So how, children, does the brain, which lives without a spark of light, build for us a world full of light?
Interpretation
The brain creates perception and understanding of the world despite lacking direct sensory input.
This quote emphasizes the power of the human brain to construct a vivid and complex understanding of the world, even in the absence of direct sensory information. It speaks to the imaginative capability of our minds to interpret reality and create meaning, highlighting the essence of human consciousness and perception.
In practice
Using this quote in a discussion about the nature of consciousness and creativity in a philosophy class.
The easier an experience, or the more entrenched, or the more familiar, the fainter our sensation of it becomes. This is true of chocolate and marriages and hometowns and narrative structures. Complexities wane, miracles become unremarkable, and if we're not careful, pretty soon we're gazing out at our lives as if through a burlap sack.
Anyone who has spent a few nights in a tent during a storm can tell you: The world doesn't care all that much if you live or die.
I used to think...that I had to be careful with how much I lived. As if life was a pocketful of coins. You only got so much and you didn't want to spend it all in one place...But now I know that life is the one thing in the world that never runs out. I might run out of mine, and you might run out of yours, but the world will never run out of life. And we're all very lucky to be part of something like that.
Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience--buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello--become new all over again.
I don't believe in reincarnation. I feel like we're here for such an appallingly brief period of time. I believe we each get this one trip, and if we're really, really fortunate, maybe we get 70 or 80 years on Earth.
My sister-in-law is a painter, and I'll say, how long did it take you to paint that painting. She'll say, It took me maybe three days, but it took me all my life to get the skills to paint that painting.
Because something or someone looks or acts differently from us does not necessarily mean that it is ugly or bad.
And yet the true creator is necessity, which is the mother of invention.
I am a spy in the house of me. I report back from the front lines of the battle that is me. I am somewhat nonplused by the event that is my life.
The world changed from having the determinism of a clock to having the contingency of a pinball machine.
If the opponent offers keen play I don't object; but in such cases I get less satisfaction, even if I win, than from a game conducted according to all the rules of strategy with its ruthless logic.
Every possession and every happiness is but lent by chance for an uncertain time, and may therefore be demanded back the next hour.
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