The Notes

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====== Favourite Quotes ======
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Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly.
<cite>Martin Luther King Jr</cite>
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"One could not be a successful scientist without realising that, in contrast to popular conception supported by newspapers and mother of scientists, a goodly number of scientists are not only narrow-minded and dull, but also just stupid." <cite>James D. Watson</cite>
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"Peace will come to the world when the people have enough to eat." <cite>Momofuku Ando</cite>
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"The epitome of strategy isn't winning every battle, but winning without fighting." <cite>Sun Tzu, The Art of War</cite>
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"They say that to do injustice is, by nature, good; to suffer injustice, evil; but that the evil is greater than the good. And so when men have both done and suffered injustice and have had experience of both, not being able to avoid the one and obtain the other, they think that they had better agree among themselves to have neither; hence there arise laws and mutual covenants; and that which is ordained by law is termed by them lawful and just. This they affirm to be the origin and nature of justice; --it is a mean or compromise, between the best of all, which is to do injustice and not be punished, and the worst of all, which is to suffer injustice without the power of retaliation; and justice, being at a middle point between the two, is tolerated not as a good, but as the lesser evil, and honoured by reason of the inability of men to do injustice. For no man who is worthy to be called a man would ever submit to such an agreement if he were able to resist; he would be mad if he did. Such is the received account, Socrates, of the nature and origin of justice. " <cite>Glaucon</cite>
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If it's a good idea, go ahead and do it. It is much easier to apologize than it is to get permission.
<cite>Rear Admiral Grace Hopper</cite>
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Leadership is a matter of intelligence, trustworthiness, humaneness, courage, and discipline ... Reliance on intelligence alone results in rebelliousness. Exercise of humaneness alone results in weakness. Fixation on trust results in folly. Dependence on the strength of courage results in violence. Excessive discipline and sternness in command result in cruelty. When one has all five virtues together, each appropriate to its function, then one can be a leader.
<cite>
Sun Tzu
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"This so demoralized a lot of his women co-workers that many stayed home from work on Monday."

This right here is a problem and it sort of reinforces the notion that some people (be they women, liberals, Christians, immigrants, whatever) are so fragile that they cannot abide people around them who think differently.

I teach at a Midwestern university. Last fall after Trump won the election I read about how students at some universities were so overwhelmed by the Trump victory that their professors delayed or canceled exams, that the school had cry ins, and other such nonsense.

What I told my students was that regardless of who you supported, half of the country was terribly disappointed the morning after the election, but that life goes on. The cows still have to get milked, the news papers have to be delivered, the Starbucks have to be open for business, students have to be taught, etc. We have to encourage people to be more resilient, not less.

I come from an immigrant family. My parents didn't sit around and cry when something didn't go their way or someone said something impolite to them. They put on their big boy/big girl pants and worked that much harder. The state of society today has me frequently asking how we become so weak minded.
<cite>
https://tech.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=10964839&cid=54964677
</cite>
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Dad taught us that public service is noble and necessary; that one can serve with integrity and hold true to the important values, like faith and family. He strongly believed that it was important to give back to the community and country in which one lived. He recognized that serving others enriched the giver’s soul. To us, his was the brightest of a thousand points of light.

In victory, he shared credit. When he lost, he shouldered the blame. He accepted that failure is part of living a full life, but taught us never to be defined by failure. He showed us how setbacks can strengthen.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/05/us/politics/george-w-bush-eulogy.html
<cite>
George W. Bush
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Divide each difficulty into as many parts as is feasible and necessary to resolve it.
<cite>Rene Descartes</cite>
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