User:Ed Poor/Thoughts and mottoes

Thoughts
The order of existence in the universe is rooted in acting for the sake of others. The world of true peace, true love and the true ideal is both the ideal of God's creation and the desire of humankind. Therefore, the origin of happiness and peace lies in living for the sake of others.

Samuel Johnson said, "The English dictionary was written with little assistance of the learned, and without any patronage of the great; not in the soft obscurities of retirement, or under the shelter of academic bowers, but amidst inconvenience and distraction, in sickness and in sorrow." —A Dictionary of the English Language (1775), Preface

In gift cultures, social status is determined not by what you control but by what you give away.

Let's put it to a vote: what's the best way to determine consensus at Wikipedia?

There is no voting at Wikipedia; everything is determined by consensus.

Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, cannot long retain it. --Abraham Lincoln

"Who's more emotional, men or women? Contrary to popular belief, I think men are much more emotional than women. ... I think men have emotion that runs deeper than oceans. We hold them in, (we must) and we confront them in private, in our rooms, in our sleep, in our car, in our MUSIC. Music can BREAK a man in half. Tear him down to a child. Sitting on the floor, crying, listening to those beautiful melodies, wanting love, wanting to give love, share love, feel, feel, feel. Women like to dance to music, and have beautiful rhythm, but I've never met one where the music could kill them. Where the music was EVERYTHING. Where music had the power to strip them of walls and masks. For my male friends, music saves them. It purges them of deep desperation and anguish in this idiotic world where men can't cry." --SurferMoon

Live for the sake of others. Give, and forget the given gift. --Sun Myung Moon

"I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong." --Frederick Douglass

In God’s sight, skin color makes no difference. God does not stand behind the barriers of religion and culture. They are nothing more than the Devil’s tricks. He has used them to rule over humanity as a false parent for tens of thousands of years. 

What is a life of true love? True love is the spirit of public service. It brings the peace that is at the root of happiness. The essence of true love is to give, to live for the sake of others and for the sake of the whole. True love gives, forgets that it has given, and continues to give without ceasing. True love gives joyfully. 

True love is the wellspring of the universe. Once a person possesses it, true love makes him or her the center and the owner of the universe.

"Love doesn't have a point. Love is the point." - Alan Moore

In the Middle East, one of the world’s tinderboxes, Jews, Christians and Muslims have found the resources in my philosophy of peace to engage in a new dimension of dialogue. In past decades my Unification Thought played a decisive role in ending the Cold War. Now I am successfully leading behind-the-scenes efforts to bring about the reunification of my homeland of Korea. --Rev. Moon

In this age, war is a most primitive and destructive means of resolving conflict, and will never lead to lasting peace. Now is the time, as the prophet Isaiah taught, to beat our swords into ploughshares and spears into pruning hooks. Why must we continue this tragic path, pouring countless dollars into wars that, in the end, will never bring the reconciliation of enemies? The time has come for the countries of the world to pool their resources and advance toward the world of peace desired by God, the Master of this great universe.  --Rev. Moon

Ralph Johnson taught me an important lesson about research: if someone (a reviewer of a paper, an attendee at a talk) comments "I don't understand" or just doesn't get it, it's our fault. It is our responsibility to work hard to develop and communicate our ideas. --William Opdyke

If everyone were in control of his appetites, there would be no need for the government to be involved in endorsing some sexual relationships while withholding endorsement from others. The more society undermines ancient standards of moral conduct, the harder it becomes to withstand temptation. This is why gay marriage threatens heterosexual marriage. When the awe in which people once held matrimony is diluted, by treating it as a man-made and thus amendable institution rather than a divinely determined one, heterosexuals find sexual sins of all sorts harder to resist.

You can't make people be good: they've got to be coaxed, not coerced. It's a process of education. People need mentors and coaches.

"Slow and steady wins the race." - moral of The Tortoise and the Hare by Aesop

We affirm governance when it is participatory, transparent, fair, and aimed toward an end that is not merely self-centered, but which seeks to benefit a wide range of stakeholders. On the other hand, we reject systems of governance that benefit only the few, which are corrupt, and aimed toward self-serving ends.

The human being is a complex being. We are at once, biological, psychological, moral, spiritual, individual and relational. Happiness or fulfillment is related to all of the above. Therefore, when we think of human development it is essential that we have a comprehensive understanding of the human being.

God did not create the world randomly, but according to several core principles that we see manifested in all things. One of the most basic is the “pair system.” That is, God created all things to exist in relationship, according to a pair system. The “pair system,” for example, underlies the fact that all species and all entities are made up of male and female aspects; both of which are absolutely essential.

When we think about conflict resolution, we should recognize that we are talking about healing, repairing or restoring a broken partnership or relationship between subject and object. The broken partnership can be between a husband and a wife, a boss and the employee, a Muslim and a Hindu, or Israel and Palestine. Peace-building, and even human development, is ultimately about establishing correct, constructive, mutually beneficial relationships.

Each entity that exists has a dual purpose, one being its own individual purpose for existence, well-being and fulfillment. At the same time, however, each entity or being is related to a larger purpose. The two “dual purposes” are the “purpose of the individual” and the “purpose of the whole.”

The great success principle, the single idea that explains human destiny is simple. It says that, "you become what you think about, most of the time."

"Thoughts are the most real things in the universe." -- Thorby Baslim in Citizen of the Galaxy

The current brutal realities that exist can be resolved through serious, methodical application of key universal principles of human reconciliation and restoration grounded in a profound understanding of the root causes of conflict and violence.

''Aim for success, not perfection. Never give up your right to be wrong, because then you will lose the ability to learn new things and move forward with your life.'' --Dr. David M. Burns

"I am neither especially clever nor especially gifted. I am only very, very curious." (attributed to Albert Einstein)

"Naturally, I think I'm right, but as I have already proven to you, I make mistakes like the next man. In fact, being - forgive me - rather cleverer than most men, my mistakes tend to be correspondingly huger." -- Dumbledore

If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them. -Isaac Asimov

In my heart of hearts, I'm an engineer, and what makes me happy is building something that works and having someone use it. That's cool. --James Gosling--Ed Poor

See you next month! --Ed Poor

Mottoes
I love Shawn's quote from Hosni Mubarak that foreign aid is taking money from the poor of rich countries and giving it to the rich of poor countries.

"I have never had a feeling politically that did not spring from the sentiments embodied in the Declaration of Independence."

I shall try to correct errors where shown to be errors, and I shall adopt new views as fast as they shall appear to be true views.

"Let us have faith that right makes might, and in that faith, let us, to the end, dare to do our duty as we understand it."

"I believe it is an established maxim in morals that he who makes an assertion without knowing whether it is true or false, is guilty of falsehood; and the accidental truth of the assertion, does not justify or excuse him."

"If I were to try to read, much less answer, all the attacks made on me, this shop might as well be closed for any other business. I do the very best I know how - the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right, what's said against me won't amount to anything. If the end brings me out wrong, ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference."

"Towering genius distains a beaten path. It seeks regions hitherto unexplored."

"A capacity, and taste, for reading, gives access to whatever has already been discovered by others. It is the key, or one of the keys, to the already solved problems. And not only so. It gives a relish, and facility, for successfully pursuing the [yet] unsolved ones."

"The will of God prevails. In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be, wrong."

"Forget about all the reasons why something may not work. You only need to find one good reason why it will."

"Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it."