quoth/tag/choice

Quote #3193

Tue, 11 May 2010 16:57:32 -0700

We live with the choices we make.
- Mihai Ocneanu
Speech: Craiova 2009

Quote #3185

Wed, 05 May 2010 12:40:19 -0700

To be entirely modern (which very few of us are) is to believe in nothing. This is not to say that it is to have no beliefs: the truly modern person may believe in almost anything, or even perhaps in everything, so long as all these beliefs rest securely upon a more fundamental and radical faith in the nothing--or, better, in nothingness as such. Modernity's highest ideal--its special understanding of personal autonomy--requires us to place our trust in an absence underlying all of reality, a fertile void in which all things are possible, from which arises no impediment to our wills, and before which we may consequently choose to make of ourselves what we choose. We trust, that is to say, that there is no substantial criterion by which to judge our choices that stands higher than the unquestioned good of free choice itself, and that therefore all judgment, divine no less than human, is in some sense an infringement upon our freedom. This is our primal ideology. In the most unadorned terms possible, the ethos of modernity is--to be perfectly precise--nihilism. . . A perfectly consistent ethics of choice would ultimately erase any meaningful distinction between good and evil, compassion and cruelty, love and hatred, reverence and transgression, and few of us could bear to inhabit the world on those terms.
- David Bentley Hart
Book: Atheist Delusions: The Christian Revolution and Its Fashionable Enemies

Quote #3184

Wed, 05 May 2010 12:33:01 -0700

Even today, co-operative secular societies in Europe do a poor job of dealing with, for example, rising Islamism. They do not co-operate to protect civil liberties; they capitulate. People who believe in nothing beyond their own preferences and security cannot win against people who believe in specific ideas and accept risk as the price of establishing them. Pure secularism only stands a chance against a fanatical politicised religion if it morphs into a totalitarian state which dispenses with civil liberties.
- Denyse O'Leary
Article »

Quote #3122

Sun, 10 Jan 2010 12:50:32 -0800

Living inspired is born in the awareness that this is it! We have but one chance at life, and the wonderful gift we are given each morning is the choice of how we are going to live that moment, that day.
- Sally Cofer-Lindberg

Quote #3037

Thu, 07 May 2009 04:06:57 -0700

To fight or to give up? This is it, the most basic and the hardest choice in life.
- The Captain
Video game: Cryostasis: The Sleep of Reason

Quote #2541

Sat, 23 Dec 2006 15:35:58 -0800

I shall decide what I do. If you say my work is fighting, or healing, or exploring, or whatever you might say, I'll always be thinking about it. And if I do end up doing that, I'll be resentful because it'll feel as if I didn't have a choice, and if I don't do it, I'll feel guilty because I should. Whatever I do, I will choose it, no one else.
- Will Parry
Book: “The Amber Spyglass” by Philip Pullman

Quote #2442

Sat, 16 Sep 2006 16:41:51 -0700

Every choice carries a consequence. For better or worse, each choice is the unavoidable consequence of its predecessor. There are not exceptions. If you can accept that a bad choice carries the seed of its own punishment, why not accept the fact that a good choice yields desirable fruit?
- Gary Ryan Blair

Quote #2222

Sun, 19 Mar 2006 11:55:46 -0800

Bart: "Look at me I'm a grad student. I'm 30 years old and made $600 last year."
Marge: "Bart don't make fun of grad students. They just made a terrible life choice."
TV: The Simpsons

Quote #1426

Tue, 22 Mar 2005 20:07:59 -0800

Work hard, work passionately, but apply your most precious asset--time--to what is meaningful to you. What are you willing to do for the rest of your life? does not mean, literally, what will you do the rest of your life? That question would be absurd, given the inevitability of change. No, what the question really asks is, if your life were to end suddenly and unexpectedly tomorrow, would you be able to say youâve been doing what you truly care about today? What would you be willing to do for the rest of your life? What would it take to do it right now?
- Randy Komisar
Book: The Monk and The Riddle: The Education of a Silicon Valley Entrepreneur

Quote #1415

Sat, 19 Mar 2005 21:07:00 -0800

The past is a gaping hole. You try to run from it, but the more you run, the deeper, more terrible it grows behind you, its edges yawning at your heels. Your only chance is to turn around and face it. But its like looking down into the grave of your love. Or kissing the mouth of a gun, a bullet trembling in its dark nest, ready to blow your head off.
- Max Payne
Video game: Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Quote #1413

Sat, 19 Mar 2005 21:05:17 -0800

The past is a gaping hole. Your only chance is to turn around and face it. but it's like kissing the lips of your dead love, darkness waiting in the hole of her mouth. We are willing to suffer, to die for the things we care about. For love, for the right choices.
- Max Payne
Video game: Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Quote #1412

Sat, 19 Mar 2005 21:04:33 -0800

Everything is subjective. choices, answers, good and evil.
- Max Payne
Video game: Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Quote #1410

Sat, 19 Mar 2005 21:03:12 -0800

The past is a puzzle, like a broken mirror. As you piece it together, you cut yourself, your image keeps shifting, and you change with it. It could destroy you, drive you mad, it could set you free. You'll see the choices you didn't know you'd made, like staying at work late to chat with a friend, instead of hurrying home to your family kissing her, I think of the cold laws of cause and effect.
- Max Payne
Video game: Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Quote #1409

Sat, 19 Mar 2005 21:02:05 -0800

Firing a gun is a binary choice, you either pull the trigger or you don't.
- Max Payne
Video game: Max Payne 2: The Fall of Max Payne

Quote #1110

Thu, 24 Feb 2005 14:09:47 -0800

Obviously, I'm going to choose an example where the math is easy.
- Dr. Michael Kotlarchyk

Quote #869

Wed, 09 Feb 2005 06:00:44 -0800

True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in the worth and choice.
- Ben Jonson