Listen, three eyes," he said, "don't you try to outweird me, I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal.
Douglas AdamsRead
Why are people born? Why do they die? Why do they want to spend so much of the intervening time wearing digital watches?
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote questions the purpose of life and the trivial pursuits people engage in.
Douglas Adams provokes thought about human existence by questioning the significance of our birth and death, while simultaneously highlighting the distractions we choose to immerse ourselves in, such as the obsession with technology and material possessions. The mention of 'digital watches' symbolizes a preoccupation with time and a frantic pace of life that may detract from understanding our true purpose.
Themes
PurposeExistenceLifeDeathDistractionTechnology
In practice
Example use cases
Using this quote in a philosophical discussion about the meaning of life.
More from Douglas Adams
All quotes β"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?" "Ask a glass of water."
Douglas AdamsRead
Protect me from knowing what I don't need to know. Protect me from even knowing that there are things to know that I don't know. Protect me from knowing that I decided not to know about the things that I decided not to know about. Amen. [...] Lord, lord, lord. Protect me from the consequences of the above prayer.
Douglas AdamsRead
Computers are still technology because we are still wrestling with it: it's still being invented; we're still trying to work out how it works. There's a world of game interaction to come that you or I wouldn't recognise. It's time for the machines to disappear. The computer's got to disappear into all of the things we use.
Douglas AdamsRead
What the computer in virtual reality enables us to do is to recalibrate ourselves so that we can start seeing those pieces of information that are invisible to us but have become important for us to understand.
Douglas AdamsRead
We are stuck with technology when all we really want is just stuff that works. How do you recognize something that is still technology? A good clue is if it comes with a manual.
Douglas AdamsRead
Similar quotes
If the whole earth is infinitely small in comparison with the sphere of the stars, what is man compared with all these created beings!
MaimonidesRead
Our emphasis here is based not only on the growing seriousness of drug-related crimes, but also on the belief that relieving our police and our courts from having to fight losing battles against drug use will enable their energies and facilities to be devoted more fully to combating other forms of crime.
Milton FriedmanRead
Like the appearance of silver in mother of pearl, the world seems real until the Self, the underlying reality, is realized.
Adi ShankaraRead
The forgiveness of God is one thing, but the proof that we want that forgiveness is the energy we expend to make amends for the wrong.
Fulton J. SheenRead
Saints cannot arise where there have been no warriors, nor philosophers where a prying beast does not remain hidden in the depths.
George SantayanaRead
The Almighty has His own purposes.
Abraham LincolnRead