Quotes About Definition

I'm not going to have any of your horrid New England directness, cousin," said St. Clare, gayly. "If I answer that question, I know you'll be at me with half a dozen others, each one harder than the last; and I'm not a going to define my position. I am one of the sort that lives by throwing stones at other people's glass houses, but I never mean to put up one for them to stone.

Indeed poetry is bounded by silence on all sides, is almost defined by silence. from "Fallacies of Silence

I loved the idea of a subversive world where mental illness was defined as just another version of normal, and education was how you made your way in the world, not something that began or ended.

He held the landlordship of an inn to be the same as Shaw's definition of marriage – as something combining the maximum of temptation with the maximum of opportunity.

I wouldn't presume to define noir - if we could define it, we wouldn't need to use a French word for it - but it seems to me it's more a way of looking at the world than what one sees.

No man had ever heard a nightingale, When once a keen-eyed naturalist was stirred To study and define -- what is a bird.

To think that realistic fiction is by definition superior to imaginative fiction is to think imitation is superior to invention.

A dilemma arises when the interests of these deaf adults seem at odds with those of the schoolchildren—for instance, when satisfying the wishes of the former means providing inadequate services to the latter. Some would argue that because hearing people have always controlled the definition of adequacy, that concept is invalid. Others hold that any deaf candidate is preferable to a hearing candidate for a position working with deaf children.

Look what was sown by the stars At night across the fields I am not defined by scars But by the incredible ability to heal

I am not defined by darkness Confided the night Each dawn I am reminded I am defined by light

the phrase "lion's share" here means "the biggest part" and has nothing to do with lions or sharing-

There is the medical definition of the word "lousy," meaning "infested with lice," and this definition of "lousy" has not appeared in my work at all, although as Count Olaf's hygiene gets worse and worse I may find occasion to use it.

Now a Jew, in the dictionary, is one who is descended from the ancient tribes of Judea, or one who is regarded as descended from that tribe. That's what it says in the dictionary; but you and I know what a Jew is -- One Who Killed Our Lord. And although there should be a statute of limitations for that crime, it seems that those who neither have the actions nor the gait of Christians, pagan or not, will bust us out, unrelenting dues, for another deuce.

Instead what we have is an Eros imprisoned by the narrow definition of romance and sexuality centered on the genitals.

When I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.

One of the results of this has been that American culture increasingly defined those who served as "heroic," a term derived from the act of service rather than any specific circumstance or performance during that service.

They differ from towns and suburbs in basic ways, and one of these is that cities are, by definition, full of strangers.

He's going to jail. He can't see. He can't hear. He can't take a leak that lasts under fifteen minutes. But he has an erection and all the other problems are small change. Next time around I'm coming back as a man. Priorities are clearly defined. Life is simple.

Wat was trouwens onkruid? Een plant die niemand plantte? Een zaadje ontsnapt aan de jas van een reiziger, iets wat er niet thuishoorde? Was het iets wat beter groeide dan wat er had moeten staan? Was het niet gewoon een woord, onkruid, met een sliert aan vooroordelen? Onkruid, onding. Onnuttig. Ongewenst.

Unlike the heart or kidney, which have a small, defined set of cell types, we still do not have a taxonomy of neurons, and neuroscientists still argue whether specific types of neurons are unique to humans. But there is no disputing that neurons are only about 10 percent of the cells in the human brain.

I am an unmarried man, as opposed to a single man. A bachelor, according to the dictionary, is a man who has never been married. An unmarried man is not married at the moment. Many of these terms have fallen into disuse.

I think when you have lawyers arguing over whether you can keep a detainee at 46 degrees... for two hours, that's not torture. It may be unpleasant, it may be coercive... but let's say what torture actually is, and that's not it.

I think when the military ousts a sitting president, even if the sitting president is deeply unpopular, that's the definition of a coup.

We require, as a species, the difference between what is safe and unsafe to define ourselves. Be it in darkness or in light, where we are means nothing without the comparison to the other place - where we are not. And thus it is the difference between them that tells us who and what we are.