REFLECTIONS

"[Individuals who break through by inventing a new paradigm are] almost always...either very young or very new to the field whose paradigm they change....These are the men who, being little committed by prior practice to the traditional rules of normal science, are particularly likely to see that those rules no longer define a playable game and to conceive another set that can replace them."
-- Thomas S. Kuhn in The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.

"In October 1838, that is, fifteen months after I had begun my systematic inquiry, I happened to read for amusement Malthus on Population, and being well prepared to appreciate the struggle for existence which everywhere goes on from long- continued observation of the habits of animals and plants, it at once struck me that under these circumstances favourable variations would tend to be preserved, and unfavourable ones to be destroyed. The results of this would be the formation of a new species. Here, then I had at last got a theory by which to work".
-Charles Darwin, from his autobiography 1876

Epitaph
Sacred to the memory of the Rev Thomas Robert Malthus, long known to the lettered world by his admirable writings on the social branches of political economy, particularly by his essay on population.
One of the best men and truest philosophers of any age or country, raised by native dignity of mind above the misrepresentation of the ignorant and the neglect of the great, he lived a serene and happy life devoted to the pursuit and communication of truth.
Supported by a calm but firm conviction of the usefulness of his labors.
Content with the approbation of the wise and good.
His writings will be a lasting monument of the extent and correctness of his understanding.
The spotless integrity of his principles, the equity and candour of his nature, his sweetness of temper, urbanity of manners and tenderness of heart, his benevolence and his piety are still dearer recollections of his family and friends.
Born Feb 14 1766 Died 29 Dec 1834.

"It ain't those parts of the Bible that I can't understand that bother me, it's the parts that I do understand." --Mark Twain, Americanwriter and humorist, 1835-1910
"The Bible has noble poetry in it ... and some good morals and awealth of obscenity, and upwards of a thousand lies." --Mark Twain,American writer and humorist, 1835-1910
"The Bible was written by the same people who said the Earth was flat." -- anonymous
"The Good Book" -- one of the most remarkable euphemisms ever coined. -- Ashley Montagu
"So far as I can remember, there is not one word in the Gospels in praise of intelligence." -- Bertrand Russell
"All this miserable tale of the Devil and Eve, and an intercessor with the childish mummeries of the God of the Jews, is irreconcileable with the knowledge of the stars." --Percy Bysshe Shelley, "The Necessity of Atheism"
"As a source of objective morality, the Bible is one of the worstbooks we have. It might have been the very worst, in fact -- if we didn't also happen to have the Koran." --Sam Harris, author of The End of Faith
"The Bible is the world's longest-running, most widely respected, and least reliable Rorschach Test. You can look in it and see anything you want to see, find anything you want to find, justify any pre-ordained conclusion you prefer--because the Bible has it all!" --Richard S. Russell
"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries,the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictivenesswith which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be moreconsistent that we called it the work of a demon than the word of God.It is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalisemankind; and for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everythingthat is cruel." --Thomas Paine
"All that is necessary, as it seems to me, to convince any reasonable person that the Bible is simply and purely of human invention is to read it. Read it as you would any other book; think of it as you would of any other; get the bandage of reverence from your eyes; drive from your heart the phantom of fear; push from the throne of your brain the cowled form of superstition -- then read the Holy Bible, and you will be amazed that you ever, for one moment, supposed a being of infinite wisdom, goodness, and purity to be the author of such ignorance and of such atrocity." --Robert G. Ingersoll

= = = = =Answers Given On A Bible Knowledge Test
Noah's wife was Joan of Ark.
Lot's wife was a pillar of salt by day and a ball of fire by night.
Moses went to the top of Mount Cyanide to get the ten commandments.The seventh commandment is "thou shalt not admit adultery."
Joshua led the Hebrews in the battle of Geritol.Jesus was born because Mary had an immaculate contraption.
The people who followed Jesus were called Decibels.
The espistles were the wives of the apostles.
One of the opossums was St. Matthew.
Salome danced in seven veils in front of King Herrod.
Paul preached acrimony, which is another name for marriage.
David fought the Finkelsteins, which a race of people who lived in Bibletimes.
The Jews had trouble throughout their history with unsympathic Genitals.
A Christian should have only one wife, this is called monotony.

It is interesting to contemplate an entangled bank, clothed with many plants of many kinds, with birds singing on the bushes, with various insects flitting about, and with worms crawling through the damp earth, and to reflect that these elaborately constructed forms... have all been produced by laws acting around us...
There is grandeur in this view of life, with its several powers, having been originally breathedinto a few forms or into one; and that, whilst this planet has gone cycling on according to the fixed law of gravity, from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been, and are being, evolved.
Charles Darwin -Origin of Species -conclusion

"The affinities of all the beings of the same class have sometimes been represented by a great tree... As buds give rise by growth to fresh buds, and these if vigorous, branch out and overtop on all sides many a feebler branch, so by generation I believe it has been with the great Tree of Life, which fills with its dead and broken branches the crust of the earth, and covers the surface with its ever branching and beautiful ramifications."
-Charles Darwin, 1859

Several men are in the locker room of a golf club. A cell phone on a bench rings and a man engages the hands free speaker function and begins to talk. Everyone else in the room stops to listen.
MAN: "Hello"
WOMAN: "Honey, it's me. Are you at the club?"
MAN: "Yes"
WOMAN: "I am at the mall now and found this beautiful leather coat.
It's only $1,000. Is it OK if I buy it?"
MAN: "Sure, go ahead if you like it that much."
WOMAN: "I also stopped by the Mercedes dealership and saw the new 2007 models. I saw one I really liked."
MAN: "How much?"
WOMAN: "$90,000"
MAN: "OK, but for that price I want it with all the options."
WOMAN: "Great! Oh, and one more thing..the house I wanted last year is back on the market. They're asking $950,000"
MAN: "Well, then go ahead and give them an offer of $900,000. They willprobably take it. If not, we can go the extra 50 thousand if it's really a pretty good price."
WOMAN: "OK. I'll see you later! I love you so much!"
MAN: "Bye! I love you, too."The man hangs up. The other men in the locker room are staring at him in astonishment, mouths agape.

He turns and asks: "Anyone know who this phone belongs to?"

And I say to mankind, Be not curious about God,For I who am curious about each am not curious about God. . . .I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least. -- Walt Whitman, "Song of Myself"

Einstein-
In response to the telegrammed question of New York's Rabbi Herbert S. Goldstein in 1929: "Do you believe in God? Stop. Answer paid 50 words." Einstein replied in only 25 (German) words: "I believe in Spinoza's God, Who reveals Himself in the lawful harmony of the world, not in a God Who concerns Himself with the fate and the doings of mankind."