A Quote by Henry Louis Gates
All historians generalize from particulars. And often, if you look at a historian's footnotes, the number of examples of specific cases is very, very small.
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We've had risk assessments performed by Harvard University, which said that even if we did have a small number of cases in this country that the likelihood of it spreading or getting into any kind of human health problem is very, very small.
No matter where you are on politics, I think it is wonderful to see candidates funding campaigns not by talking to a very small number of very rich people, but by reaching out to a very large number of citizens.
If you look at why do we end up with the nominees that we get often? It's because you have only a very small number of Americans participating in the primaries, and those people tend to be your most dyed in the wool partisans.
A small lens gives you a very specific look. You don't have a shallow depth of field.
There is something very easy about women's friendships that you don't see as often with men. We all know examples of this, when women will just call each other up or drop a line, not with anything specific to say.
Speaking of failure, when we do our question and answer period, you look at what's happened with our Navy in terms of the number of ships and our armed forces generally, how they're so depleted, how they're at almost record-setting lows and in some cases absolute record-setting lows. It is very, very unfortunate and very, very dangerous for our country.
The older I get the more I'm convinced that it's the purpose of politicians and journalists to say the world is very simple, whereas it's the purpose of historians to say, 'No! It's very complicated.'
The job of the historian is to help give people a sense of existence in time, without which we are really not fully human.
But I really think it's a very unfortunate part of our judicial system and I would feel much, much better if more states would really consider whether they think the benefits outweigh the very serious potential injustice, because in these cases the emotions are very, very high on both sides and to have stakes as high as you do in these cases, there is a special potential for error. We cannot ignore the fact that in recent years a disturbing number of inmates on death row have been exonerated.
The simplicity of nature is not to be measured by that of our conceptions. Infinitely varied in its effects, nature is simple only in its causes, and its economy consists in producing a great number of phenomena, often very complicated, by means of a small number of general laws.
The thing about 'Gilmore Girls' is that it's such a specific voice, and I lived with it for so long before it got on the air It's a very specific rhythm and a very specific banter.
People like me, like Karen Elson and Soo Joo, we're a very specific woman with a very specific look. I think that's also why we last longer. There's no one else like us.
We're going to show great heart. DACA is a very, very difficult subjects, one of the most difficult. You have these incredible kids in many cases, not in all cases, in some of the cases they are gang members and drug dealers, too. But you have some absolutely incredible kids, I would say mostly. They were brought here in such a way, it's a very, very tough subject.
Doing 'CSI: N.Y.' is not 'CSI.' Doing 'CSI: Miami' is not 'CSI: N.Y.,' it's 'CSI: Miami.' It has a very, very specific tone. It has a very specific look. It has a specific way in which they tell their stories that's different from 'CSI: N.Y.' and 'CSI.'
If I may bend your ear for a moment, I like Terry Pratchett. I like footnotes. I like footnotes even when they are not as entertaining as a Pratchett footnote, even when they are in the middle of a book on evolutionary biology and briefly explain the Red Queen hypothesis or the fate of the Stephen's Island Wren or how many bunnies can dance on the back of Australia. Footnotes fill me with a very mild glee. The endnote simply does not compare.
You're not a historian, but most historians will tell you that they make very discrete judgment as to what facts to omit in order to make their book into some shape, some length that can be managed.
When I meet a historian who cannot think that there have been great men, great men moreover in politics, I feel myself in the presence of a bad historian, and there are times when I incline to judge all historians by their opinion of Winston Churchill -- whether they can see that, no matter how much better the details, often damaging, of man and career become known, he still remains quite simply, a great man.
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