Common Denominators Quotes

Democracy is fatal for the arts; it leads only to chaos or the achievement of new and lower common denominators of quality. ~ Walter Legge

I don't believe in lowest common denominators. Our focus has been on delivering value. We're rarely going to be the cheapest theater in a market. We strive to be the best. ~ Gerry Lopez

I try to make myself realize that I have learned the difference between right and wrong. That there is such a thing as right and wrong. But instead I've learned that these are things - this "right", this "wrong"- these are things that we are told. Simply told to believe. These are things we have not tested. And while most of the things we are told may be true, it is not until we have tested them, taunted them, flaunted them, that we truly know they are right. Or wrong. Or true. Or false. Or somewhere in-the-fucking-between. And I think I know now a little better which is which. And I also know I'll never quit testing this world. I'll never rely on common knowledge. Or common denominators. Or even common sense, for that matter. ~ Josh Kilmer-Purcell

Sometimes we need to look at everything going wrong in our lives and admit to ourselves, I am the only common denominator here. ~ Dan Pearce

All human beings face the same fundamental problems of loving and of suffering, of striving toward human aspirations for themselves and their children, of simply being and inevitably dying. These are the basic truths in all people, the common denominators of all cultures and all races and all ethnic categories. In ~ John Howard Griffin

The problem with a lot of people who read only literary fiction is that they assume fantasy is just books about orcs and goblins and dragons and wizards and bullshit. And to be fair, a lot of fantasy is about that stuff.

The problem with people in fantasy is they believe that literary fiction is just stories about a guy drinking tea and staring out the window at the rain while he thinks about his mother. And the truth is a lot of literary fiction is just that. Like, kind of pointless, angsty, emo, masturbatory bullshit.

However, we should not be judged by our lowest common denominators. And also you should not fall prey to the fallacious thinking that literary fiction is literary and all other genres are genre. Literary fiction is a genre, and I will fight to the death anyone who denies this very self-evident truth.

So, is there a lot of fantasy that is raw shit out there? Absolutely, absolutely, it's popcorn reading at best. But you can't deny that a lot of lit fic is also shit. 85% of everything in the world is shit. We judge by the best. And there is some truly excellent fantasy out there. For example, Midsummer Night's Dream; Hamlet with the ghost; Macbeth, ghosts and witches; I'm also fond of the Odyessey; Most of the Pentateuch in the Old Testament, Gargantua and Pantagruel.

Honestly, fantasy existed before lit fic, and if you deny those roots you're pruning yourself so closely that you can't help but wither and die. ~ Patrick Rothfuss

One of the common denominators I have found is that expectations rise above that which is expected. ~ George W. Bush

It's just a weird idea to me because each book is a complete universe unto itself, so why would I want this other universe from this other galaxy that has nothing to do with mine? That's how I really feel about it. Let's be honest - I'm still the writer, so certain things will be common denominators. But that I just want to keep natural and not studied. ~ Chang-rae Lee

I imagine you working on me as an algebra problem, reducing me to fractions, crossing out common denominators, until there's nothing left on the page but a line that says x = whatever it is that is wrong with me. ~ Patricia McCormick

Humility: The realization of our dependence on God. I have always had strong feelings about that word regardless of what anyone's background might be. One of the common denominators of greatness is acknowledging that dependence. As power comes from Charity, power also comes from knowing who you are, a divine offspring of a divine being. ~ Hyrum W. Smith

There are common denominators that unite all members of al-Nahda: There is no one in al-Nahda who doubts about Islam There is no one in al-Nahda that believes in extremist views of Islam. ~ Rashid Al-Ghannushi

The quest for this unwearied inner peace is constant and universal. Probe deeply into the teachings of Buddha, Maimonides, or a Kempis, and you will discover that they base their diverse doctrines on the foundations of a large spiritual serenity. Analyze the prayers of troubled, overborne mankind of all creeds, in every age - and their petitions come down to the irreducible common denominators of daily bread and inward peace. Grown men do not pray for vain trifles. When they lift up their hearts and voices in this valley of tears they ask for strength and courage and understanding. ~ Joshua Loth Liebman

To owe what you had not yet earned, to have to work to earn what you had already spent, was a personal diminishment, an insult to nature and common sense. ~ Wendell Berry

People working together in a strong community with a shared goal and a common purpose can make the impossible possible. ~ Tom Vilsack

The way Mom saw it, women should let menfolk do the work because it made them feel more manly. That notion only made sense if you had a strong man willing to step up and get things done, and between Dad's gimp, Buster's elaborate excuses, and Apache's tendency to disappear, it was often up to me to keep the place from falling apart. But even when everyone was pitching in, we never got out from under all the work. I loved that ranch, though sometimes it did seem that instead of us owning the place, the place owned us. ~ Jeannette Walls

There is no figure more common in scripture, and none more beautiful, than that by which Christ is likened unto light. Incomprehensible in its nature, itself the first visible, and that by which all things are seen, light represents to us Christ. Whose generation none can declare, but Who must shine upon us ere we can know aught aright, whether of things Divine or human. ~ Herman Melville

Four years ago, when I started writing this book, my hypothesis was mostly based on a hunch. I had been doing some research on university campuses and had begun to notice that many students I was meeting were preoccupied with the inroads private corporations were making into their public schools. They were angry that ads were creeping into cafeterias, common rooms, even washrooms; that their schools were diving into exclusive distribution deals with soft-drink companies and computer manufacturers, and that academic studies were starting to look more and more like market research. ~ Naomi Klein

It is always singular, but encouraging, to meet with common sense in very old books, as the Heetopades of Veeshnoo Sarma; a playful wisdom which has eyes behind as well as before, and oversees itself. It asserts their health and independence of the experience of later times. This pledge of sanity cannot be spared in a book, that it sometimes pleasantly reflect upon itself. ~ Henry David Thoreau

The uncommon man has done the impossible and there has been that much more light in the world because of it. Children respond to heroes by thinking creatively and sometimes in breaking beyond the bounds of the impossible in their turn, and so becoming heroes themselves. ~ Madeleine L'Engle

The whole idea of hobknobbing and schmoozing and the concept of an "elite" class of celebrities better than the common people has always made my stomach turn. ~ Bill Watterson

Ideas are not situated within the books we read – but within ourselves. That's why we consider many ideas to be evident once we read them. We read a book, and, after doing so, we consider what we read to be 'common sense'.

The expression of ideas, and not the ideas in themselves, is what we seek when reading books. Ideas are latent components of our soul – and the soul can hardly make an agreement with the brain to help language produce a refined and precise expression of those ideas. Those who succeed in making that agreement are the writers – the good writers. And we need to thank them – and we can automatically do so if we read their books. ~ Vizi Andrei

The world is like a sheet of paper on which something is typed. The reading and the meaning will vary with the reader, but the paper is the common factor, always present, rarely perceived. When the ribbon is removed, typing leaves no trace on the paper. So is my mind - the impressions keep on coming, but no trace is left. ~ Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Shaping the fourth industrial revolution to ensure that it is empowering and human-centered, rather than divisive and dehumanizing, is not a task for any single stakeholder or sector or for any one region, industry or culture. The fundamental and global nature of this revolution means it will affect and be influenced by all countries, economies, sectors and people. It is, therefore, critical that we invest attention and energy in multistakeholder cooperation across academic, social, political, national and industry boundaries. These interactions and collaborations are needed to create positive, common and hope-filled narratives, enabling individuals and groups from all parts of the world to participate in, and benefit from, the ongoing transformations. ~ Klaus Schwab

Common sense in reflecting on these subjects, I assured my friend with some warmth, is merely a stupid absence of imagination and mental flexibility. ~ H.P. Lovecraft

There is always this quarrel about what is preferable: the straight, naturalistic, epic storytelling or the modernistic, disjointed, slightly hermetic one. To me it does not matter, as long as it's good. I like both kinds. Although the common reader seems to prefer the first, which is to be expected, and who would blame her? ~ Per Petterson

London! the needy villain's general home, The common sewer of Paris and of Rome! With eager thirst, by folly or by fate, Sucks in the dregs of each corrupted state. ~ Samuel Johnson

I've worn dresses from all different price ranges, and the thing that couture dresses have in common is that the fit is amazing. ~ Beyonce Knowles

Leaders encourage others to continue the quest and inspire others through courage and hope. Leaders give heart by visibly recognizing others' contributions to the common vision. With a thank you note, a smile, an award, and public praise, the leader lets others know how much they mean to the organization. ~ James M. Kouzes

To dine with a glacier on a sunny day is a glorious thing and makes common feast of meat and wine ridiculous. The glacier eats hills and sunbeams. ~ John Muir

Come close to me baby. Let your love hold you. I know this world is crazy, but what's it without you? ~ Common

In the modern-day world, where time is premium and battle for subsistence is unimaginably tough, the hapless common man simply gives in and pays the bribe just to get on with life. ~ Shaffi Mather

The world is full of people who write poorly but passionately, and others who can put a sentence together but have no feeling behind it. All they have in common is that they don't give up when people say they're talentless hacks. And both of those types of writers have audiences. ~ Kameron Hurley

One common function of arguments about language is to stand in for arguments on subjects people are reluctant to broach more directly. ~ Deborah Cameron

The certainty of incoherence in reading, the inevitable crumbling of the soundest constructions, is the deep truth of books. Since appearance constitutes a limit, what truly exists is a dissolution into common opacity rather than a development of lucid thinking. The apparent unchangingness of books is deceptive: each book is also the sum of the misunderstandings it occasions. ~ Georges Bataille

Words like 'freedom', 'justice' and 'democracy' are not common concepts; on the contrary, they are rare. People are not born knowing what these are. It takes enormous, and above all, individual effort to arrive at the respect for other people that these words imply. ~ James A. Baldwin

People think common sense is common - but it's not. ~ Don Cherry

The existence of common features in different forms of life indicates some relationship between the different organisms, and according to the concept of evolution, these relations stem from the circumstance that the higher organisms, in the course of millions of years, have gradually evolved from simpler ones. ~ Hans Adolf Krebs

A desert lily need not turn jealous eyes toward the common violet. ~ Colleen Houck

Louisiana commenced her existence as a state under a code of laws differing from all the other states which were founded on the common law, in that its code, a new one, was founded mainly on the Civil Law and the Code Napoleon of France. ~ Samuel Freeman Miller

I'm not usually sold on epiphanies. I am more interested in the opposite experience: not those rare moments of startling insight or realization, but-what I suspect are more common-those sudden flashes of anxious confusion and bewilderment. ~ Robert Atwan

They were falling back into familiarity, into common ground, into the dirty gray. Just ordinary humans in ordinary opaque boiled-egg light, without grace, without revelation, composite of contradictions, easy principles, arguing about what they half believed in or even what they didn't believe in at all, desiring comfort as much as raw austerity, authenticity as much as playacting, desiring coziness of family as much as to abandon it forever. Cheese and chocolate they wanted, but also to kick all these bloody foreign things out. A wild daring love ... but also a rice and dal love blessed by the unexciting feel of everyday, its surprises safely enmeshed in something solidly familiar ... Every single contradiction history or opportunity might make available to them, every contradiction they were heir to, they desired. But only as much, of course, as they desired purity and a lack of contradiction. ~ Kiran Desai

In the face of our common dangers, in this wintr of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. ~ Barack Obama

I do not agree that ethics requires grounding in religious concepts or faith. Instead, I firmly believe that ethics can also emerge simply as a natural and rational response to our very humanity and our common human condition. ~ Dalai Lama XIV

Do not commit the error, common among the young, of assuming that if you cannot save the whole of mankind you have failed. ~ Jan De Hartog

It's unwise to pay too much, but it's worse to pay too little. When
you pay too much, you lose a little money - that's all. When you pay
too little, you sometimes lose everything, because the thing you
bought was incapable of doing the thing it was bought to do. The
common law of business balance prohibits paying a little and getting a
lot - it can't be done. If you deal with the lowest bidder, it is well
to add something for the risk you run, and if you do that you will
have enough to pay for something better. ~ John Ruskin

For we conceive it as the aim of a philosopher, as such, to do somewhat more than define and formulate the common normal opinions of mankind. His function is to tell men what they ought to think, rather than what they do think: he is expected to transcend Common Sense in his premises, and is allowed a certain divergence from Common Sense in his conclusions. It is true that the limits of this deviation are firmly, though indefinitely, fixed: the truth of a philosopher's premises will always be tested by the acceptability of his conclusions: if in any important point he be found in flagrant conflict with common opinion, his method is likely to be declared invalid. Still, though he is expected to establish and concatenate at least the main part of the commonly accepted moral rules, he is not necessarily bound to take them as the basis on which his own system is constructed. Rather, we should expect that the history of Moral Philosophy--so far at least as those whom we may call orthodox thinkers are concerned--would be a history of attempts to enunciate, in full breadth and clearness, those primary intuitions of Reason, by the scientific application of which the common moral thought of mankind may be at once systematized and corrected. ~ Henry Sidgwick

The most common sort of lie is that by which a man deceives himself: the deception of others is a relatively rare offense. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

The very nature of Joy makes nonsense of our common distinction between having and wanting. ~ C.S. Lewis

We desire more public space for secularism, space that would recognize secularism as a legitimate moral stance. But we simultaneously desire more religious freedom (which is not the same as advocating more religion)... We want the freedom not to be religious and the freedom to be religious differently... We think it's important for Americans to come to terms with th fact that Christianity, and often conservative Christianity, functions as the yardstick and measure of what counts as 'religion' and 'morality' in America... In short, for dissenting views to be heard currently, they have to speak the language of a consensus from which they are already excluded. The price of refusing to speak this common language is either not to be recognized at all or to be recognized only so as to be dismissed as an 'extremist. ~ Janet R. Jakobsen

Too much faith is the worst ally. When you believe in something literally, through your faith you'll turn it into something absurd. One who is a genuine adherent, if you like, of some political outlook, never takes its sophistries seriously, but only its practical aims, which are concealed beneath these sophistries. Political rhetoric and sophistries do not exist, after all, in order that they be believed; rather, they have to serve as a common and agreed upon alibi. Foolish people who take them in earnest sooner or later discover inconsistencies in them, begin to protest, and finish finally and infamously as heretics and apostates. No, too much faith never brings anything good ... ~ Milan Kundera

Truth, like climate, is common property. ~ Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward

The dominant feature of the later legislation has been this steady reduction of the status of the native, and, though the intention has been protective, legislation has now gone so far that it may well be asked what purpose or plan there is or what possible outcome there can be from a system that confines the native within a legal status that has more in common with that of a born idiot than of any other class of British subject. ~ Paul Hasluck

"Where the hell are you?" he snapped when I answered.
"You're back? Good. So how was - ?"
"You're not here."
"Because I'm supposed to be waiting by the gate?"
"You know what I mean. Simon said you went to talk to Tori, but you're not on the property, so I'm really hoping you're with her."
I glanced at Tori's back, a half mile away. "Kind of."
"She took off, didn't she? And you went after her, knowing you aren't supposed to leave the property unaccompanied."
"Tori needs - "
"Tori can look after herself."
"And I can't?"
A growl. He knew better than to answer. Despite my lack of defensive superpowers, I'd gotten myself - and Tori - out of plenty of scrapes. Sometimes, knowing you don't have the skills to fight can be a bonus. With Tori, overconfidence equals lack of caution and, yes, as Derek would say, common sense.
"I'm just going to talk to her," I said. "I'll bring her home - "
"No, you'll come back. Right now. That's an order."
"Well, in that case . . . no."
A louder growl.
"Seriously?" I said. "An order? Has that ever worked?"
He grumbled something I couldn't hear and probably didn't want to.
"I'm not kidding, Chloe. Stop running, turn around, and - "
"I'll be back as soon as I catch her. 'Kay? Bye." ~ Kelley Armstrong