This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Ursula Le Guin, fully Ursula Kroeber Le Guin
We can't prevent suffering. This pain and that pain, yes, but not Pain.
What I am about to say may sound provocative, but I feel more and more strongly that even these ideas are not enough, that we must go farther and deeper.
Authority | Morality | Order | Responsibility | Science | Understanding | Will |
Ursula Le Guin, fully Ursula Kroeber Le Guin
The wise needn't ask, the fool asks in vain.
Ursula Le Guin, fully Ursula Kroeber Le Guin
We're in the world, not against it. It doesn't work to try to stand
Books | Understanding | Think |
It has become clear that the legacy of the past decades we have to cope with is even worse than we anticipated or could anticipate in the joyful atmosphere of those first weeks of freedom. New problems are emerging day by day, and we can see how interconnected they are, how long it takes to solve them, and how difficult it is to establish priorities.
Change | Global | Purpose | Purpose | Spirit | Understanding | Will |
In my opinion such a thing is impossible for many years... People have been talking about a 3000 miles high-angle rocket shot from one continent to another, carrying an atomic bomb and so directed as to be a precise weapon... I think we can leave that out of our thinking.
Mathematics | Rest | Understanding |
When a man has his heart in the right place and good taste, he can not only do well in politics but is even predetermined for it. If someone is modest and does not yearn for power, he is certainly not ill-equipped to engage in politics; on the contrary, he belongs there. What is needed in politics is not the ability to lie but rather the sensibility to know when, where, how and to whom to say things.
Awareness | Earth | Hypothesis | Understanding | World | Awareness |
Today's world, as we all know, is faced with multiple threats. From whichever angle I look at this menace, I always come to the conclusion that salvation can only come through a profound awakening of man to his own personal responsibility, which is at the same time a global responsibility. Thus, the only way to save our world, as I see it, lies in a democracy that recalls its ancient Greek roots: democracy based on an integral human personality personally answering for the fate of the community.
Authority | Awareness | Heart | Office | Opposition | Position | Understanding | Awareness |
We must not be afraid of dreaming the seemingly impossible if we want the seemingly impossible to become a reality.
Experience | Order | Responsibility | Sense | Understanding | Will | Work | Understand |
There are no exact directions. There are probably no directions at all. The only things that I am able to recommend at this moment are: a sense of humor; an ability to see the ridiculous and the absurd dimensions of things; an ability to laugh about others as well as about ourselves; a sense of irony; and, of everything that invites parody in this world. In other words: rising above things, or looking at them from a distance; sensibility to the hidden presence of all the more dangerous types of conceit in others, as well as in ourselves; good cheer; an unostentatious certainty of the meaning of things; gratitude for the gift of life and courage to assume responsibility for it; and, a vigilant mind.
Experience | Nothing | Phenomena | Understanding | World | Understand |
V. S. Pritchett, fully Sir Victor Sawdon Pritchett
All writers - all people - have their stores of private and family legends which lie like a collection of half-forgotten, often violent toys on the floor of memory.
Commitment | Evil | Hell | Society | Society |
The scene changes but the aspirations of men of good will persist.
Body | Knowledge | Men | Nature | Responsibility | Understand |
Woodrow Wilson, fully Thomas Woodrow Wilson
A little group of willful men, representing no opinion but their own, have rendered the great Government of the United States helpless and contemptible.
Man | Meaning | Sound | Understanding |