The one thing that unifies men in a given age is not their individual philosophies but the dominant problem that these philosophies are designed to solve.
Jacques Barzun (1907-2012) French-American historian, educator, polymath
Romanticism and the Modern Ego, ch. 1 (1943)
(Source)
Quotations about:
adaptation
Note not all quotations have been tagged, so Search may find additional quotes on this topic.
Let not these things thy least concern engage;
For though thou fret, they will not mind thy rage.
Him only good and happy we may call
Who rightly useth what doth him befall.
[τοῖς πράγμασιν γὰρ οὐχὶ θυμοῦσθαι χρεών:
μέλει γὰρ αὐτοῖς οὐδέν: ἀλλ᾽ οὑντυγχάνων
τὰ πράγματ᾽ ὀρθῶς ἂν τιθῇ, πράσσει καλῶς]Euripides (485?-406? BC) Greek tragic dramatist
Bellerophon [Βελλεροφῶν], frag. 287 (TGF) (c. 430 BC) [Morgan (1718)]
(Source)
Quoted in Plutarch, "De Tranquilitate Animi [On the Contentedness of the Mind]," sec. 4. (467a). Nauck frag. 287, Barnes frag. 132, Musgrave frag. 24.
(Source (Greek)). Alternate translations:Nor ought we to be angry at Events;
For they our anger heed not: but the man
Who best to each emergency adapts
His conduct, will assuredly act right.
[tr. Wodhull (1809)]Events will take their course, it is no good
Our being angry at them; he is happiest
Who wisely turns them to the best account.
[tr. Shilleto (1888), frag. 298]It does no good to rage at circumstance;
Events will take their course with no regard
For us. but he who makes the best of those
Events he lights upon will not fare ill.
[tr. Helmbold (1939)]There is no point in getting angry at circumstances. They are uncaring, utterly unconcerned.
But a man who responds to them in the right way, he fares well.
[tr. Stevens (2012)]One should not get angry with affairs, for they show no concern; but if a man handles affairs correctly as he encounters them, he fares well.
[tr. Collard, Hargreaves, Cropp (1995)]
When life hands you lemons, make whiskey sours.
W. C. Fields (1880-1946) American entertainer [b. William Claude Dukenfield]
(Attributed)
While attributed to Fields, possibly on a radio show, there is no documentation to indicate he ever actually said it.
More exploration of other references: The Big Apple: “When life gives you lemons, make a whiskey sour. For God’s sake, we’re adults now, people”.
Adapt or perish, now as ever, is Nature’s inexorable imperative.
H.G. Wells (1866-1946) British writer [Herbert George Wells]
Mind at the End of Its Tether, ch. 4 “Recent Realizations of the Nature of Life” (1945)
(Source)
The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance.
Alan Watts (1915-1973) Anglo-American philosopher, writer
The Wisdom of Insecurity: A Message for an Age of Anxiety, ch. 3 (1951)
(Source)
The values to which people cling most stubbornly under inappropriate conditions are those values that were previously the source of their greatest triumphs.
Jared Diamond (b. 1937) American geographer, historian, ornithologist, author
Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed, ch. 8 (2005)
(Source)
What we need to do is always lean into the future; when the world changes around you and when it changes against you — what used to be a tail wind is now a head wind — you have to lean into that and figure out what to do, because complaining isn’t a strategy.
Jeff Bezos (b. 1964) American business magnate, entrepreneur, investor
Interview, ABC News (25 Sep 2013)
(Source)
I often say that research is a way of finding out what you are going to do when you can’t keep on doing what you are doing now.
Charles F. Kettering (1876-1958) American inventor, engineer, researcher, businessman
“Industrial Prospecting,” Speech, Founder Societies of Engineers (20 May 1935)
