Serious Study Quotes & Sayings

Funny but, for me, the Bible was a hobby before it was a serious study. It was the thing I'd sneak off and do on the side, feeling rather guilty because I wasn't doing my real school homework or whatever ... and never thinking I would make it a life's work. — N. T. Wright

Fortunately, both governments have been in favor of studying the Mexican migration problem in greater depth. For the first time, I think, we will have something scientifically sound that says something about this phenomenon. The study is ongoing, and I hope that, with a push from both of us, it will provide a sound basis for serious public discussion on the migration issue. — Ernesto Zedillo

Despite these afternoon misgivings and self-reproaches I clung to my notion, ill-defined though it was, that a serious study of human knowledge, or theory, or belief, if undertaken with a critical but not a cruel mind, would in the end yield some secret, some valuable permanent insight, into the nature of life and the true end of man. — Robertson Davies

Many in the church have turned their back on serious study, and have embraced an anti-intellectualism which refuses to learn anything from scholarship at all lest it corrupt their pure faith. It is time to end this standoff, and to reestablish a hermeneutic of trust (itself a sign of the gospel!) in place of the hermeneutic of suspicion which the church has so disastrously borrowed from the postmodern world. — N. T. Wright

That happened when I was a freshman in high school. The guy reading it [the Bible] was dating my older sister. I thought he was the cutest thing that had ever happened in Nashville. He was nine years older than me and I thought, 'Mimi, I hate to do this to you, but I'm going to steal this guy away.' So I went to this Bible study thinking I was going to make this guy fall in love with me. I was fourteen. Hey, you know. But I was so overwhelmed by what they were talking about at this Bible study. I became a very serious, committed Christian. — Amy Grant

He lifted my luggage off the floor. "You're not sleeping on the couch or the recliner. You're sleeping in my bed."
"Which is more unsanitary than the couch, I'm sure."
"There's never been anyone in my bed but me."
I rolled my eyes. "Give me a break!"
"I'm absolutely serious. I bag 'em on the couch. I don't let them in my room."
"Then why am I allowed in your bed?"
One corner of his mouth pulled up into an impish grin. "Are you planning on having sex with me tonight?"
"No!"
"That's why. Now get your cranky ass up, take your hot shower, and then we can study some Bio. — Jamie McGuire

In my first publication I might have claimed that I had come to the conclusion, as a result of serious study of the literature and deep thought, that valuable antibacterial substances were made by moulds and that I set out to investigate the problem. That would have been untrue and I preferred to tell the truth that penicillin started as a chance observation. My only merit is that I did not neglect the observation and that I pursued the subject as a bacteriologist. My publication in 1929 was the starting-point of the work of others who developed penicillin especially in the chemical field. — Alexander Fleming

I told Mother of my decision to study medicine. She encouraged me to speak to Father ... I began in a roundabout way ... He listened, looking at me with that serious and penetrating gaze of his that caused me such trepidation, and asked whether I knew what I wanted to do. — Rita Levi-Montalcini

The art of war is at once comprehensive and complicated; ... it demands much previous study; and ... the possession of it, in its most improved and perfect state, is always a great moment to the security of a nation. This, therefore, ought to be a serious care of every government; and for this purpose, an academy, where a regular course of instruction is given, is an obvious expedient, which different nations have successfully employed. — George Washington

And religion causes most of the problems, war, and economics of course, and study your history or you're going to repeat it; and if you're burning a Harry Potter book you need some serious counseling, you don't get it, you're missing the whole point. — Michael Berryman

The question may arise - how can credible Christian organizations justify and condone meditative practices that clearly resemble Eastern meditation? As pointed out earlier in this book, Christian terminology surrounds these practices. It only takes a few popular Christian leaders with national profiles to embrace a teaching that sounds Christian to bring about big changes in the church. Moreover, we have many trusting Christians who do not use the Scriptures to test the claims of others. Building an entire prayer method around an out-of-context verse or two is presumptuous, at best. Now more than ever, it is critical that Christians devote themselves to serious Bible study and discernment regarding this issue. — Ray Yungen

Some Christians want enough of Christ to be identified with him but not enough to be seriously inconvenienced; they genuinely cling to basic Christian orthodoxy but do not want to engage in serious Bible study; they value moral probity, especially of the public sort, but do not engage in war against inner corruptions; they fret over the quality of the preacher's sermon but do not worry much over the quality of their own prayer life. Such Christians are content with mediocrity. — D. A. Carson

Ask a man to explain his success and he will typically credit his own innate qualities and skills. Ask a woman the same question and she will attribute her success to external factors, insisting she did well because she "worked really hard," or "got lucky," or "had help from others." Men and women also differ when it comes to explaining failure. When a man fails, he points to factors like "didn't study enough" or "not interested in the subject matter." When a woman fails, she is more likely to believe it is due to an inherent lack of ability.8 And in situations where a man and a woman each receive negative feedback, the woman's self-confidence and self-esteem drop to a much greater degree.9 The internalization of failure and the insecurity it breeds hurt future performance, so this pattern has serious long-term consequences.10 — Sheryl Sandberg

In the United States, one of the main topics of academic political science is the study of attitudes and policy and their correlation. The study of attitudes is reasonably easy in the United States: heavily-polled society, pretty serious and accurate polls, and policy you can see, and you can compare them. — Noam Chomsky

This impeccably researched study of the classic black insult game may be the funniest work of serious scholarship ever published. — Terry Teachout

The Christian who is not diligently involved in a serious study of Scripture is simply inadequate as a disciple of Christ. To be an adequate Christian and competent in the things of God we must do more than attend "sharing sessions" and "bless me parties." We cannot learn competency by osmosis. Biblically illiterate Christians are not only inadequate but unequipped. In fact, they are inadequate because they are not equipped. — R.C. Sproul

It would be a serious mistake to think of Billy Graham or any other television revivalist as a latter-day Jonathan Edwards or Charles Finney. Edwards was one of the most brilliant and creative minds ever produced by America. His contribution to aesthetic theory was almost as important as his contribution to theology. His interests were mostly academic; he spent long hours each day in his study. He did not speak to his audiences extemporaneously. He read his sermons, which were tightly knit and closely reasoned expositions of theological doctrine — Neil Postman

I want to tell any young girl out there who's a geek, I was a really serious geek in high school. It works out. Study harder. — Sheryl Sandberg

Professor Lyall looked modestly proud. "I am considered a bit of an expert on the procreative practices of Ovis orientalis aries."
"Sheep?"
"Sheep."
"Sheep!" Madame Lefoux's voice came over suddenly high, as though she were suppressing an inclination to giggle.
"Yes, as in baaaa." Professor Lyall frowned. Sheep were a serious business, and he failed to see the source of Madame Lefoux's amusement.
"Let me understand this correctly. You are a werewolf with a keen interest in sheep breeding?" A little bit of French accent trickled into Madame Lefoux's speech in her glee.
Professor Lyall continued bravely on, ignoring her flippancy. "I preserve the nonviable embryo in formaldehyde for future study. Lord Maccon has been drinking my samples. When confronted, he admitted to enjoying both the refreshing beverage and the 'crunchy picked snack' as well. I was not pleased. — Gail Carriger

Study and discipline are the prerequisite to any form of accomplishment. Unfortunately however, studying is much like paying taxes for most of us - we only do it when we have to. If you're serious about developing greatness in your life, study the lives of great men and women and follow their advice! — Bob Proctor

It has always been difficult for Jews to take Christians serious, mostly because Christians lack the fundamentals that religious Jews learn in their youth. It remains an embarrassing fact, that modern Jews can comprehend the New Testament better than modern Christians. There is no excuse for this. Christians have dropped the ball and should be anxious to remedy that neglect. Not only would they benefit themselves, but their community too. — Michael Ben Zehabe

Well I tried to, but I could never write anything that I liked or was worthwhile. I threw it all out and realized that I had to make a serious study- that my tastes were far more advanced than my abilities. — Elliott Carter

'You're there, but the books draw you in to whole other worlds. I mean, I know you study more serious things than the silly stories I read, but when you're there, you can be anywhere. It fascinates me.' — Caethes Faron

I HAVE already hinted that the dainty, squeamish, and fastidious taste acquired by a surfeit of idle reading, had not only rendered our hero unfit for serious and sober study, but had even disgusted him in some degree with that in which he had hitherto indulged. He — Walter Scott

Had set himself to the serious study of the great aristocratic art of doing absolutely nothing. — Oscar Wilde

I make these little films. I'm just a working person. I just study people a little bit more. It's more sociological, and it's funny anyway - not that serious. It's not like false humility. I just take it for what it is. — Julie Delpy

Today's investor is so concerned with anticipating the future that he is already paying handsomely for it in advance. Thus what he has projected with so much study and care may actually happen and still not bring him any profit. If it should fail to materialize to the degree expected he may in fact be faced with serious temporary and perhaps even permanent loss. — Benjamin Graham

Man-made global warming was a potential serious threat, and NASA wanted Congress to fund new satellites to study the problem. It was a team effort to get that accomplished. — Roy Spencer

Ironically, the serious study of the impossible has frequently opened up rich and entirely unexpected domains of science. For example, over the centuries the frustrating and futile search for a "perpetual motion machine" led physicists to conclude that such a machine was impossible, forcing them to postulate the conservation of energy and the three laws of thermodynamics. Thus the futile search to build perpetual motion machines helped to open up the entirely new field of thermodynamics, which in part laid the foundation of the steam engine, the machine age, and modern industrial society. — Michio Kaku

So Rosewater told him. It was The Gospel from Outer Space, by Kilgore Trout. It was about a visitor from outer space, shaped very much like a Tralfamadorian, by the way. The visitor from outer space made a serious study of Christianity, to learn, if he could, why Christians found it so easy to be cruel. He concluded that at least part of the trouble was slipshod storytelling in the New Testament. He supposed that the intent of the Gospels was to teach people, among other things, to be merciful, even to the lowest of the low. But the Gospels actually taught this: Before you kill somebody, make absolutely sure he isn't well connected. So it goes. *** The flaw in the Christ — Kurt Vonnegut

Just the opposite. In childhood and youth their study, and what philosophy they learn, should be suited to their tender years: during this period while they are growing up towards manhood, the chief and special care should be given to their bodies that they may have them to use in the service of philosophy; as life advances and the intellect begins to mature, let them increase the gymnastics of the soul; but when the strength of our citizens fails and is past civil and military duties, then let them range at will and engage in no serious labour, as we intend them to live happily here, and to crown this life with a similar happiness in another. How — Plato

mad maddie: i am SOOOO pissed. SnowAngel: oh no. why? mad maddie: one word. well, two. JANA WHITAKER. SnowAngel: the queen bee of our entire class? *gasps* what'd she do this time? mad maddie: i hate her. she's evil. SnowAngel: i KNOW that. TELL ME WHAT SHE DID!!!! mad maddie: we had a substitute for last period study hall and he insisted on taking roll, cuz god forbid one of us had snuck off to do something productive. when he got to me he called out, "madeleine kinnick?" and jana turns around, all batting eyes and innocent, and goes, "um, isn't your name madigan?" SnowAngel: yr name IS madigan. mad maddie: which jana totally knows! SnowAngel: so what's the problem? mad maddie: r u serious?!! mad maddie: it was the way she said it, like she was honestly confused. like, "oh my goodness, i THINK i know u, don't i?" WHEN WE'VE GONE TO SCHOOL TOGETHER SINCE 7th GRADE!!! — Lauren Myracle

Novels are excluded from "serious reading," so that the man who, bent on self-improvement, has been deciding to devote ninety minutes three times a week to a complete study of the works of Charles Dickens will be well advised to alter his plans. The reason is not that novels are not serious-some of the great literature of the world is in the form of prose fiction-the reason is that bad novels out not to be read, and that good novels never demand any appreciable mental application on the part of the reader. A good novel rushes you forward like a skiff down a stream, and you arrive at the end, perhaps breathless, but unexhausted. The best novels involve the least strain. Now in the cultivation of the mind one of the most important factors is precisely the feeling of strain, of difficulty, of a task which one part of you is anxious to achieve and another part of you is anxious to shirk; and that feeling cannot be got in facing a novel. — Arnold Bennett

There will be no room, here, for the smug myopia which views American civilization as the final solution to all world problems; which recommends our institutions for universal adoption and turns away with contempt from the serious study of the institutions of peoples whose civilizations may seem to us to be materially less advanced. — George F. Kennan

The moment you begin a serious study of the scriptures, you will find greater power to resist temptation. You will find the power to avoid deception. You will find the power to stay on the straight and narrow path ... When you begin to hunger & thirst after those words, you will find life in greater abundance. — Ezra Taft Benson

If even one of these unidentified UFOs turns out to be an alien craft, the impact on all aspects of our nation's culture-economic, political, personal-will be limited only by what is learned from an open, serious, objective study of the subject. — Don Berliner

Man's capacity to dig himself in, to secrete a shell, to build around himself a tenuous barrier of defence, even in apparently desperate circumstances, is astonishing and merits a serious study. — Primo Levi

In the early 1990s, Anders Ericsson, a colleague of Neil Charness at Florida State University, coined the term "deliberate practice" to describe this style of serious study, defining it formally as an "activity designed, typically by a teacher, for the sole purpose of effectively improving specific aspects of an individual's performance."4 — Cal Newport

Murder investigations start with the victim, because usually in the first instance that's all you've got. The study of the victim is called victimology because everything sounds better with an 'ology' tacked on the end. To make sure you make a proper fist of this, the police have developed the world's most useless mnemonic - 5 x W H & H - otherwise known as Who? What? Where? When? Why? and How? Next time you watch a real murder investigation on the TV, and you see a group of serious-looking detectives standing around talking, remember that what they're actually doing is trying to work out what sodding order the mnemonic is supposed to go in. Once they've sorted that out, the exhausted officers will retire to the nearest watering hole for a drink and a bit of a breather. — Ben Aaronovitch

To the secular arm, therefore, be delivered any and every book which, catering for the youngsters, throttles the life of the old folktales with coils of explanatory notes, and heaps on their maimed corpses the dead weight of biographical appendices. Nevertheless, that which delighted our childhood may instruct our manhood; and notes, appendices, and all the gear of didactic exposition, have their place elsewhere in helping the student, anxious to reach the seed of fact which is covered by the pulp of fiction. For, to effect this is to make approach to man's thoughts and conceptions of himself and his surroundings, to his way of looking at things and to explanation of his conduct both in work and play. Hence the folk-tale and the game are alike pressed into the service of study of the human mind. Turn where we may, the pastimes of children are seen to mimic the serious pursuits of men. — Edward Clodd

The philosophy that I have worked under most of my life is that the serious study of natural history is an activity which has far-reaching effects in every aspect of a person's life. It ultimately makes people protective of the environment in a very committed way. It is my opinion that the study of natural history should be the primary avenue for creating environmentalists. — Roger Tory Peterson

We do not realize how deeply our starting assumptions affect the way we go about looking for and interpreting the data we collect. We should recognize that nonhuman organisms need not meet every new definition of human language, tool use, mind, or consciousness in order to have versions of their own that are worthy of serious study. We have set ourselves too much apart, grasping for definitions that will distinguish man from all other life on the planet. We must rejoin the great stream of life from whence we arose and strive to see within it the seeds of all we are and all we may become. — Sue Savage-Rumbaugh

The most remarkable thing in Binder's article may be her reference to a Women's Studies professor at the University of Michigan who, in Binder's words, worries that Fat Studies "may lead to a social proselytizing rather than serious study." In short, identity studies are becoming so far removed from any hint of academic or intellectual legitimacy that even teachers of a more established and only moderately asinine disciplines are reacting to the far more extreme asininity of newer ones. — Bruce Bawer

The only sure rule is to remember that the Bible is indeed God's gift to the church, to equip that church for its work in the world, and that serious study of it can and should become one of the places where, and the means by which, heaven and earth interlock and God's future purposes arrive in the present. — N. T. Wright

It is more fun to listen to the radio speeches of a dictator than to study economic treatises. The entrepreneurs and technologists who pave the way for economic improvement work in seclusion; their work is not suitable to be visualized on the screen. But the dictators, intent upon spreading death and destruction, are spectacularly in sight of the public. Dressed in military garb they eclipse in the eyes of the movie-goers the colourless bourgeois in plain clothes. The problems of society's economic organization are not suitable for light talk at fashionable cocktail parties. Neither can they be dealt with adequately by demagogues haranguing mass assemblies. They are serious things. They require painstaking study. They must not be taken lightly. — Ludwig Von Mises

The first things to study are form and values. For me, these are the things that are the basics of what is serious in art. — Jean-Baptiste-Camille Corot

I enjoy practicing law too much to even contemplate retiring, but I often think about engaging in serious study of the history of art, of the intricacies of classical music. I could write a fugue, or perhaps learn to play the cello. — Karen DeCrow

I know of no other practise which will make one more attractive in conversation than to be well-read in a variety of subjects. There is a great potential within each of us to go on learning. Regardless of our age, unless there be serious illness, we can read, study, drink in the writings of wonderful men and women. It is never too late to learn. — Gordon B. Hinckley

Expect forces to interfere with you and expect to conquer them all, if you are serious about the study. Just as there are powers that interfere with those who seek enlightenment, there are forces that will help. — Frederick Lenz

Without a serious study of journalism, there can be no understanding of citizenship, democracy, or community. — Roy Peter Clark

There came a time in my life when I doubted the divinity of the Scriptures, and I resolved as a lawyer and a judge I would try the Book as I would try anything in the courtroom, taking evidence for and against. It was a long, serious and profound study and using the same principles of evidence in this religious matter as I always do in secular matters, I have come to the decision that the Bible is a supernatural Book, that it has come from God, and that the only safety for the human race is to follow its teachings. — Salmon P. Chase

Blackadder was fifty-four and had come to editing Ash out of pique. He was the son and grandson of Scottish schoolmasters. His grandfather recited poetry on firelight evenings: Marmion, Childe Harold, Ragnarok. His father sent him to Downing College in Cambridge to study under F. R. Leavis. Leavis did to Blackadder what he did to serious students; he showed him the terrible, the magnificent importance and urgency of English literature and simultaneously deprived him of any confidence in his own capacity to contribute to, or change it. The young Blackadder wrote poems, imagined Dr Leavis's comments on them, and burned them. — A.S. Byatt

The FDA, NCI and ACS, and the large treatment centres work to eliminate choice of cancer therapies, particulary better ones. They openly attack breakthroughs made by "mavericks", which they define as anyone outside their ranks. Folks, any serious study of how these entities work together to destroy hopeful approaches to cancer reveals a trail of corruption, conspiracy, dishonesty, and inhumanity that warrants desigantion of evil ... We continue to use them not because they work, but because those who perform them have so vigorously eliminated any other choice. — Julian Whitaker

How important are money management and finances in marriage and family affairs? Tremendously. The American Bar Association recently indicated that 89 percent of all divorces could be traced to quarrels and accusations over money. Another study estimated that 75 percent of all divorces result from clashes over finances. Some professional counselors indicated that four out of every five families wrestle with serious money problems ... — Jeffrey R. Holland

You study Yoga in India, Liss?" he asks. "Yes, Ketut." "You can do Yoga," he says, "but Yoga too hard." Here, he contorts himself in a cramped lotus position and squinches up his face in a comical and constipated-looking effort. Then he breaks free and laughs, asking, "Why they always look so serious in Yoga? You make serious face like this, you scare away good energy. To meditate, only you must smile. Smile with face, smile with mind, and good energy will come to you and clean away dirty energy. Even smile in your liver. Practice tonight at hotel. Not to hurry, not to try too hard. Too serious, you make you sick. You can calling the good energy with a smile. All finish for today. See you later, alligator. Come back tomorrow. I am very happy to see you, Liss. Let your conscience be your guide. If you have Western friends come to visit Bali, bring them to me for palm-reading. I am very empty in my bank since the bomb. — Elizabeth Gilbert

With the utmost love and attention the man who walks must study and observe every smallest living thing, be it a child, a dog, a fly, a butterfly, a sparrow, a worm, a flower, a man, a house, a tree, a hedge, a snail, a mouse, a cloud, a hill, a leaf, or no more than a poor discarded scrap of paper on which, perhaps, a dear good child at school has written his first clumsy letters. The highest and the lowest, the most serious and the most hilarious things are to him equally beloved, beautiful, and valuable. — Robert Walser

Mediocre people often have a tinge of religion about them, but it is only a tinge. They take their religion as it comes. They may pray and worship more or less regularly, and they usually stay clear of publicly disgraceful crimes, but they are lukewarm, colorless. Seldom or never do they read a serious book about prayer or study to learn more about God and His plans, to discover how to be humble and chaste and patient. They are always too busy for the one thing necessary. — Thomas Dubay

All the electronic devices are weakening the social bonds. Sociologists and psychologists should study this serious threat instead of repeating that communication is the cement of society. — Mario Bunge

When, however the elements of this [book] such as time study, functional formanaship etc, are used without being accompanied by the true philosophy of management, the results are in many cases disastrous. And, unfortunately, even [when those] who are throughly in sympathy ... undertake to change too rapidly ... they frequently meet with serious trouble, and sometimes with strikes, followed by failure. — Frederick Winslow Taylor

Until recently we've only been able to speculate about story's persuasive effects. But over the last several decades psychology has begun a serious study of how story affects the human mind. Results repeatedly show that our attitudes, fears, hopes, and values are strongly influenced by story. In fact, fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs than writing that is specifically designed to persuade through argument and evidence. — Jonathan Gottschall

A study of the San Francisco Beat enclave by psychiatrist Dr. Francis Rigney in the late 1950's showed 60 percent "were so psychotic or crippled by tensions, anxiety and neurosis as to be nonfunctional in the competitive world." In contrast, the several studies released so far made of the student radicals at Berkeley show them to be stable, serious, and of above-average intelligence. The point is that the Beats had to "cop out" of the Rat Race because they couldn't perform; the New Left chooses to reject a society it could easily be successful in. — Jack Newfield

UCL made provision for women to study science. Skinner told Humphry that a good Fabian should consider his daughters' education as seriously as his sons'. Humphry said that Dorothy - and Griselda - were still only little girls. Hardly, said Skinner, smiling at the two serious young faces. Hardly. They would be young women any moment, he could see. His look made Dorothy feel unexpectedly heated, on her skin, and also inside her. She wriggled a little and sat straighter. Griselda said she didn't think her parents saw any need for her to be educated. Skinner said, it should be enough that she wanted to be educated. — A.S. Byatt

At the beginning of this study on the conditions of suggestion, we have admitted that suggestion could not develop in sickly minds - that it demanded, in order to attain to its full power, minds relatively sane. We have just now demonstrated that it depended on a lack of synthesis, on a weakening of consciousness. Are not these two affirmations contradictory ? Not at all. A symptom may disappear in certain maladies and still remain a pathological symptom. The crepitant rale does not exist in all stages of pneumonia; it disappears in many serious lung affections; it is none the less a very characteristic sign of the disease. — Anonymous

Unidentified flying objects are a very serious subject which we must study fully. We appeal to all viewers to send us details of strange flying craft seen over territories of the Soviet Union. This is a serious challenge to science and we need the help of all Soviet citizens. — Felix Ziegel

But my shift to the serious study of economics gradually weakened my belief in Major Douglas's A+B theorem, which was replaced in my thought by the expression MV = PT. — James Meade

If you study a lot because you are worried that others will think badly of you for being ignorant and you'll feel stupid, this is a serious mistake. — Dogen

The serious and critical reader will not want a treacherous impartiality, which offers him a cup of conciliation with a well-settled poison of reactionary hate at the bottom, but a scientific conscientiousness, which for its sympathies and antipathies - open and undisguised - seeks support in an honest study of the facts, a determination of their real connections, an exposure of the causal laws of their movement. — Leon Trotsky

I must continue to follow the path I take now. If I do nothing, if I study nothing, if I cease searching, then, woe is me, I am lost. That is how I look at it - keep going, keep going come what may.
But what is your final goal, you may ask. That goal will become clearer, will emerge slowly but surely, much as the rough draught turns into a sketch, and the sketch into a painting through the serious work done on it, through the elaboration of the original vague idea and through the consolidation of the first fleeting and passing thought. — Vincent Van Gogh

I desire before I leave the world, as my best legacy to my family,, my serious, solemn advice, to make choice of my God for their God. He has been my father's God, and the God of your Mother's predecessors. I solemnly charge you to make it your first care to seek after peace with God, and being reconciled, to make it your study to please God in all things. — Robert Dabney

During the Second World War, for example, Lieutenant Colonel Henry K. Beecher conducted a classic study of men with serious battlefield injuries. In the Cartesian view, the degree of injury ought to determine the degree of pain, rather like a dial controlling volume. Yet 58 percent of the men - men with compound fractures, gunshot wounds, torn limbs - reported only slight pain or no pain at all. Just 27 percent of the men felt enough pain to request pain medication, although such wounds routinely require narcotics in civilians. Clearly, something that was going on in their minds - Beecher thought they were overjoyed to have escaped alive from the battlefield - counteracted the signals sent by their injuries. Pain was becoming recognized as far more complex than a one-way transmission from injury to "ouch. — Atul Gawande

The Study proves that such experiments resulted in serious damage to study subjects and their children. Finally, the Tuskeegee Syphilis Study proves that considerable external pressure is often required before the medical profession takes the necessary action to terminate such experimentation. — Colin A. Ross

If, therefore, those called to office and leadership roles in the church remain content merely to organize and manage the internal affairs of the church, they are leaving a vacuum exactly where there ought to be vibrant, pulsating life. Of course Christian leaders need to be trained and equipped for management, for running of the organization. The church will not thrive by performing in a bumbling, amateur fashion and hoping that piety and goodwill will make up for incompetence. But how much more should a Christian minister be a serious professional when it comes to grappling with scripture and discovering how it enables him or her, in preaching, teaching, prayer, and pastoral work, to engage with the huge issues that confront us as a society and as individuals. If we are professional about other things, we ought to be ashamed not to be properly equipped both to study the Bible ouselves and to bring its ever-fresh word to others. — N. T. Wright

From this I conclude that the best education for the situations of actual life consists of the experience we acquire from the study of serious history. For it is history alone which without causing us harm enables us to judge what is the best course in any situation or circumstance. — Polybius

Two Dutch researchers did a study in which they had groups of students answer forty-two fairly demanding questions from the board game Trivial Pursuit. Half were asked to take five minutes beforehand to think about what it would mean to be a professor and write down everything that came to mind. Those students got 55.6 percent of the questions right. The other half of the students were asked to first sit and think about soccer hooligans. They ended up getting 42.6 percent of the Trivial Pursuit questions right. The "professor" group didn't know more than the "soccer hooligan" group. They weren't smarter or more focused or more serious. They were simply in a "smart" frame of mind, and, clearly, associating themselves with the idea of something smart, like a professor, made it a lot easier - in that stressful instant after a trivia question was asked - to blurt out the right answer. — Malcolm Gladwell

We do not base botany upon the old-fashioned division into useful and useless plants, or our zoology upon the naive distinction between harmless and dangerous animals. But we still complacently assume that consciousness is sense and the unconsciousness is nonsense. In science such an assumption would be laughed out of court. Do microbes, for instance, make sense or nonsense?
Whatever the unconscious may be, it is a natural phenomenon producing symbols that prove to be meaningful. We cannot expect someone who has never looked through a microscope to be an authority on microbes; in the same way, no one who has not made a serious study of natural symbols can be considered a competent judge in this matter. But the general undervaluation of the human soul is so great that neither the great religions nor the philosophies nor scientific rationalism have been willing to look at it twice. — C. G. Jung

Authors as diverse as Matthew Arnold and George Orwell have given thought to the serious question: what is to be done about morals and ethics now that religion has so much decayed? Arnold went almost as far as to propose that the study of literature replace the study of religion. I must say that I slightly dread the effect that this might have had on literary pursuit, but as a source of ethical reflection and as a mirror in which to see our human dilemmas reflected, the literary tradition is infinitely superior to the childish parables and morality tales, let alone the sanguinary and sectarian admonitions, of the "holy" books. — Christopher Hitchens