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They would rather have an eternity of contentment, even if that eternity were fixed and frozen, like a butterfly mounted in a case.

Alan Lightman

I picked such seemingly disparate essays, I thought it was important to say what was the guiding principle in the selection rather than focus on any one essay.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Disparate Essay Guide Important Pick Power Say Seemingly Thought
The great ideas in science, like the Cro-Magnon paintings and the plays of Shakespeare, are part of our cultural heritage.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Author Great Heritage Idea Paint Science
We feel such a strong connection to nature. But the relationship between nature and us is one-sided. There is no reciprocity. There is no mind on the other side of the wall.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Aside Connection Mind Reciprocity Relationship Strong Wall
A world in which time is absolute is a world of consolation. For while the movements of people are unpredictable, the movement of time is predictable.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Absolute Consolation Time World
While people can be doubted, time cannot be doubted. While people brood, time skips ahead without looking back.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Ahead Back Brood Doubt Look People
I think people all over the institution recognize that different ways of understanding are valuable. Artists may think in a different way than biologists or chemists, but you can learn something from that.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Different Institute Over People Recognize Think Understanding Valuable
Such is the cost of immortality. No person is whole. No person is free. Over time, some have determined that the only way to live is to die. In death, a man or a woman is free of the weight of the past [and the future].
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Cost Determine Free Future Immortality No Person Such Whole Woman
Except for a God who sits down after the universe begins, all other gods conflict with the assumptions of science.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Aftre Begin Down Ecept Gof Sit Universe
After a while the car becomes just another thing that he owns. Moreover, when his neighbor next door buys two cars, in an instant our man feels wretchedly poor and deprived.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Become Buy Car Deprive Door Feel Man Moreover Neighbour Poor
The future is pattern, organization, union, intensification; the past, randomness, confusion, disintegration, dissipation.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Future Order Organisation Past Pattern Point
Imagine a world in which there is no time. Only images.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Image Imagine Nom Time World
If you told a story that was all darkness, it wouldn’t be real.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Darkness Real Story Told
Our species has advanced from Stone Age to Industrial Revolution to Digital Emptiness. We’ve become weightless, in the bad sense of the word.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Advance Imagination Revolution Sense Species World
The tragedy of this world is that everyone is alone. For a life in the past cannot be shared with the present.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Alone Everyone Tragedy World
No one knows the nature of God, or even if God exists. In a sense, all of our religions are literary works of the imagination.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Exist God Know Nature Sense
It is true that the arts at MIT don’t have the same amount of funding or same status as the sciences or engineering.
ALAN LIGHTMAN

Amount Art Engineer Fund Same Science Status True

They would rather have an eternity of contentment, even if that eternity were fixed and frozen, like a butterfly mounted in a case.

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They would rather have an eternity of contentment, even if that eternity were fixed and frozen, like a butterfly mounted in a case.

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