Quotes & Sayings About Undetermined

It is one diagnostic trait of Homo sapiens that groups of individuals are periodically infected with a feverish nervousness which causes the individual to turn on and destroy, not only his own kind, but the works of his own kind. It is not known whether this be caused by a virus, some airborne spore, or whether it be a species reaction to some meteorological stimulus as yet undetermined. — John Steinbeck

My drawings inspire, and are not to be defined. They place us, as does music, in the ambiguous realm of the undetermined. — Odilon Redon

Death gives a reason to our lives. More important then that, death creates a special value for time. If our time on earth was undetermined, life on its own wouldn't make any sense and probably we would still be living without clothes and with a spear on hand. Death is the most powerful agent in nature, it comes to take away the old and make space for the new. Our effort to avoid it and make our short stay here something slightly memorable is what motivates us. Life only exists because of death. — Marilena Chaui

It is what is. I repeated, looking at him in the eyes. No. It isn't. That's stupidity right up there with 'failure is not an option.' Of course it's an option or there wouldn't be any sort of adventure to it, would there? The word 'adventure' means undetermined outcome, did you know that? So failure would have to be an option, right? — Josh Hanagarne

I see artists bored by light-without-heat, irked at gigantic galleries' pushing out art-as-product, leaving behind the over determined for the undetermined, guided by interior voices and bringing us out of a long tunnel to new blueness. — Jerry Saltz

Thus began a break of undetermined length and meaning. — Jacob Slichter

Iraq will require US occupation of undetermined length. — Barack Obama

When we measure something we are forcing an undetermined, undefined world to assume an experimental value. We are not measuring the world, we are creating it. — Niels Bohr

Only through blind Instinct, in which the only possible guidance of the Imperative is awanting, does the Power in Intuition remain undetermined; where it is schematised as absolute it becomes infinite; and where it is presented in a determinate form, as a principle, it becomes at least manifold. By the above-mentioned act of Intelligising, the Power liberates itself from Instinct, to direct itself towards Unity. — Johann Gottlieb Fichte

Why, then, does water-form the very basis of life in all life's various manifestations? Because water embraces everything is in and all through everything; because it rises above the distinctions between plants and animals and human beings; because it is a universal element shared by all; itself undetermined, yet determining; because, like the primal mother it is, it supplies the stuff of life to everything living. — Theodor Schwenk

instead of simply saying, "A rabbi, a priest, and a black guy walk into a bar," he'd say, "The subjects of this joke are three males, two of whom are clergymen, one of the Jewish faith, the other an ordained Catholic minister. The religion of the African-American respondent is undetermined, as is his educational level. The setting for the joke is a licensed establishment where alcohol is served. No, wait. It's a plane. I — Paul Beatty

The Reading Terminal Market on 12th and Arch was created in 1892 when the Reading Railroad opened markets below the elevated tracks of the new train shed. It had consistently housed an undetermined amount of aromas since then by creating a gastronomic bazaar conveniently located at street level. — Craig Johnson

... now that I'm stuck here for an undetermined amount of time, it seems beyond foolish not to let me help." She took a bite for emphasis. "You could at least let me make you a sandwich," she added balefully through her mouthful.
"That was me being respectful of your law degree," Ian said. — Suzanne Brockmann

The potential infinite means nothing other than an undetermined, variable quantity, always remaining finite, which has to assume values that either become smaller than any finite limit no matter how small, or greater than any finite limit no matter how great. — Georg Cantor

We say release, and radiance, and roses,"

We say release, and radiance, and roses,
and echo upon everything that's known;
and yet, behind the world our names enclose is
the nameless: our true archetype and home.

The sun seems male, and earth is like a woman,
the field is humble, and the forest proud;
but over everything we say, inhuman,
moves the forever-undetermined god.

We grow up; but the world remains a child.
Star and flower, in silence, watch us go.
And sometimes we appear to be the final
exam they must succeed on. And they do. — Rainer Maria Rilke

In matters of great concern, and which must be done, there is no surer argument of a weak mind than irresolution; to be undetermined where the case is so plain, and the necessity so urgent. To be always intending to live a new life, but never to find time to set about it; this is as if a man should put off eating, and drinking, and sleeping, from one day and night to another, till he is starved and destroyed. — John Tillotson

If the results of the present study on the chemical nature of the transforming principle are confirmed, then nucleic acids must be regarded as possessing biological specificity the chemical basis of which is as yet undetermined. — Oswald Theodore Avery

Chaldeans came from an undetermined part of East Arabia. — William Foxwell Albright

Nihilism is the rejection of the principles of civilisation as such ... I said civilisation, and not: culture. For I have noticed that many nihilists are great lovers of culture, as distinguished from, and opposed to, civilisation. Besides, the term culture leaves it undetermined what the thing is which is to be cultivated (blood and soil or the mind), whereas the term civilisation designates at once the process of making man a citizen, and not a slave; an inhabitant of cities, and not a rustic; a lover of peace, and not of war; a polite being, and not a ruffian. — Leo Strauss

Many words are in a state of mutation, the pronunciation being unsettled even in the best society, a result that must often arise where language is as variable and undetermined as the English. — James F. Cooper

I prefer true but imperfect knowledge, even if it leaves much undetermined and unpredictable, to a pretense of exact knowledge that is likely to be false. — Friedrich August Von Hayek

Edgar Allan Poe was an American poet, short story writer, playwright, editor, critic, essayist and one of the leaders of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of the macabre and mystery, Poe was one of the early American practitioners of the short story and a progenitor of detective fiction and crime fiction. He is also credited with contributing to the emergent science fiction genre.Poe died at the age of 40. The cause of his death is undetermined and has been attributed to alcohol, drugs, cholera, rabies, suicide (although likely to be mistaken with his suicide attempt in the previous year), tuberculosis, heart disease, brain congestion and other agents. Source: Wikipedia — Edgar Allan Poe

This 'vampire' stuff is to stay right in this room. Until we have the assailant in custody we say nothing about these girls being drained of blood. No more rumors. No reports in the papers," he added, looking directly at me and ignoring my colleague from the opposition press. "The official opinion at this time is that the cause of death is 'undetermined and under investigation'. We don't want to start a panic. It's bad for police operations. It's bad for the people. And it's had for business. — Jeff Rice

According to the rules of comedy, your suffering will be funny after an undetermined length of time. Maybe not while you're having your gangrenous leg sawed off, watching your home burn down or learning how to be intimate with your cellmate, but, in the big scheme of things, soon. — Chuck Lorre

You can be assured, though, that prayer is unbounded, undetermined, and untethered. We may end a certain series of spoken words, but the spirit of the prayer stays with us, walks out the door, and down the street with us. At any moment of the day, we can pop back into that same spirit with just a pause on a bridge, the thought of a friend, or the whispered word, "thanks. — David Brazzeal

American Casualties on the USS Maine

Two hundred & Sixty Six American sailors were killed when the American battleship, USS Maine, exploded and sank in Havana harbor after a massive explosion of undetermined origin. The first Board of Inquiry regarding the incident stated that a mine placed on or near the hull had sunk the ship. Later studies determined that it was more likely heat from smoldering coal in the ship's bunker that set off the explosion in an adjoining ammunition locker.

In February 1898, the recovered bodies of the American sailors who died on the battleship were interred in the Colon Cemetery, in Havana. Nearly two years later they were exhumed and now 163 of the crew that were killed in 1898 are buried at Arlington National Cemetery, near the USS Maine Memorial.

The beautiful monument shown is located in Central Park West in New York City. — Hank Bracker

Hieroglyphics had covered the walls and pillars, and from some undetermined point below had come a voice that was not a voice; a chaotic sensation which only fancy could transmute into sound, but which he attempted to render by the almost unpronounceable jumble of letters, "Cthulhu fhtagn". — H.P. Lovecraft

Where your hard work is Pre-Determined, Your Goals are Very Determined, Results are Undetermined and your Enjoyment is Post-Determined". Is the Way which lead you to Height of Success. — Kunal Shah

One paper says I'm Catholic and the other says I'm Jewish. I guess that's fitting because as a Methodist I'm meant to be undetermined some of the time. — Martha Raye

To leave the atom constituted as it was but to interfere with the probability of its undetermined behaviour, does not seem quite so drastic an interference with natural law as other modes of mental interference that have been suggested. (Perhaps that is only because we do not understand enough about these probabilities to realize the heinousness of our suggestion.) Unless it belies its name, probability can be modified in ways which ordinary physical entities would not admit of. There can be no unique probability attached to any event or behaviour; we can only speak of 'probability in the light of certain given information,' and the probability alters according to the extent of the information. It is, I think, one of the most unsatisfactory features of the new quantum theory in its present stage that it scarcely seems to recognize this fact, and leaves us to guess at the basis of information to which its probability theorems are supposed to refer. — Arthur Stanley Eddington

In mathematical analysis we call x the undetermined part of line a: the rest we don't call y, as we do in common life, but a-x. Hence mathematical language has great advantages over the common language. — Georg C. Lichtenberg

The U.S-Mexican border es una herida abierta where the Third World grates against the first and bleeds. And before a scab forms it hemorrhages again, the lifeblood of two worlds merging to form a third country - a border culture.
Borders are set up to define the places that are safe and unsafe, to distinguish us from them. A border is a dividing line, a narrow strip along a steep edge. A borderland is a vague and undetermined place created by the emotional residue of an unnatural boundary. It is in a constant state of transition. The prohibited and forbidden are its inhabitants. — Gloria E. Anzaldua

The work comes into the world at an undetermined hour, from a still unknown, but it comes inevitably. — Giacomo Puccini

Necessity and life are so intimately related and connected that life itself is threatened where necessity is altogether eliminated. For the elimination of necessity, far from resulting automatically in the establishment of freedom, only blurs the distinguishing line between freedom and necessity. (Modern discussions of freedom, where freedom is never understood as an objective state of human existence but either presents an unsolvable problem of subjectivity, of an entirely undetermined or determined will, or develops out of necessity, all point to the fact that the objective, tangible difference between being free and being forced by necessity is no longer perceived.) — Hannah Arendt

The mind remains undetermined in the great Void. Here the highest knowledge is unbounded. That which gives things their thusness cannot be delimited by things. So when we speak of 'limits', we remain confined to limited things. The limit of the unlimited is called 'fullness.' The limitlessness of the limited is called 'emptiness.' Tao is the source of both. But it is itself neither fullness nor emptiness — Zhuangzi

Here in Tibet live the people my mother taught me to love before I met them. We are family, and love has undetermined aptitude and great hunger. I wander around town with a heavy heart. You can love a place as you love a person and it is especially easy to feel that way here, where man and nature are intertwined deeply. I commit to memory little things: the thin film of dust incited by the ends of chubas dragging on the earth; the gentle contours of the mountains; the steady gaze of a yak; the alacrity with which children submit to authority; the patience of women who sit in the main square with bottles of milk and yogurt for sale; the songs on the streets. — Tsering Wangmo Dhompa

Kronos couldn't have risen if it hadn't been for a lot of demigods who felt abandoned by their parents," I said. "They felt angry, resentful, and unloved, and they had a good reason."
Zeus's royal nostrils flared. "You dare accuse-"
"No more undetermined children," I said. "I want you to promise to claim your children-all your demigod children-by the time they turn thirteen. They won't be left out in the world on their own at the mercy of monsters. I want them claimed and brought to camp so they can be trained right, and survive."
"Now, wait just a moment," Apollo said, but I was on a roll.
"And the minor gods," I said. "Nemesis, Hecate, Morpheus, Janus, Hebe
they all deserve a general amnesty and a place at Camp Half-Blood. Their children shouldn't be ignored. Calypso and the other peaceful Titan-kind should be pardoned too. And Hades-"
"Are you calling me a minor god?" Hades bellowed. — Rick Riordan

My brain
Worked with a dim and undetermined sense
Of unknown modes of being; o'er my thoughts
There hung a darkness, call it solitude
Or blank desertion. — William Wordsworth

From a slight, undetermined drawing, where the ideas of the composition and character are just touched upon, the imagination supplies more than the painter himself, probably, could produce. And we accordingly often find that the finished work disappoints the expectation that was raised from the sketch ... — Joshua Reynolds

If your talking about the Summerdale house and the bodies found there, we feel that some of them died of drug overdose, then buried alive. Trouble is the state never did toxicology on the victims, as they wouldn't fit with their theory that they were all strangled. Even Dr. Stein say that the 13 died of suffocation and 10 were left undetermined, which leads me to believe that there's ... that they were not killed the way the state wants you to believe. — John Wayne Gacy

The interaction of genetic and external influences makes my behaviour unpredictable, but not undetermined. In the gap between those words lies freedom. — Matt Ridley

The Christian religion seems to have fulfilled its great biological purpose, in so far as we are able to judge. It has led human thought to independence, and has lost its significance, therefore, to a yet undetermined extent ... It seems to me that we might still make use in some way of its form of thought, and especially of its great wisdom of life, which for two thousand years has proven to be particularly efficacious. — Carl Jung

Women from earliest times have been used as conveniences of communication with unseen, inaccessible powers, but always in the sense that such exposing of self to dangerous mysteries, such destruction of the understanding as was required to become the slave of unseen powers, did not matter because the communicant was only a woman, in herself an undetermined cipher - a nothing. — Laura Riding

Who is ultimately stronger? The answer is undetermined. — Matt Fitzgerald

Oh, there are no living poets, Miss Van Damn. We're not entirely sure there ever were. They've found some shreds of sonnets in England and, embedded in a chalk wall of a cave in France, some yet undetermined thing which might be the legendary inward eye. But all evidence, such as it is, suggests that, if there ever were poets, they were all burned into extinction during the interglacial period of despair. — Paddy Chayefsky

Tomorrow's past is yesterday's future and is presently undetermined. — Calvin W. Allison