Quotes About Perception

If the eccentric is sufficiently integrated to succeed in some field, to gain wealth or power, he is admired and respected and his oddity is overlooked. But if the eccentric fails, he is pitied or ridiculed and shunned as something strange.

The standardized American is largely a myth created not least by Americans themselves.

I look at everything. God gave me eyes and I look at women and men and subway excavations and moving pictures and the little flowers of the field. I casually inspect the universe.

You're a good model for a German soldier, except for the hair. You look as though you once had a thought in your head and that's hard to find.

Isn't it sad that you can tell people that the ozone layer is being depleted, the forests are being cut down, the deserts are advancing steadily, that the greenhouse effect will raise the sea level 200 feet, that overpopulation is choking us, that pollution is killing us, that nuclear war may destroy us -- and they yawn and settle back for a comfortable nap. But tell them that the Martians are landing, and they scream and run.

If we only obey those rules that we think are just and reasonable, then no rule will stand, for there is no rule that some will not think is unjust and unreasonable.

All humanity could share a common insanity and be immersed in a common illusion while living in a common chaos. That can't be disproved, but we have no choice but to follow our senses.

To any who know the star field well from one certain reference point, stars are as individual as people. Jump ten parsecs, however, and not even your own sun is recognizable.

What is really amazing, and frustrating, is mankind's habit of refusing to see the obvious and inevitable until it is there, and then muttering about unforeseen catastrophes.

It is the obvious which is so difficult to see most of the time. People say 'It's as plain as the nose on your face.' But how much of the nose on your face can you see, unless someone holds a mirror up to you?

It is the obvious which is so difficult to see most of the time. People say 'It's as plain as the nose on your face.' But how much of the nose on your face can you see, unless someone holds a mirror up to you?

Forget for a while that you have glasses on your nose and autumn in your heart.

Zo zijn we Chlebnikov kwijtgeraakt. (...) Hij was de enige in het eskadron met een samowar. Op stille dagen dronken we samen hete thee. We werden door eendere hartstochten gedreven. We keken allebei naar de wereld als naar een weiland in mei, een weiland waarover vrouwen lopen, en paarden.

What did our dear Joseph manage to see in life? Bupkis is what.

Voi sapete tutto. Ma a che vi serve, se avete sempre gli occhiali sul naso e l'autunno nell'anima?

Shuffling her manly feet, shaking her head, she listed off—at the top of her voice, for the whole street to hear—the names of women who were happy with their husbands.

A well-thought-out story doesn't need to resemble real life. Life itself tries with all its might to resemble a well-crafted story.

When I was a little boy, they called me a liar, but now that I am grown up, they call me a writer.

What a strange power there is in clothing.

If you want to go public with your opinions, then someone is going to judge you a moron. And there is always a risk that you may be.

You should always be taking pictures, if not with a camera then with your mind. Memories you capture on purpose are always more vivid than the ones you pick up by accident.

Competition only exists in your head, not in the marketplace.

Public speaking is only bad if your clothes don't fit correctly.

This is what I like about being a designer: You can't really get it until you see it.