Critically Quotes

Donald Saari uses a combination of stories and questions to challenge students to think critically about calculus. "When I finish this process," he explained, "I want the students to feel like they have invented calculus and that only some accident of birth kept them from beating Newton to the punch." In essence, he provokes them into inventing ways to find the area under the curve, breaking the process into the smallest concepts (not steps) and raising the questions that will Socratically pull them through the most difficult moments. Unlike so many in his discipline, he does not simply perform calculus in front of the students; rather, he raises the questions that will help them reason through the process, to see the nature of the questions and to think about how to answer them. "I want my students to construct their own understanding," he explains, "so they can tell a story about how to solve the problem. ~ Ken Bain

Proper worship in any age is critically predicated upon adequate and accurate knowledge of the God worshiped. No matter how ceremonially elaborate, emotionally rousing, or sermonically eloquent, worship that is not offered from a proper understanding of who God is falls short. ~ Andreas J. Kostenberger

...[H]uman reason in its pure use, so long as it was not critically examined, has first tried all possible wrong ways before it succeeded in finding the one true way. ~ Immanuel Kant

The conservative response to modernity is to embrace it, but to embrace it critically, in full consciousness that human achievements are rare and precarious, that we have no God-given right to destroy our inheritance, but must always patiently submit to the voice of order, and set an example of orderly living. ~ Roger Scruton

I need to give you one last bit of advice in the off chance this rather extraordinary and enviable situation in which you find yourself is actually true- that somehow you've fallen deep down into a Cordova story. I stared back at him. Be the good guy, he said. How do I know I'm the good guy? He pointed at me, nodding. A very wise question. You don't. Most bad guys think they're good. But there are a few signifiers. You'll be miserable. You'll be hated. You'll fumble around in the dark, alone and confused. You'll have little insight as to the true nature of things, not until the very last minute, and only if you have the stamina and the madness to go to the very, very end. But most importantly- and critically- you will act without regard for yourself. You'll be motivated by something that has nothing to do with the ego. You'll do it for justice. For grace. For love. Those large rather heroic qualities only the good have the strength to carry on their shoulders. And you'll listen. ~ Marisha Pessl

The effect on Lucy was not bad, for the faint seemed to merge subtly into the narcotic sleep. It was with a feeling of personal pride that I could see a faint tinge of colour steal back into the pallid cheeks and lips. No man knows, till he experiences it, what it is to feel his own lifeblood drawn away into the veins of the woman he loves.
The Professor watched me critically. "That will do," he said. "Already?" I remonstrated. "You took a great deal more from Art." To which he smiled a sad sort of smile as he replied, "He is her lover, her fiance. You have work, much work to do for her and for others, and the present will suffice. ~ Bram Stoker

Women standing up for each other is critically important. ~ Hillary Clinton

Such immaturity will manifest itself in a lack of integrity. This lack will critically affect the child's spiritual development; the less able a child is to deal with anger well, the more antagonistic will be his attitude toward authority, including the authority of God. A child's immature handling of anger is a primary reason the child will reject the parent's spiritual values. ~ Gary Chapman

Check it out."
Jonah removed the bubble wrap and held up the picture for his three cousins.
Dan took a step backward. The shock was almost as powerful as it had been the day before at the Uffizi. "It's perfect! It's every bit as disgusting as the real one!"
Amy nodded. "And so fast. We only called you yesterday."
Jonah shrugged. "Even the Janus take a short cut every now and then. You can do a lot with digitization these days. You break the picture down to squares and reproduce them one at a time. The other two are just as fly."
"You mean, hog ugly," Hamilton amended.
"The serpents don't help," Dan put in critically. "Live fat spaghetti. Lady, if you're thinking of a modeling career, forget it!"
The rapper clucked sympathetically. "You guys just don't appreciate the power of the visual image. The Wiz used to be like that–until Gangsta Kronikles. When you're in film industry, you understand the whole picture's-worth-a-thousand-words deal."
Hamilton rolled his eyes. "Here we go again. ~ Gordon Korman

In cold weather states like Vermont, where the weather can get to 20 below zero, home heating assistance is critically important. In fact, it is a life and death issue. ~ Bernie Sanders

If you claim to 'love' animals but you eat animal products, you need to think critically about how you understand love. ~ Gary L. Francione

Singing is my dream and, while it may have not been a commercial success, critically I was thrilled with the reception my first album got. ~ Minnie Driver

What we care about is, when faced with a problem and you're a member of a team, do you, at the appropriate time, step in and lead. And just as critically, do you step back and stop leading, do you let someone else? ~ Laszlo Bock

A neoliberal, late-capitalist education system is increasingly one that teaches people to function, and to perform at ever-higher levels, but not necessarily to think critically. It emphasises standardized testing and stresses "delivery" over enquiry; "resilience" over versatility. ~ Marcus Gilroy-Ware

Space exploration and experimentation are critically valuable to our nation. I know of no better way to honor those seven who sacrificed their lives than to recommit ourselves to defend and enhance America's important strategies in space. ~ Rob Bishop

I could see why someone would want to make a website about me, and my quotes. They are all gold. How many people have written, directed AND starred in their own movies. I just don't know why they would want to put words into my mouth, I mean I did write, direct AND star in a critically acclaimed movie. ~ Zach Braff

There is no way of cutting ourselves free of our conceptual inheritance: all we are required to do is use our experience critically and discriminatingly, refining and improving our inherited ideas, and determining more exactly the limits to their scope. ~ Stephen Toulmin

Indeed," Fowler answered. He turned and looked at Tony critically. "I say, old man, but you're not much older than that German kid."
Yeah," Tony grinned. "But I'm from Texas and meaner than a junkyard bulldog. Makes a difference, you know. ~ Robert L. Wise

One can, in principle, outline sort of a set of neural circuits that are critically involved and even identify disorders that affect different components of that neural circuit and see what happens if you knock out, for example, inability to recognize faces, how it affects your response to portraiture. ~ Eric Kandel

You can't talk about truth without talking about learning how to die because it's precisely by learning how to die, examining yourself and transforming your old self into a better self, that you actually live more intensely and critically and abundantly. ~ Cornel West

Whether I'm critically well received, whether or not I sell books - of course it becomes progressively harder to get them published - nevertheless, it's what I do, every day. ~ Tama Janowitz

He hit the circuit in 1917 as 'Frank Fay, Nut Monologist,' and resistance was immediate. Variety critically stated, 'Fay needs a good straight man, as before, to feed his eccentric comedy.' A comedian standing alone onstage? Unheard of. Doesn't this guy know anything about showbiz? To stand still and tell jokes was a foreign move. To perform without some kind of gimmick was considered amateurish. ~ Kliph Nesteroff

Jobs are critically important, but looking at economic change through the impact on jobs has always been a difficult way to think about economic progress. ~ Marc Andreesen

The self is constituted within a variety of arenas and in relation to multiple traditions. Self-hood, on this understanding, is both provisional and open-ended, and critically depends on the configuration of relationships between one's own groups and those cultures and values that are deemed 'other'. The regulation of alterity becomes a defining attribute of self-hood, as my sense of who I am is crucially mediated by an understanding of that which I am not (paraphrasing William Connolly). ~ Michael Kenny

Our analytical faculties allow us to look critically at our writing and interpret it. Sometimes we make bold, impulsive edits to our poems, but most forms of precision and economy in poetry, it seems to me, are signatures of the analytical mind. ~ James Arthur

Believing himself to be unseen by other bathers, he gave himself up to being alone with his body. He wriggled his toes, breathed hard through his nose, twisted his brown moustache where some drops of water still clung, and looked himself critically all over. The scrutiny seemed to satisfy him, as well as it might. I, whose only acquaintance was with bodies and minds developing, was suddenly confronted by maturity in its most undeniable form; and I wondered, what must it feel like to be him, master of those limbs which have passed beyond the need of gym and playing field, and exist for their own beauty and strength? What can they do, I thought, to be conscious of themselves? ~ L.P. Hartley

She examined me, she looked at me critically and said, "Why are you trying to starve yourself?" To keep myself from feeling love, from feeling lust, from feeling anything at all. ~ Joyce Carol Oates

If anyone should tell you that a particular person has spoken critically of you, don't bother with excuses or defenses. Just smile and reply, "I guess that person doesn't know about all my other faults. Otherwise, he wouldn't have mentioned only these." ~ Epictetus

You want the film to be critically successful - you certainly want the film to be financially successful so that you can ... well, because that's how movies like this are made, you know, they need to make money. But as a director, you can only make the movie that you want to make. ~ Joseph Kosinski

...Society needs to open its collective mind to all ideas and ideologies. It needs to give its people the chance to listen to the opinions of others, and then examine them critically instead of rejecting them prematurely. Such a creative dialogue based on positive critical thinking can enhance and develop ideas. ~ Raif Badawi

We need to educate young people to deal with new modes of education that are emerging with the new electronic technologies and we need to educate them to not only learn how to critically read this ubiquitous screen culture but also how to be cultural producers. ~ Henry Giroux

There's been an incredible censorship in America and throughout the world, but particularly in America where students aren't even allowed to critically think about evolution, the issue of origins; they are not allowed to hear other points of view; they are taught incorrectly about science and taught that evolution is fact. ~ Ken Ham

Politics is about power. It is about the power of the state. It is about the power of the state as applied to individuals, the society in which they live and the economy in which they work. Most critically, our responsibility in this parliament is how that power is used: whether it is used for the benefit of the few or the many. ~ Kevin Rudd

Even though I wanted to experience all these things I was interested in, I couldn't get them. So I had to think critically and culturally about what was available. ~ Chuck Klosterman

I think it's your bosoms." Rand Surveyed him critically. "The dress wouldn't be as tight if they weren;t so large. I think your bosoms are too big."
Alexei looked down at his overstuffed chest. "Can bosoms ever be too big?"
Not real bosoms perhaps, but I think in your case ... " Rand considered him thoughtfully. "No question about it: they're definately too big"
Are you sure?" Alexei studied his reflection. "I thought they were just the right size for a man of my height. ~ Victoria Alexander

(Note: If you don't appreciate a little humor in the midst of critically important theological issues, you may not have come to the same conclusion I have, which is this: I don't have to take myself too seriously in order to take God seriously.) ~ Angie Smith

Women in Thai society have been placed in the space of the home. It is possible that women have assuredly taken up that place without thinking too critically about it. ~ Araya Rasdjarmrearnsook

I was brought up in a home environment where I was taught to think critically and was encouraged to seek answers to questions about my faith. ~ Ken Ham

Understand that you, yourself, are no more than the composite picture of all your thoughts and actions. In your relationships with others, remember the basic and critically important rule: If you want to be loved, be lovable. If you want respect, set a respectable example! ~ Denis Waitley

The function of education is to teach one to think intensively and think critically. Intelligence plus character; that is the goal of a true education. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Thinking critically is a chore. It does not come naturally or easily. And if the fruits of such efforts are not carefully displayed to young minds, then they will not harvest them. Every school child must be implanted with the wonder of the atom, not the thrall of magic. ~ Perry DeAngelis

I think most Americans understand that we went through a period in which American leadership was judged quite critically internationally. ~ Susan Rice

[Her] work taught me that you could be all the traditional feminine things
a mother, a lover, a listener, a nurturer
and you could also be critically astute and radical and have a minority opinion that was profoundly moral. ~ Anne Lamott

I don't shy away from saying that the single most developed tradition of critical thought devoted to the study of capitalism was initiated by Karl Marx. His work was built on that of many people who preceded him. It does not offer the only set of solutions to our problems; it has its own shortcomings and failures. But if you want to think critically about capitalism, sooner of later you are going to have to encounter the theoretical traditions of Marxism, because it is the most developed and draws from contributions made from every country on Earth, from a thousand struggles against business and governments supporting capitalism. It's a repository, a rich resource that ought to be made use of by anyone who wants to have a balanced perspective when it comes to dealing with the real problems. ~ Richard Wolff

Of course, there are also faculty who are discouraged from speaking critically about social issues because of the increasing assumption in American society that any form of critique which calls official power into question is somehow un-American. This absurd attempt to define any critique of official power as unpatriotic has a chilling effect on faculty, especially when such views and the names of the people to whom they are ascribed are widely disseminated in right-wing and dominant media outlets. ~ Henry Giroux

At a time when we need an urgent national conversation about how schools and curriculum should address the environmental crisis, we're being told that the problems we need to focus on are teacher incompetence, government monopoly, and market competition. The reform agenda reflects the same private interests that are moving to shrink public space-interests that have no desire to raise questions that might encourage students to think critically about the roots of the environmental crisis, or to examine society's unsustainable distribution of wealth and power. ~ Bill Bigelow

In all death penalty cases, spending time with clients is important. Developing the trust of clients is not only necessary to manage the complexities of the litigation & deal with the stress of a potential execution; it's also key to effective advocacy. A client's life often depends on his lawyer's ability to create a mitigation narrative that contextualizes his poor decisions or violent behavior. Uncovering things about someone's background that no one has previously discovered--things that might be hard to discuss but are critically important--requires trust. Getting someone to acknowledge he has been the victim of child sexual abuse, neglect, or abandonment won't happen without the kind of comfort that takes hours and multiple visits to develop. Talking about sports, TV, popular culture, or anything else the client wants to discuss is absolutely appropriate to building a relationship that makes effective work possible. ~ Bryan Stevenson

Avoid results-by volume approach, instead focus on few critically important but uncomfortable actions. ~ Tim Ferriss

This suggests that for our species, too, the cerebellum is critically important.63 ~ Frans De Waal

At its heart shamanism is an ouroboros that, regardless of
cultural or religious trappings that have crowded its path, what
remains its critically profound gift to the present lies in its
simplistic roots of the past. ~ S. Kelley Harrell

Government subsidies can be critically analyzed according to a simple principle: You are smarter than the government, so when the government pays you to do something you wouldn't do on your own, it is almost always paying you to do something stupid. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

What," she barked, "is that?" "We have a guest for supper tonight," Miss Stump replied, and as she glanced back at him he thought he saw a mischievous glint in her eye. "Indio's monster, in fact - though Indio now calls him Caliban." "Caliban?" Maude narrowed her eyes, cocking her head as she examined him critically. "Aye, I can see that, but is he safe in the theater with us is what I'm wanting to know?" Apollo felt a tug on his hand. He looked down at Indio, who whispered, "She's nice. Truly. ~ Elizabeth Hoyt

We have one crystal clear reason apart from the blessed happiness of this way of life. It is this: prayer is the core of our day. Take prayer out, and the day would collapse, would be pithless, a straw blown in the wind. But how can you pray
really pray, I mean
with one against who you have a grudge or whom you have been discussing critically with another? Try it. You will find it cannot be done. ~ Amy Carmichael

He did not in the least wish the future Mrs. Newland Archer to be a simpleton. He meant her (thanks to his enlightening companionship) to develop a social tact and readiness of wit enabling her to hold her own with the most popular married women of the 'younger set,' in which it was the recognized custom to attract masculine homage while playfully discouraging it. If he had probed to the bottom of his vanity (as he sometimes nearly did) he would have found there the wish that his wife should be as worldly-wise and eager to please as the married lady whose charms had held his fancy through two mildly agitated years; without, of course, any hint of the frailty which had so nearly marred that unhappy being's life, and had disarranged his own plans for a whole winter.

How this miracle of fire and ice was to be created, and to sustain itself in a harsh world, he had never taken the time to think out; but he was content to hold his view without analyzing it, since he knew it was that of all the carefully-brushed, white-waistcoated, buttonhole-flowered gentlemen who succeeded each other in the club box, exchanged friendly greetings with him, and turned their opera-glasses critically on the circle of ladies who were the product of the system. In matters intellectual and artistic Newland Archer felt himself distinctly the superior of these chosen specimens of old New York gentility; he had probably read more, thought more, and even seen a good deal more of the world, than a ~ Edith Wharton

I think we live a culture that's obsessed with people, you know, 'Celebrities are just like us!' Everything I do except my job is critically analyzed online. ~ Pete Wentz

As you give God your time, your gifts, your resources and talents, He will use them to have a critically important and eternal impact on this world. ~ Christine Caine

First, as I've always said, it all starts with product, which means having the right assortment, styles, and fits. Second is price, where we strive to offer the best quality, style, and design at a fair value. This is critically important, given the highly promotional environment we are operating in. And third, traffic. ~ Mickey Drexler

American Christian churches have a golden opportunity to put aside our idolatrous ties to Republicans and Democrats and think more critically and creatively about how the gospel relates to our new and emerging political culture. When ~ Charles C. Camosy

What do you need to succeed in business? You need the ability to think critically and communicate, and those things you can get just as easily out of a philosophy degree. ~ Matthew Stewart

It is necessary to remember, as we think critically about domination, that we all have the capacity to act in ways that oppress, dominate, wound (whether or not that power is institutionalized). It is necessary to remember that it is first the potential oppressor within that we must resist – the potential victim within that we must rescue – otherwise we cannot hope for an end to domination, for liberation. ~ Bell Hooks

While my father was a diplomat rather than a business person, I count him as a critically important formative role model. He was comfortable living and working all around the world, wherever he was assigned. ~ Muhtar Kent

You are burnt beyond recognition, he added, looking at his wife as one looks at a valuable piece of personal property which has suffered some damage. She held up her hands, strong, shapely hands, and surveyed them critically, drawing up her fawn sleeves above the wrists. Looking at them reminded her of her rings, which she had given to her husband before leaving for the beach. She silently reached out to him, and he, understanding, took the rings from his vest pocket and dropped them into her open palm. She slipped them upon her fingers; then clasping her knees, she looked across at Robert and began to laugh. The rings sparkled upon her fingers. He sent back an answering smile. ~ Kate Chopin

When we can let go of what other people think and own our story, we gain access to our worthiness - the feeling that we are enough just as we are and that we are worthy of love and belonging. When we spend a lifetime trying to distance ourselves from the parts of our lives that don't fit with who we think we're supposed to be, we stand outside of our story and hustle for our worthiness by constantly performing, perfecting, pleasing, and proving. Our sense of worthiness - that critically important piece that gives us access to love and belonging - lives inside of our story. ~ Brene Brown

Hollywood is a roulette wheel. Each project dictates what's going to happen for you next, and it doesn't really matter that your project is critically acclaimed or won awards or has fans worldwide. It's a matter of how many movie tickets and DVDs and on-demand movies that you sell. ~ Adam Green

The Bible is our fire-guard. Some read God's Word critically but the Word is their critic and by their own attitude towards the Word they condemn themselves. ~ Reinhard Bonnke

You simply can't be tentative in a startup. You have to go for it at every chance you get. And if the leader of the organization is anxious, his or her fear pervades the organization. Everything comes from the top in a company. So if you are starting a company or building one, face your fears and move past them. It's critically important to your company. ~ Fred Wilson

You might be an intelligent person, but once you let someone else filter the world for you, you have no way to critically analyze what you're hearing. At best, absolute best case scenario, if they blatantly contradict themselves, you can spot that. But if they take basic care to maintain an internal logical consistency, which they all do, you've got nothing. You've delegated the ability to make up your mind. ~ Max Barry

As everyone who has read the Marxists critically has not failed to see ... the gospel of St. Marx is just the old Judaeo-Christian mythology with the supernatural sanctions left out, thus making the cult the most implausible and unreasonable of all the Christian heresies. It is true that there is reciprocal hostility between Marxists and the other Christian cults, but that is merely normal. Christian sects began persecuting each other even before one of them attained political power in the decaying Roman Empire, and everyone remembers the fearful Wars of Religion that convulsed and almost ruined Europe. The Gospel of Love invariably incites the most savage and blood-thirsty hatreds. ~ Revilo P. Oliver

A genuinely free and educated man should be able to tune himself, as one tunes a musical instrument, absolutely arbitrarily, at his convenience at any time and to any degree, philosophically or philologically, critically or poetically, historically or rhetorically, in ancient or modern form. ~ Karl Wilhelm Friedrich Schlegel

You have to remain critically vigilant.Question every premise, challenge conventional wisdom, and never accept the truth of something merely because everyone else views it as obvious. ~ Friedrich Haller

By operating without a leader the scout bees of a swarm neatly avoid one of the greatest threats to good decision making by groups: a domineering leader. Such an individual reduces a group's collective power to uncover a diverse set of possible solutions to a problem, to critically appraise these possibilities, and to winnow out all but the best one. ~ Thomas D. Seeley

A famous bon mot asserts that opinions are like arse-holes, in that everyone has one. There is great wisdom in this ... but I would add that opinions differ significantly from arse-holes, in that yours should be constantly and thoroughly examined.
We must think critically, and not just about the ideas of others. Be hard on your beliefs. Take them out onto the verandah and beat them with a cricket bat ... Be intellectually rigorous. Identify your biases, your prejudices, your privilege. ~ Tim Minchin

Most people define learning too narrowly as mere 'problem-solving', so they focus on identifying and correcting errors in the external environment. Solving problems is important. But if learning is to persist, managers and employees must also look inward. The need to reflect critically on their own behaviour, identify the ways they often inadvertently contribute to the organisation's problems, and then change how they act. ~ Chris Argyris

...not every proposition should be taken as a final assertion. When Nietzsche writes down a sentence, this does not necessarily mean that he thinks that this is the only way of understanding things. His thought is a constant searching and attempting - an experimental effort that is still to be tested. The written sentence is to be regarded only as an experimental piece, which, on closer consideration or in another connection, may be critically handled or rejected. ~ Bertaux

A lot of the films I do go down brilliantly critically and win awards, but not a lot of people see them. ~ Martin Compston

When you're battling against the minds of the studios and the money that can go into promoting larger budget films, it's very hard for a very small-budget Australian film to get a look in. You can get critically acclaimed and go to various film festivals around the world, but that doesn't necessarily mean the majority of people are going to hear about it. ~ Hugo Weaving

Hwang Jung-eun is one of the brightest stars of the new South Korean generation - she's Han Kang's favourite, and the novel we're publishing scooped the prestigious Bookseller's Award, for critically-acclaimed fiction that also has a wide popular appeal. She stands out for her focus on social minorities - her protagonists are slum inhabitants, trans women, orphans - and for the way she melds this hard-edged social critique with obliquely fantastical elements and offbeat dialogue. ~ Deborah Smith

Most men's eyes, when you look at them critically, are not like that. They may look at you very expressively, but when you look at them, just as features, they are not very nice. ~ Charlotte Perkins Gilman

The first vehicle was an unmanned two-ton, hundred-thousand-dollar steel-caged contraption named ANGUS (for Acoustically Navigated Geophysical Underwater System), which had powerful strobe lights, a collection of thermometers, and, most critically, high-definition cameras. Late ~ Simon Winchester

Fanfiction is the madwoman in mainstream culture's attic, but the attic won't contain it forever. Writing and reading fanfiction isn't just something you do; it's a way of thinking critically about the media you consume, of being aware of all the implicit assumptions that a canonical work carries with it, and of considering the possibility that those assumptions might not be the only way things have to be. ~ Anne Jamison

Above them, one of the blackened television screens brightens, and there's an announcement about the in-flight movie. It's an animated film about a family of ducks, one that Hadley's actually see, and when Oliver groans, shes about to deny the whole thing. But then she twists around in her seat and eyes him critically.
"There's nothing wrong with ducks," she tells him, and he rolls his eyes.
"Talking ducks?"
Hadley grins. "They sing, too."
"Don't tell me," he says. "You've already seen it."
She holds up two fingers. "Twice."
"You do know it's meant for five-year-olds, right?"
"Five- to eight-year-olds, thank you very much."
"And how old are you again?"
"Old enough to appreciate our web-footed friends."
"You," he says, laughing in spite of himself, "are a mad as a hatter."
"Wait a second," Hadley says in mock horror. "Is that a reference to a...cartoon?"
No, genius. It's a reference to a famous work of literature by Lewis Carroll. But once again, I can see how well that American education is working for you. ~ Jennifer E. Smith

alerting the system to contradictions relies critically on particular brain regions - and one in particular, called the anterior cingulate cortex. ~ David Eagleman

Europe clearly is the only place where people can speak up critically, and this is a unique cultural value. ~ Shirin Ebadi

The most terrifying burden of the creature is to be isolated, which is what happens in individuation: one separates himself out of the herd. This move exposes the person to the sense of being completely crushed and annihilated because he sticks out so much, has to carry so much in himself. These are the risks when the person begins to fashion consciously and critically his own framework of heroic self-reference. Here is precisely the definition of the artist type, or the creative type generally. We have crossed a threshold into a new type of response to man's situation. No one has written about this type of human response more penetratingly than Rank; and of all his books, Art and Artist is the most secure monument to his genius. I ~ Ernest Becker

Bejart is almost never performed in New York City; critically, he just gets attacked here. ~ David Hallberg

If you write a lovely story about India, you're criticized for selling an exotic version of India. And if you write critically about India, you're seen as portraying it in a negative light - it also seems to be a popular way to present India, sort of mangoes and beggars. ~ Kiran Desai

Sharks have swum the oceans for over 400 million years, but we're threatening this critically important species for the purpose of making soup - it's sad and wasteful. ~ Ted Danson

In problem-posing education, people develop their power to perceive critically the way they exist in the world with which and in which they find themselves; they come to see the world not as a static reality, but as a reality in process, in transformation. ~ Paulo Freire

I'd like Muslims to look at their religion as a set of beliefs that they can appraise critically and pick and choose from. ~ Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Seated at the table, high in her firmament of gin, she looked critically at her brother and his wife, remembering some real or imagined injustice of her youth, for with any proximity the constellations of some families generate among themselves an asperity that nothing can sweeten. ~ John Cheever

Our civilization depends critically on software, and we have a dangerously low degree of professionalism in the computer fields ~ Bjarne Stroustrup

It's critically important that people trust you during a public health crisis. ~ Richard E. Besser

We haven't developed a progressive vocabulary. We say something is "public," but we just mean it's viewable online. Or we say it's "open," but we just mean it's accessible. I would like for us to think about terms critically and maybe change our vocabulary a bit. What if pubic actually meant publicly-funded, or social meant socialized. ~ Astra Taylor

The basic rule for thinking about faith is this: What matters about faith is not us, but the object of faith. Faith isn't primarily a power or capacity in me; it isn't first and foremost an attitude which I adopt; indeed, it's not first of all something which I do. Faith is objective - that is, faith is wholly turned outward to the object of faith. In a real sense, it's not faith itself but that toward which faith is turned that is critically important in getting our thinking straight. What matters about faith is therefore not us but God, the object of faith. But ~ John Webster

A book is actually a place, a place where we, as adults, still have the chance to engage in active imagining, translating word into image, connecting these images to memories, dreams and larger ideas. Television, film, even the stage play, have already been imagined for us, but the book, in whatever form we choose to interact with it, forces us to complete it ... The fact that books provide us the place to imagine is critically important, as it is there, in the imagination, that all sense of possibility rests. ~ Joe Meno

When you're writing a book, you don't really think about it critically. You don't want to know too well what you're doing. First, you write the book, then you find the justification for it. ~ E.L. Doctorow

Destroying hope is a critically important project. And when it is achieved, formal democracy is allowed - even preferred, if only for public relation purposes. In more honest circles, much of this is conceded. Of course, it is understood much more profoundly by beasts in men's shapes who endure the consequences of challenging the imperatives of stability and order. ~ Noam Chomsky

Most plans are critically flawed by their own logic. A failure at any step will ruin everything. That's just basic cause and effect. It's easy for a good plan to fall apart. Therefore, a plan that has no attachment to logic cannot be stopped. The success or failure of any step will have no impact on the macro level. ~ Brian Clevinger

If only I could see myself from the same vantage point that I observe the world; I might judge my behavior and expressions more critically, and others less. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

I look at everything I've done critically - but I think that's the job of an actor. If you ever sit on your laurels or think that you're good - in a way, I don't then think you're pushing yourself. ~ Nicole Kidman