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complexity quotes

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“Know how complicated it is and then state it simply.” Ernest Hemingway, The Garden of Eden
“We must never forget that human motives are generally far more complicated than we are apt to suppose, and that we can very rarely accurately describe the motives of another.” Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Idiot
“Too large a proportion of recent 'mathematical' economics are merely concoctions, as imprecise as the initial assumptions they rest on, which allow the author to lose sight of the complexities and interdependencies of the real world in a maze of...” John Maynard Keynes, The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money
“Because complexity inhibits flexibility, early choices are especially crucial.” Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy
“Complex ideas may, perhaps, be well known by definition, which is nothing but an enumeration of those parts or simple ideas, that compose them.” David Hume, An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding
“The madly complicated modern world was something I took little interest in. It had no relevancy, no weight.” Bob Dylan, Chronicles, Volume One
“I adore simple pleasures. They are the last refuge of the complex.” Oscar Wilde, A Woman of No Importance
“The truth is rarely pure and never simple.” Oscar Wilde, The Importance of Being Earnest
“The living bird is not its labelled bones.” Margaret Atwood, The Blind Assassin
“It is merely because a stepping-stone, here and there, is heedlessly left unsupplied in our road to the Differential Calculus, that this latter is not altogether as simple a thing as a sonnet by Mr. Solomon Seesaw.” Edgar Allan Poe, Eureka
“If you need more than 3 levels of indentation, you're screwed anyway, and should fix your program.” Linus Torvalds
“The modern world would grind to a halt if there weren't men with enough advanced training to keep the complicated parts of civilization working smoothly.” Kurt Vonnegut, Player Piano
“Busy, busy, busy, is what we Bokononists whisper whenever we think of how complicated and unpredictable the machinery of life really is.” Kurt Vonnegut, Cat's Cradle
“It is no use trying to sum people up.” Virginia Woolf, Jacob's Room
“we humans have never been able to replicate something more complicated than what we ourselves are, yet natural selection did it without even thinking.” Linus Torvalds
“It does not follow that a deep, intricate character is more or less estimable than such a one as yours.” Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice
“'it depends' is almost always the right answer in any big question.” Linus Torvalds
“The mind is a complex and many-layered thing, Potter... or at least, most minds are.” J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
“A proposition must be plain to be adopted by the understanding of a people. A false notion which is clear and precise will always meet with a greater number of adherents in the world than a true principle which is obscure or involved.” Alexis de Tocqueville, Democracy in America

Related topics

simplicity truth motive life knowledge mind dirtiness programming people mathematics choice poetry pleasure evolution logic civilization chaos ideas flexibility question

Related authors

Linus Torvalds (3)
Oscar Wilde (2)
Kurt Vonnegut (2)
Ernest Hemingway (1)
Fyodor Dostoyevsky (1)
Jane Austen (1)
Virginia Woolf (1)
John Maynard Keynes (1)
J. K. Rowling (1)
Edgar Allan Poe (1)
Margaret Atwood (1)
Henry Kissinger (1)
Bob Dylan (1)
Alexis de Tocqueville (1)
David Hume (1)

Related sources

The Garden of Eden (1)
The Idiot (1)
A Woman of No Importance (1)
The Importance of Being Earnest (1)
Pride and Prejudice (1)
Democracy in America (1)
The Blind Assassin (1)
An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (1)
Diplomacy (1)
Chronicles, Volume One (1)
Player Piano (1)
Eureka (1)
The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money (1)
Cat's Cradle (1)
Jacob's Room (1)