For it is humanly certain that most of us remember very little of what we have read. To open almost any book a second time is to be reminded that we had forgotten well-nigh everything that the writer told us. Parting from the narrator and his narrative, we retain only a fading impression; and he, as it were, takes the book away from us and tucks it under his arm.
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Along your pathway of life you will observe that you are not the only traveler. There are others who need your help. There are feet to steady, hands to grasp, minds to encourage, hearts to inspire, and souls to save.
— Thomas S. Monson (via quotestuff)
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I still value hope, but I see it as only part of what’s required, a starting point. Think of it as the match but not the tinder or the blaze. To matter, to change the world, you also need devotion and will and you need to act.
— Rebecca Solnit on changing the world, “The Case for Hope, Continued.” (via utnereader)
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None of us can take back what we’ve done in the past, the most meaningful apology is how you live the rest of your life.
— Penny Beernsten, from “Being Wrong” by Kathryn Schulz
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There are days I want to track down God,
point to my life, and yell
“None of this was part of my Goddamn plan!”
But I know he’d just shrug and say, “I’m sorry.
I never meant to give the impression that this
would be easy. I know none of this
is easy.
But that’s why I invented time. It’s a slow,
steady promise. If you just hold on,
just white knuckle grip keep breathing,
time will take you far enough away
from anything. It’s a blessing.
It will heal you if you let it.
point to my life, and yell
“None of this was part of my Goddamn plan!”
But I know he’d just shrug and say, “I’m sorry.
I never meant to give the impression that this
would be easy. I know none of this
is easy.
But that’s why I invented time. It’s a slow,
steady promise. If you just hold on,
just white knuckle grip keep breathing,
time will take you far enough away
from anything. It’s a blessing.
It will heal you if you let it.
— Clementine von Radics
(via adderalldust)
The Only Known Photograph of Einstein Deriving his Famous E=mc2 Equation
At a public lecture in Pittsburgh in 1934, four hundred lucky students were privy to a lecture by Albert Einstein, in which the great man mathematically derived his famous mass-energy equivalence equation: E=mc2. What you see above is a photo from that lecture, and what is thought to be the only surviving photo that shows Einstein working on that derivation.
The photo was pulled from a halftone newspaper clipping by David Topper and Dwight Vincent of the University of Winnipeg, who discovered it in 2007. Sadly, everything is a bit fuzzy so you can’t really make out the famed equation itself. And even though the original article had a crisp picture of Einstein posing next to one of his blackboards, he’s next to the wrong one.
Here’s a closer look at the man and the math. If you look closely, you’ll see the mass-energy equivalence in the lower left hand corner of the blackboard on the right:
Fortunately, Topper and Vincent managed to take the blurry photo and reproduce both blackboards in their original paper. Here’s the math behind the magic, the derivation of mass-energy equivalence as presented by Albert Einstein.
In case you’re wondering why the famous equation says Δ
wow, known the facts behind this takes my breath away. epic nerdry at work for me right now.
The books that will move you, inspire you, make you cry, make you think, make you laugh. Are there any books that you would add?
Perfect
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Look for the remedy inside the pain.
because the rose came from the thorn
and the ruby came from a stone.’
because the rose came from the thorn
and the ruby came from a stone.’
— Rumi
Xu Bing, A Book From the Sky, 1987. Installation at Chazen Museum of Art, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 1991. Moveable-type prints and books.
Xu trained as a printmaker in Beijing. A Book From the Sky, with its invented Chinese woodblock characters, may be a stinging critique of the meaninglessness of contemporary political language.
