#utility

All I ever promised was that I was sure I could develop a new pharmacological agent which might answer a physiological question. Any utility would be implicit in that answer. ↗

— James W. Black

#answer #any #could #develop #ever

I hate war as only a soldier who has lived it can, only as one who has seen its brutality, its futility, its stupidity. ↗

— Dwight D. Eisenhower

#futility #hate #i #lived #only

So, it becomes an exercise in futility if you write something that does not express the film as the director wishes. It's still their ball game. It's their show. I think any successful composer learns how to dance around the director's impulses. ↗

— Danny Elfman

#around #ball #ball game #becomes #composer

Science has a simple faith, which transcends utility. It is the faith that it is the privilege of man to learn to understand, and that this is his mission. ↗

— Vannevar Bush

#his #learn #man #mission #privilege

Nothing leads so straight to futility as literary ambitions without systematic knowledge. ↗

— H. G. Wells

#knowledge #leads #literary #nothing #straight

What makes my approach special is that I do different things. I do jazz, blues, country music and so forth. I do them all, like a good utility man. ↗

— Ray Charles

#blues #country #country music #different #different things

A Cathedral Façade at Midnight Along the sculptures of the western wall I watched the moonlight creeping: It moved as if it hardly moved at all Inch by inch thinly peeping Round on the pious figures of freestone, brought And poised there when the Universe was wrought To serve its centre, Earth, in mankind’s thought. The lunar look skimmed scantly toe, breast, arm, Then edged on slowly, slightly, To shoulder, hand, face; till each austere form Was blanched its whole length brightly Of prophet, king, queen, cardinal in state, That dead men’s tools had striven to simulate; And the stiff images stood irradiate. A frail moan from the martyred saints there set Mid others of the erection Against the breeze, seemed sighings of regret At the ancient faith’s rejection Under the sure, unhasting, steady stress Of Reason’s movement, making meaningless. ↗

— Thomas Hardy

#faith #futility #moonlight #mortality #night

The fishes are also employed for the same purpose on any yard, which happens to be sprung or fractured. Thus their form, application, and utility are exactly like those of the splinters applied to a broken limb in surgery. ↗

— William Falconer

#any #application #applied #broken #employed

Failures of perspective in decision-making can be due to aspects of the social utility paradox, but more often result from simple mistakes caused by inadequate thought. ↗

— Herman Kahn

#caused #decision-making #due #failures #inadequate

Whenever you play dance music, it serves a function. It becomes a utility; you have to worry about the tempos and what you're going to play for people. But when you're playing for listening, you're free. ↗

— Stan Kenton

#becomes #dance #dance music #free #function