One cannot walk down an avenue, converse with a friend, enter a building, browse beneath the sandstone arches of an old arcade without meeting an instrument of time.
ALAN LIGHTMANWe 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.
More Alan Lightman Quotes
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A world in which time is absolute is a world of consolation.
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You’ve made something grand, but it will be grander if it has feeling and beauty and harmony.
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I have no opposition at all to technology. I think technology is a wonderful thing that has to be used thoughtfully, and we can’t just assume that every bit of new technology improvesthe quality of life; it’s really in how the technology is used.
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Just didn’t know whether I would finish the book much less for it to come close to what I intended. I think that for any novel you never know exactly how the book is going to turn out…
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it is sometimes hard to tell what is real. We often invent what isn’t there. Or ignore what is.
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I have a number of vague ideas where I just have the core or kernel of the idea. I feel like I need some time for my mind to fill up again. I feel empty. Right now.
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We try to connect. We try to find truth. We dream and we hope. And underneath all of these strivings, we are haunted by the suspicion that what we see and understand of the world is only a tiny piece of the whole.
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“Then there are those who think their bodies don’t exist. They live by mechanical time. They rise at seven o’clock in the morning. They eat their lunch at noon and their supper at six. They arrive at their appointments on time, precisely by the clock.
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I was in New York and had lunch with Oliver Sachs and compared notes with him – he is someone I really like.
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I should have written books instead of reading them.
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Tornadoes, hurricanes, floods, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions happen without the slightest consideration for human inhabitants.
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You can’t let your characters just be mouthpieces for your ideas. They have to live and breathe on their own.
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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.
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I’ve taken a philosophical position on e-mail. Although I think it’s a wonderful communication technology, and it has a lot of good uses, it is abused quite a lot.
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If a person holds ambitions, he suffers knowingly, but very slowly.
ALAN LIGHTMAN