Keep on the lookout for novel ideas that others have used successfully. Your idea has to be original only in its adaptation to the problem you're working on.
Thomas A. EdisonRead
Nature is what we know. We do not know the gods of religions. And nature is not kind, or merciful, or loving. If God made me - the fabled God of the three qualities of which I spoke: mercy, kindness, love - He also made the fish I catch and eat. And where do His mercy, kindness, and love for that fish come in? No; nature made us - nature did it all - not the gods of the religions.
Interpretation
This quote emphasizes that nature is the fundamental reality we understand, contrasting it with the qualities ascribed to deities in various religions.
Edison argues that the essence of existence and the laws of nature govern our lives, rather than any divine benevolence attributed to religious gods. He illustrates the often harsh realities of nature and questions the concepts of mercy, kindness, and love when applied to both humans and the natural world, suggesting that nature itself, rather than a religious deity, is responsible for existence and life.
In practice
In a philosophy class discussing the nature of existence.
Keep on the lookout for novel ideas that others have used successfully. Your idea has to be original only in its adaptation to the problem you're working on.
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Genius is not inspired. Inspiration is perspiration.
I didn't fail 1000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1000 steps.
There is no substitute for hard work.
But there are some situations of the human mind in which good sense has very little power.
Nothing teaches us about the preciousness of the Creator as much as when we learn the emptiness of everything else.
I know, my dear Watson, that you share my love of all that is bizarre and outside the conventions and humdrum routine of daily life.
The fact that one can lose one's sense of self in an ocean of tranquility does not mean that one's consciousness is immaterial or that it presided over the birth of the universe.
He has come to the most dreadful conclusion a literary man can come to, the conclusion that the ordinary view is the right one. It is only the last and wildest kind of courage that can stand on a tower before ten thousand people and tell them that twice two is four.
The interior deprives men of their senses. Here, the eerie stillness of the wilderness and the darkness of night render the men both deaf and blind. Without eyes or ears, they have no frame of reference-and without a frame of reference, they have no clear identities.
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