Douglas R. Hofstadter · 880 pages
Rating: (3.2K votes)
“It turns out that an eerie type of chaos can lurk just behind a facade of order - and yet, deep inside the chaos lurks an even eerier type of order.”
― Douglas R. Hofstadter, quote from Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
“I would like to understand things better, but I don’t want to understand them perfectly.”
― Douglas R. Hofstadter, quote from Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
“This computer-generated pangram contains six a's, one b, three c's, three d's, thirty-seven e's, six f's, three g's, nine h's, twelve i's, one j, one k, two l's, three m's, twenty-two n's, thirteen o's, three p's, one q, fourteen r's, twenty-nine s's, twenty-four t's, five u's, six v's, seven w's, four x's, five y's, and one z.”
― Douglas R. Hofstadter, quote from Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
“Please, Oh please, publish me in your collection of self-referential sentences!”
― Douglas R. Hofstadter, quote from Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
“Supperational thinkers, by recursive definition, include in their calculations the fact that they are in a group of superrational thinkers.”
― Douglas R. Hofstadter, quote from Metamagical Themas: Questing for the Essence of Mind and Pattern
“Oh No! My wings are effed up!”
― Tammara Webber, quote from Between the Lines
“Everything has beauty," she said, "but not everyone sees it." Her stomach hurt, her eyes burned. "I saw you, Hatter." Her words whispered through the night. "I saw you." She walked away.”
― Marie Hall, quote from Her Mad Hatter
“But, in fact, his reserve might, in some degree, have proceeded from design. If so, then here was evinced the unhealthy climax of that icy though conscientious policy, more or less adopted by all commanders of large ships, which, except in signal emergencies, obliterates alike the manifestation of sway with every trace of sociality; transforming the man into a block, or rather into a loaded cannon, which, until there is call for thunder, has nothing to say. Viewing”
― Herman Melville, quote from Benito Cereno
“ان نعيش حقا يعني ان نرفض الاخرين ، فالقبول بهم يتطلب التخلي عن الاشياء ، كبح جماح الذات ، التصرف ضد الفطرة ، اضعاف النفس . نحن لانتصور الحرية الا لأنفسنا ولانبسطها على القريبين منا الا بشق النفس .”
― Emil M. Cioran, quote from History and Utopia
“What do zombies chant at a riot?”
“Grrarphsnarg?” he asked, in a surprisingly well-done bit of mindless zombie imitating.
“No, but that was really good. Disconcertingly good.”
“I was deceased for a time.”
“True. But anyway, the rioters get all riled up, and they chant: ‘What do we want? Brains! When do we want them? Brains!’” I fell into a wave of appropriately boisterous laughter; Ethan seemed less impressed.
“I truly hope the stipend we pay you doesn’t get spent on the development of jokes like that.”
― Chloe Neill, quote from House Rules
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