Thinking quotes
95.1K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside thinking — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"The most watched programme on the BBC, after the news, is probably 'Doctor Who.' What has happened is that science fiction has been subsumed into modern literature. There are grandparents out there who speak Klingon, who are quite capable of holding down a job. No one would think twice now about a parallel universe."
""There's a door," he whispered. "Where does it go?" "It stays where it is, I think," said Rincewind."
"I would like you to teach [the orcs] civilised behaviour," said Ladyship coldly. He appeared to consider this. "Yes of course, I think that would be quite possible," he said. "And who would you send to teach the humans?"
"Most gods find it hard to walk and think at the same time."
"I don't think I've ever been critical of the money Douglas Adams makes, especially since, as has been tactfully pointed out, I myself have had to change banks having filled the first one up."
"I think women today are so overwhelmed and overtaxed."
"I don't think there are any footsteps to be walked in. No one else has taken things that you can buy at the grocery store and put them together. I hope that I have a career as long as Julia Child."
"I like going to New York. I like the galleries and the theatre and the restaurants and bars and music. I think that city is more alive than Los Angeles."
"Any carefully planned thing destroys the creativity. You can't think your way through a story; you have to live it. So, you don't build a story; you allow it to explode."
"Think of Shakespeare and Melville and you think of thunder, lightning, wind. They all knew the joy of creating in large or small forms, on unlimited or restricted canvases. These are the children of the gods."
"The average TV commercial of sixty seconds has one hundred and twenty half-second clips in it, or one-third of a second. We bombard people with sensation. That substitutes for thinking."
"Forgive, I hope you won't be upset, but when I was a boy I used to look up and see you behind your desk, so near but far away, and, how can I say this, I used to think that you were Mrs. God, and that the library was a whole world, and that no matter what part of the world or what people or thing I wanted to see and read, you'd find and give it to me."
"You're not like the others. I've seen a few; I know. When I talk, you look at me. When I said something about the moon, you looked at the moon, last night. The others would never do that. The others would walk off and leave me talking. Or threaten me. No one has time any more for anyone else. You're one of the few who put up with me. That's why I think it's so strange you're a fireman, it just doesn't seem right for you, somehow."
"I don't think in any language. I think in images."
"a person hoping to become a poet must have the capacity of thinking of several things at a time."
"I think my favorite fact about myself is that I have never been dismayed by a critic's bilge or bile, and have never once in my life asked or thanked a reviewer for a review."
"We only half live when we only half think."
"Very often, if you think about what's erotic and break it down, as we're feeling the excitement of eroticism, we're feeling fear. We want to try to dominate our fear and get rid of our fear, so we go towards it and have sex with it, basically. That's really sad."
"Humans are really interesting. We're so clever, what we do with our brain. How we manage to con ourselves into thinking all sorts of things is really fascinating. By the same token, if we could just convince ourselves of things that would gather us together and powerfully turn things around for the good, that would be awesome. It's doubtful because we're such a fear-based species."
"People say that New Yorkers aren't friendly, but I think they're more friendly than Londoners. Here there is a front-footed nature of Americans. You can go out on a night out and meet 10 random people and stay in touch with them, whereas that's not going to happen in the same way in London."
