Craig Venter: on the verge of creating synthetic life

“A teacher who communicates to his students nothing but the syllabus laid down by the authorities, using methods he has learnt at the teachers’ training college, can be compared to a dispenser of pills made up according to prescription, who can never be a true physician.” Johannes Itten, Design and Form

Rob Hopkins: Transition to a world without oil

“Da Shealladh. It means the two sights. Both this and the otherworld. The steeple and the darkness against which steeple stands in all its delusive certainty.” Read the entire post by Martin Edmond about second sight.

Intuition is the art of making right conclusions from wrong premises.

“Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one getting burned.” Buddha

“Many pieces of weak writing suffer more from writer’s not having really consented, deep down, to give her meaning than from whatever lack of skill she may have.” Peter Elbow, Writing with Power

When we groundlessly assume that the behaviour of our neighbours is based on their goals, we just bring to the world one more pile of trash. In fact, people never know with full certitude what are their goals and why they live at all. They are just as much unprotected, even helpless sometimes, as they succeeded in getting rid of stereotypes.

People undervalue the power of everyday places. There are a few quiet places I owe the best finds of my mind, and all of them look like but usual places. I think that the key to thinking is repetition, not novelty of impressions. When we are used to think at the same place, our thinking power grows, because we use that place as a container for our thoughts — we can easily start where we left off.