Quotes About Humanity

Opera, next to Gothic architecture, is one of the strangest inventions of Western man. It could not have been foreseen by any logical process.

In countries other than Pakistan - I won't necessarily call them 'Western' - people support me. This is because people there respect others. They don't do this because I am a Pashtun or a Punjabi, a Pakistani, or an Iranian, they do it because of one's words and character. This is why I am being respected and supported there.

I think the American Western laid down a kind of subject matter that's about following your instinct or following your gut and having a sort of removed quality from your humanity. And I think Clint Eastwood helped to establish that.

There is certainly a longstanding idea within western culture that civilization is only a thin veneer. As soon as something happens, say a war or a natural disaster or an epidemic like we're going through right now, the worst comes out in each of us.

The most powerful force ever known on this planet is human cooperation - a force for construction and destruction.

Powerful people are always in charge. You have to acknowledge that and deal with it as a reality. They're not devils. They're not monsters. They're human beings, like us, that have their share of insecurities and fears. You have to contemplate that as you go through life.

The pain of powerlessness is excruciating. It is the most painful experience in the earth school, and everyone shares it.

I don't need to have my convictions confirmed by a show of numbers. However, being among people in front of a band leads me to believe that all is not lost, that humans, now and then, can communicate on a higher level than the political and the practical.

The practical case for manned spacef light gets ever-weaker with each advance in robots and miniaturisation - indeed, as a scientist or practical man, I see little purpose in sending people into space at all. But as a human being, I'm an enthusiast for manned missions.

For 25 years practicing medicine, I never asked anybody if they were a Republican or a Democratic or an independent and asked if they had insurance or not. I took care of everybody.

In every age and every man there is something to praise as well as to blame.

I'm not a perfect Muslim; I think none of us are perfect human beings. I do the five pillars of Islam, you know, I pray five times a day.

I pray for everybody throughout the game, even my opponents. Outside of the game, we still have to live life, still have to lead normal lives, and we still need our bodies.

Pray for the people of West Africa. You cannot be apathetic towards people for whom you are earnestly praying.

How could we claim to love our neighbour while at the same time praying for God to destroy them?

We're trying to elevate humanity and not preach to humanity in the way we approach our art. We're always just trying to get a good party going.

The thing I try to preach the most when anybody asks me for advice - I say just be a good person first and foremost.

As a preacher who is fully human, and clearly not divine, I can't speak as Jesus did. But I do seek to speak truth that carries weight and authority. All of us who preach the gospel aspire to speak under the authority of Jesus.

And every human being is precious.

There is precious little that's charitable about the world of charity.

This precious thing of empathy and love and understanding is something we have to hold and appreciate and protect.

At times, we forget the magnitude of the havoc we can wreak by off-loading our minds onto super-intelligent machines, that is, until they run away from us, like mad sorcerers' apprentices, and drag us up to the precipice for a look down into the abyss.

I realized that a great deal of life is exactly and precisely about being able to feel pain: my own and other people's.

Not only have computers changed the way we think, they've also discovered what makes humans think - or think we're thinking. At least enough to predict and even influence it.