A Quote by Stanislaw Lem

Cripple God, who always desires more than he's able to have, and doesn't always realize this to begin with. Who has built clocks, but not the time that they measure. Has built systems or mechanisms that serve particular purposes, but they too have outgrown these purposes and betrayed them. And has created an infinity that, from being the measure of the power he was supposed to have, turned into the measure of his boundless failure.

Stanislaw Lem

Quote Topics

Able Always Begin Being Betrayed Boundless Built Clocks Created Cripple Desires Failure God His Infinity Measure Mechanisms More Particular Power Purposes Realize Serve Supposed Systems Than Them Time Too Turned

Quote Author

Stanislaw Lem
Polish - Writer
September 12, 1921 - March 27, 2006

What do we measure when we measure time? The gloomy answer from Hawking, one of our most implacably cheerful scientists, is that we measure entropy. We measure changes and those changes are all for the worse. We measure increasing disorder. Life is hard, says science, and constancy is the greatest of miracles.

David Quammen

Racism itself is difficult to measure. We can measure hate crimes - which are absolutely an indicator. We can measure reports of discrimination. We can measure the number of times hateful words are being used across the Internet. Those things all help us measure racism, but it can sometimes be nebulous.

Shaun King

There appears to exist a greater desire to live long than to live well! Measure by man's desires, he cannot live long enough; measure by his good deeds, and he has not lived long enough; measure by his evil deeds, and he has lived too long.

Johann Georg Ritter von Zimmermann

The strength and weakness of physicists is that we believe in what we can measure. And if we can't measure it, then we say it probably doesn't exist. And that closes us off to an enormous amount of phenomena that we may not be able to measure because they only happened once. For example, the Big Bang. ... That's one reason why they scoffed at higher dimensions for so many years. Now we realize that there's no alternative.

Michio Kaku

The thing you can't measure is someone's heart, someone's desire. You can measure a 40, his vertical, his bench press, and that might let you know things like, yeah, he can jump high. But desire, his dedication, his determination, that's something you can't measure. That's something you can't measure about Rod Smith.

Shannon Sharpe

Money cannot be applied to the *general welfare*, otherwise than by an application of it to some *particular* measure conducive to the general welfare. Whenever, therefore, money has been raised by the general authority, and is to be applied to a particular measure, a question arises whether the particular measure be within the enumerated authorities vested in Congress. If it be, the money requisite for it may be applied to it; if it be not, no such application can be made.

James Madison

The present moment is always full of infinite treasure. It contains far more than you can possibly grasp. Faith is the measure of its riches: what you find in the present moment is according to the measure of your faith. Love also is the measure: the more the heart loves, the more it rejoices in what God provides. The will of God presents itself at each moment like an immense ocean that the desire of your heart cannot empty; yet you will drink from that ocean according to your faith and love.

Jean-Pierre de Caussade

Time is a measure of space, just as a range-finder is a measure of space, but measuring locks us into the place we measure.

Frank Herbert

Standardized testing is at cross purposes with many of the most important purposes of public education. It doesn't measure big-picture learning, critical thinking, perseverance, problem solving, creativity or curiosity, yet those are the qualities great teaching brings out in a student.

Randi Weingarten

History uses a unit of measure for time that is different from that of the lifespan of the individual, whereas man is only too ready to measure the evolution of history by his own yardstick.

Gustav Stresemann

The measure of a life is a measure of love and respect, So hard to earn so easily burned In the fullness of time, A garden to nurture and protect It's a measure of a life The treasure of a life is a measure of love and respect, The way you live, the gifts that you give In the fullness of time, It's the only return that you expect

Neil Peart

Don’t measure busywork. Don’t measure activity. Measure accomplishment. It doesn’t matter what people do as much as it matters what they get done.

Larry Winget

The measure of a man's culture is the measure of his appreciation. We are ourselves what we appreciate and no more.

Frank Lloyd Wright

Hardly anything can be more important in the mental training of a child than the bringing him to do it in its proper time, whether he enjoys it or not. The measure of a child's ability to do this becomes, in the long run, the measure of his practical efficiency in whatever sphere of life he labors.

Henry Clay Trumbull

No one can define or measure justice, democracy, security, freedom, truth, or love. No one can define or measure any value. But if no one speaks up for them, if systems aren’t designed to produce them, if we don’t speak about them and point toward their presence or absence, they will cease to exist.