicholas Stoller

What is surprising is not the magnitude of our forecast errors, but our absence of awareness of it. This is all the more worrisome when we engage in deadly conflicts: wars are fundamentally unpredictable (and we do not know it). Owing to this misunderstanding of the causal chains between policy and actions, we can easily trigger Black Swans thanks to aggressive ignorance-like a child playing with a chemistry kit. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

She wanted something else, something different, something more. Passion and romance, perhaps, or maybe quiet conversations in candlelit rooms, or perhaps something as simple as not being second. — Nicholas Sparks

Thoreau's writings feel more alive to me than any thing that I've ever read. When I read anything by Thoreau, I see his subject. I feel it. I taste it. I smell it. I feel as though he's walking beside me, showing me with gestures and soft-spoken words the marvelous natural wonders that he's written about. — Nicholas Trandahl

Surprise, surprise! I have a band! I'm really excited that we have a song on the soundtrack of 'American Reunion' for that very reason. — Thomas Ian Nicholas

Vicky had once told her that she should not be ashamed of her pubic hair. Pubic hair was what men expected to see on women. Vicky said that there was a young prostitute at the Centre who had no pubic hair & many customers were known to shy off her because they thought that she was diseased. So Phyllis was resigned to displaying her pubic hair to all who wanted to see it.[MMT] — Nicholas Chong

McDermott and two colleagues - James H. Fowler of the University of California, San Diego, and Nicholas A. Christakis of Harvard University - published a paper titled 'Breaking Up is Hard to Do, Unless Everyone Else is Doing it Too.' Their study shows that divorce can spread like a virus among friends, siblings and co-workers. — Katie Hafner

It is so much easier to try to help a six-month-old child or a six-year-old child than it is a 16-year-old troubled kid. — Nicholas Kristof

The only condition for such brand of more sophisticated rationalism: to believe and act as if one does not have the full story - to be sophisticated you need to accept that you are not so. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

In creating the world, God used arithmetic, geometry, and likewise astronomy. — Nicholas Of Cusa

Even if I thought he as perfect for her." She turned to face him. "What were we thinking?"
"We weren't," he said. "We were in love. — Nicholas Sparks

Dress your best on your execution day. Be extremely courteous to your assistant when you lose money. Try not to blame others for your fate, even if they deserve blame. Never exhibit any self-pity. Do not complain. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

want to either. We take what is offered us on this earth and live life to the fullest. No one can predict their own future, though many have tried. What will be is what will be in the end. You cannot change the course of time." The king patted Nicholas — Robyn Neeley

I built the solenoid and with great expectations late one evening I pressed the switch which sent a current of 40 amperes through the coil. The result was spectacular-a deafening explosion, the apparatus disappeared, all windows were blown in or out, a wall caved in, and thus ended my pioneering experiment on liquid hydrogen cooled coils! — Nicholas Kurti

Absolutely not. I'm an expert in procrastination, but the last thing I want you to think is that I'm incompetent, too. Because I'm actually pretty good at what I do. -Jo — Nicholas Sparks

I am a firm believer that there is rarely a straight line between good and evil. — Nicholas Denmon

I wrote an article not so long ago that was published in the Los Angeles Times, and I think I titled it "Movies vs. History." But I think they had another title for it. I got sort of sick and tired of seeing movies that got picked apart by people because they had taken dramatic or poetic license and I said "These people don't understand the distinctions." — Nicholas Meyer

No buts," he said, "because there are none. You see yourself as someone who couldn't get away. I see the courageous woman who escaped. You see yourself as someone who should be ashamed or guilty because she let it happen. I see a kind, beautiful woman who should feel proud because she stopped it from happening ever again. Not many women have the strength to do what you did.. — Nicholas Sparks

Jordan Grafman, head of the cognitive neuroscience unit at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, explains that the constant shifting of our attention when we're online may make our brains more nimble when it comes to multitasking, but improving our ability to multitask actually hampers our ability to think deeply and creatively. — Nicholas Carr

If someone tells you they love turkey smothered with cranberry sauce, that they love it more than anything else in the world, you might spend the day roasting that someone a turkey and smothering it with cranberry sauce. If that same someone then takes one little bite and says, 'That'll be all, thank you,' you'll likely go red in the face and hurl both these turkeys our the nearest window because clearly, this person never loved turkey smothered with cranberry sauce in the first place.
Little bites are never enough when you love something. When you love something, you want it all. That's how it works. And that's how it was for Archer. Archer didn't want a little taste of adventure with a side of leftover discoveries. Archer wanted the whole turkey and he wanted it stuffed with enough salts and spices to turn his taste buds into sparklers. — Nicholas Gannon

I am sorie God made me so comely. — Nicholas Udall

Yet simplicity has been difficult to implement in modern life because it is against the spirit of a certain brand of people who seek sophistication so they can justify their profession. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

In my thoughts forever. — Nicholas Sparks

Within itself the soul sees all things more truly than as they exist in different things outside itself. And the more it goes out unto other things in order to know them, the more it enters into itself in order to know itself. — Nicholas Of Cusa

Love is like the wind, you can't see it but you can feel it. — Nicholas Sparks