#gum

Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's game because they almost always turn out to be—or to be indistinguishable from—self-righteous sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time. ↗

— Neal Stephenson

#trolls #free

It's often a bad sign when people defend themselves against charges which haven't been made. ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#defensiveness #noam-chomsky #september- #iraq

There are only 3 things that can make your dreams come true: your thoughts, your words, and your actions. ↗

— Mike Dooley

#gumption #thoughts #words #dreams

Quit calling me Grey. It makes me sound like I’m a boy. Like Dorian Gray.” “Dorian who?” I sighed. “Just think up something else. Plain old Nora works too, you know.” “Sure thing, Gumdrop.” I grimaced. “I take that back. Let’s stick with Grey. ↗

— Becca Fitzpatrick

#fitzpatrick #grey #gumdrop #hush #nora

Advertising is the modern substitute for argument; its function is to make the worse appear the better. ↗

— George Santayana

#appear #argument #better #function #make

I'm sorry to say that the subject I most disliked was mathematics. I have thought about it. I think the reason was that mathematics leaves no room for argument. If you made a mistake, that was all there was to it. ↗

— Malcolm X

#mathematics #schooling #mathematics

When a man who is drinking neat gin starts talking about his mother he is past all argument. ↗

— C.S. Forester

#argument #drinking #gin #mothers #alcohol

It does take great maturity to understand that the opinion we are arguing for is merely the hypothesis we favor, necessarily imperfect, probably transitory, which only very limited minds can declare to be a certainty or a truth. ↗

— Milan Kundera

#close-mindedness #hypothesis #open-mindedness #maturity

Argumentation is a human enterprise that is embedded in a larger social and psychological context. This context includes (1) the total psyches of the two persons engaged in dialogue, (2) the relationship between the two persons, (3) the immediate situation in which they find themselves and (4) the larger social, cultural and historical situation surrounding them. ↗

— Peter Kreeft

#culture #dialogue #psychology #relationships #sociology

On close inspection, this device turned out to be a funereal juke box - the result of mixing Lloyd's of London with the principle of the chewing gum dispenser. ↗

— Cecil Beaton

#chewing #chewing gum #close #device #gum