War is bestowed like electroshock on the depressive nation: thousands of volts jolting the system, an artificial galvanizing, one effect of which is loss of memory. War comes… as absolute failure of imagination, scientific and political. That a war can be represented as helping a people to "feel good" about themselves, their country, is a measure of that failure.

About Adrienne Rich

Adrienne Cecile Rich (; May 16, 1929 – March 27, 2012) was an American poet, essayist and feminist. She was called "one of the most widely read and influential poets of the second half of the 20th century", and was credited with bringing "the oppression of women and lesbians to...

More quotations from Adrienne Rich

The worker can unionize, go out on strike; mothers are divided from each other in homes, tied to their children by compassionate bonds; our wildcat strikes have most often taken the form of physical or mental breakdown.

—Adrienne Rich

I know of no woman—virgin, mother, lesbian, married, celibate, whether she earns her keep as a housewife, a cocktail waitress, or a scanner of brain waves—for whom the body is not a fundamental problem: its clouded meanings, its fertility, its desire, its so-called frigidity, its bloody speech, its silences, its changes and mutilations, its rapes and ripenings.

—Adrienne Rich

women self-image body problems

O you who love clear edges more than anything… watch the edges that blur.

—Adrienne Rich

When someone with the authority of a teacher, say, describes the world and you are not in it, there is a moment of psychic disequilibrium, as if you looked into a mirror and saw nothing. Yet you know you exist and others like you, that this is a game done with mirrors. It takes some strength of soul—and not just individual strength, but collective understanding—to resist this void… and to stand up, demanding to be seen and heard.

—Adrienne Rich

Lying is done with words, and also with silence.

—Adrienne Rich in Women and Honor

silence speech lying honor

More quotations tagged with “science”

In wilderness I sense the miracle of life, and behind it our scientific accomplishments fade to trivia.

—Charles Lindbergh

life accomplishment science wilderness trivia

Whenever you hear the consensus of scientists agrees on something or other, reach for your wallet, because you're being had.

—Michael Crichton

science money agreement being fooled

There is no other species on the Earth that does science. It is, so far, entirely a human invention, evolved by natural selection in the cerebral cortex for one simple reason: it works. It is not perfect. It can be misused. It is only a tool. But it is by far the best tool we have, self-correcting, ongoing, applicable to everything. It has two rules. First: there are no sacred truths; all assumptions must be critically examined; arguments from authority are worthless. Second: whatever is inconsistent with the facts must be discarded or revised. We must understand the Cosmos as it is and not confuse how it is with how we wish it to be.

—Carl Sagan in Cosmos

science earth tools brains

The suppression of uncomfortable ideas may be common in religion and politics, but it is not the path to knowledge; it has no place in the endeavor of science.

—Carl Sagan in Cosmos

politics religion learning knowledge censorship science suppression

Skeptical scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep insights can be winnowed from deep nonsense.

—Carl Sagan

religion science doubt nonsense skepticism insight

History

23 Nov 2014 Added
26 Oct 2026 Wording changed

Previous wording

War is bestowed like electroshock on the depressive nation: thousands of volts jolting the system, an artificial galvanizing, one effect of which is loss of memory. War comes . . . as absolute failure of imagination, scientific and political. That a war can be represented as helping a people to "feel good" about themselves, their country, is a measure of that failure.