Others hold that each decision must be considered and committed to, that without commitment there is chaos. Such people are content to live in contradictory worlds, so long as they know the reason for each.
ALAN LIGHTMANOthers hold that each decision must be considered and committed to, that without commitment there is chaos. Such people are content to live in contradictory worlds, so long as they know the reason for each.
More Alan Lightman Quotes
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It’s the Platonic philosophy in The Republic that philosophers should lead the country.
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Who would fare better in this world of fitful time? Those who have seen the future and live only one life? Or those who have not seen the future and wait to live life? Or those who deny the future and live two lives?
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We’re plugged in 24 hours a day now. We’re all part of one big machine, whether we are conscious of that or not.
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Novels aren’t pedagogical instruments, or instructions in law or physics or any other discipline.
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Order is the law of nature, the universal trend, the cosmic direction. If time is an arrow, that arrow points toward order.
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Time is the clarity for seeing right and wrong.
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Or perhaps it is not because the cosmos is irrational but because they are rational. Who can say which, in an acausal world?
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I believe that we need to slow down.
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We live in a highly polarized society. We need to try to understand each other in respectful ways.
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But what is the past? Could it be, the firmness of the past is just illusion? Could the past be a kaleidoscope, a pattern of images that shift with each disturbance of a sudden breeze, a laugh, a thought? And if the shift is everywhere, how would we know?
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I think Joe Leiberman has been one of the leaders of the country… people have such a broad respect for him as a moral force.
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Each person knows that somewhere is recorded the moment she was born, the moment she took her first step, the moment of her first passion, the moment she said goodbye to her parents.
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We often do not see what we do not expect to see.
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But rational thoughts lead only to rational thoughts, whereas irrational thoughts lead to new experiences.
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Some make light of decisions, arguing that all possible decisions will occur. In such a world, how could one be responsible for his actions?
ALAN LIGHTMAN