Quotes About Interpretation

The wolfish horror of the worst scriptural verses is cloaked under various forms of sheep's clothing: the words are not meant to be taken literally, they are 'metaphorical'.

the behaviour of an individual may not always be interpretable as designed to maximize its own genetic welfare: it may be maximizing somebody else's genetic welfare, in this case that of a parasite inside it.

Some people have views of God that are so broad and flexible that it is inevitable that they will find God wherever they look for him. One hears it said that 'God is the ultimate' or 'God is our better nature' or 'God is the universe.' Of course, like any other word, the word 'God' can be given any meaning we like. If you want to say that 'God is energy,' then you can find God in a lump of coal.

David Deutsch, in The Fabric of Reality, embraces the 'many worlds' interpretation of quantum theory

And, for speakers of Arabic and Indian languages, knowledge of the Qur'an or the Bhagavad Gita is presumably just as essential for full appreciation of their literary heritage.

A. N. Wilson in Jesus and Robin Lane Fox in The Unauthorized Version (among

Human suffering has been caused because too many of us cannot grasp that words are only tools for our use, and that the mere presence in the dictionary of a word like 'living' does not mean it necessarily has to refer to something definite in the real world. Whether

J. Anderson Thomson, bir evrimsel psikiyatristin bak?? aç?s?yla bunun için bana baÅŸka bir sebep gösterir: Hepimizin sahip olduÄŸu, cans?z nesneleri sanki birer ajanlarm?? gibi kiÅŸiselleÅŸtirmeye olan psikolojik eÄŸilimimiz. Thomson'un söylediÄŸi üzere, bir gölgeyi h?rs?z sanmaya, bir h?rs?z? gölge sanmaktan daha yatk?n?zd?r.

Arta reprezentationala de toate tipurile (si, probabil, arta non-reprezentationala de asemenea) depinde de observatia ca un lucru poate tine locul altuia si ca aceasta substitutie poate fi utila pentru gandire sau comunicare.

Problems arise when (especially) theologians use such metaphorical language without realizing that that is what they are doing, and without even realizing that there is a distinction between metaphor and reality – saying something like: 'It is not important whether Jesus really fed the five thousand. What matters is what the idea of the story means to us.' Actually it is important, because millions of devout people do believe the Bible is literally true.

wanted to believe the Darwinian idea. I chose to believe it not because I think there was enormous evidence for it, nor because it had the full authority to give interpretation to my origins, but I chose to believe it because it delivered me from trying to find meaning and freed me to my own erotic passions.

But sometimes things are said and they're not just words. They are everything that one person thinks of another in a sentence. Just one sentence.

Maybe he doesn't really think it now. But sometimes things are said and they're not just words. They are everything that one person thinks of another in a sentence. Just one sentence.

panegyrics of a man they had never understood

I had begun with the comforting conclusion that books are the tongue of divine wisdom, and had ended only with the thin hunch that all books are grand follies, destined forever to be misunderstood.

There was no meaning in it, not then and now now, but you can't write that, can you?

I believe in what you see being most of what there is, as I've taught my students, and that life's passed along to us empty. So, while significance weighs heavy, that's the most it does. Hidden meaning is all but absent.

My greatest human flaw and strength, not surprisingly, is that I can always imagine anything—a marriage, a conversation, a government—as being different from how it is, a trait that might make one a top-notch trial lawyer or novelist or realtor, but that also seems to produce a somewhat less than reliable and morally feasible human being.)

Explaining is where we all get into trouble.

Sometimes, when people in the South tell you to have a blessed day, it means fuck you and I hope you have a nice time in hell.

the tongues of men are not much leashed by concerns for accuracy or truth.

From a legal point of view—" He shook his head. "Forget the law. It isn't going to help. They'll cite it where it suits them, ignore it where it doesn't. They're clerics, Archeth. They spend their whole fucking lives selectively interpreting textual authority to advantage.

who knows how the data behind these metaphors has traveled, from where and for how long.

We consider the underlying fallacy of the plaintiff's argument to consist in the assumption that the enforced separation of the two races stamps the colored race with a badge of inferiority. If this be so, it is not by reason of anything found in the act, but solely because the colored race chooses to put that construction upon it.