Mean Something Quotes

PICARD: Did you read that book I gave you? (Wesley reacts, barely concealing a grimace as he recalls.)
WESLEY: Some of it.
PICARD: That's reassuring.
WESLEY: I just don't have much time.
PICARD: (re the book in his hand) There is no greater challenge than the study of philosophy. (Wesley glances over at Picard's book)
WESLEY: William James sure won't be on my Starfleet exams.
PICARD: The important things never will be. Anyone can be trained to deal with technology, and the mechanics of piloting a starship.
WESLEY: But Starfleet Academy--
PICARD: It takes more than just that. Open your mind to the past... to history, art, philosophy. And then... (re: the stars) ...this will mean something.
(Wesley considers this, almost embarrassed as he realizes Picard does truly care about him.)
Then: PICARD (continuing) Just consider James' wisdom: "Philosophy... is not a technical matter... it is our sense of what life honestly means... our individual way of feeling the total push and pressure of the cosmos."
(then) That's what I want for you.

From:
STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION
"Samaritan Snare" #40272-143
Written by Robert L. McCullough ~ Jean-Luc Picard

I wanna thank you for making all the love songs mean something again ~ Neil Hilborn

I think I would really lay down and die. Music comes from a very primal, twisted place. When a person sings, their body, their mouth, their eyes, their words, their voice says all these unspeakable things that you really can't explain but that mean something anyway. People are completely transformed when they sing; people look like that when they sing or when they make love. But it's a weird thing - at the end of the night I feel strange, because I feel I've told everybody all my secrets. ~ Jeff Buckley

You do have to listen to the stories, for stories always mean something. The question that worries me is: WHAT exactly do they mean? ~ Cressida Cowell

Newt had said I loved Ivy more than the church. I wasn't going to deny it, but there were all kinds of love, and how shallow would I be if my anchor to reality was a hunk of real estate? It was the people who were there that made it mean something. ~ Kim Harrison

Neil felt a half-second from losing his mind, but then Andrew said his name and Neil's thoughts ground to a startled halt. He was belatedly aware of his hand at his ear and his fingers clenched tight around his phone. He didn't remember pulling it from his pocket or making the decision to dial out. He lowered it and tapped a button, thinking maybe he'd imagined things, but Andrew's name was on his display and the timer put the call at almost a minute already. Neil put the phone back to his ear, but he couldn't find the words for the wretched feeling that was tearing away at him. In three months championships would be over. In four months he'd be dead. In five months the Foxes would be right back here for summer practices with six new faces. Neil could count his life on one hand now. On the other hand was the future he couldn't have: vice-captain, captain, Court. Neil had no right to mourn these missed chances. He'd gotten more than he deserved this year; it was selfish to ask for more. He should be grateful for what he had, and gladder still that his death would mean something. He was going to drag his father and the Moriyamas down with him when he went, and they'd never recover from the things he said. It was justice when he'd never thought he'd get any and revenge for his mother's death. He thought he'd come to terms with it but that hollow ache was back in his chest where it had no right to be. Neil felt like he was drowning. Neil found his voice at last, but the best he h ~ Nora Sakavic

The screen came up to light again, showing a devastated section of the city grid. No, not decimated. Had that part of the city been decimated, one out of every ten buildings would be destroyed. That's what decimated means. Personally, I think some early-years, respected television personality got decimated and devastated confused at some point, and no one wanted to point it out to him, so everyone started using them interchangeably. But dammit, words mean what they mean, even if everyone thinks they ought to mean something else. ~ Jim Butcher

I mean something dirty, sweaty," Luiz corrected idly, leaning closer. He stroked the back of his knuckles down Michael's cheek. "What I like best. Rock, blues, with an edge of metal. Something dangerous. Real. The audience driven to ... well, in the old days it would have been bloodlust. But these are more temperate times. So lust will have to do. ~ Jae T. Jaggart

You don't want me, and I don't want anybody else. So I'll just be . . . left behind. Left to pick up the pieces of my dreams and my heart when you get up from this table and walk away, shattering them both because the girl who means everything never even gave me a chance to mean something. ~ Elizabeth Hayley

We're family," Alyss said.
Redd snorted. "Is that supposed to mean something?"
Family," Alyss said again, trying to convince herself more than Redd.
Don't talk to me about family! You were never disowned by your parents!"
I'd rather have been disowned by them then see them murdered. ~ Frank Beddor

Songs are about whatever you want them to be about. For me it might mean something completely different than what it means to you. So I'd say it's about whatever the listener thinks it's about. ~ Norah Jones

I used to fall hard when I was younger, and it occupies a lot of journals and redundant preoccupation and analysis. It is a state in which you are in an overheated fervor of production - of mental production - where you're analyzing everything that happened. And what they said! And how they looked! Did that touch mean something, or not? Everything is sort of endowed with meaning, but you're also hopelessly boring and out of the world. ~ Todd Haynes

The Toreador primogen approached her Ventrue counterpart. When she neared, Eleanor gave Victoria a hug in greeting. Or rather, the Ventrue made it plain she was favoring Victoria with a hug.

When the Kindred separated, Eleanor said, "This looks like a wonderfuil party, my dear. You must be very satisfied." Her face was animated with all the false sincerity she could muster, which was enough to fool and flatter anyone but one as perceptive as Victoria.

Victoria wanted to gut the bitch right here, but she knew she had to be careful. On the other hand, too much care might alert Eleanor as much as a blatant warning, so she had to play along with the Ventrue's double-entendre politics.

"Well thank you Eleanor. Such compliments certainly mean something when they come from you. ~ Stewart Wieck

I don't want to save you, Ruby. I want to mean something to you, because for the first time in
forever, someone means something to me. ~ Lisa Swallow

The thing no one tells you about surviving, about the mere act of holding out, is how many hours are nothing because nothing happens. They also don't tell you about how you can share your deepest secrets with someone, kiss them, and the next hour it's like there's nothing between you because not everything can mean something all the time or you'd be crushed under the weight of it. ~ Courtney Summers

If I could turn my thoughts into spoken words and share them with someone, they'd become real and mean something. Now, they were only lines that could be erased when I didn't feel them anymore or hopeful thoughts that, like shadows, would disappear when the sun went away. - Rebecca Meyer, Crooked Lines ~ Holly Michael

If love and beauty were easy to find, they would not exist.
Chaos and sadness exist in order for you to find the love and beauty in them. So that love and beauty mean something.
It's meant to be hard. ~ Pleasefindthis

I never had a problem with genre because a genre actually is like a uniform - you put yourself into a certain uniform. But if you dress up in a police officer's uniform, it doesn't mean that you are an officer; it can mean something else. ~ Wong Kar-Wai

Act as if you're a writer. Sit down and begin. Act as if you might just create something beautiful, and by beautiful I mean something authentic and universal. Don't wait for anybody to tell you it's okay. ~ Dani Shapiro

Most of my writing is emotionally autobiographical. You've got to pull up the things that mean something to you in order for them to mean anything to your audience. That's how they know you're not kidding. ~ Bruce Springsteen

Conner took a deep breath, "Francesca, I am not going to let you to give your first kiss away in a bet. A first kiss should be special." He leaned down whispering in my ear. "When I do kiss you it is going to mean something. ~ D.C. Gambel

For God's sake, all of you, say spiteful things about me, then I shall know I mean something to you. Don't say surgaries, or I'm done. ~ D.H. Lawrence

I know the odds are all against us and I know you feel this way too
So I know I would rather die trying to know if I could mean something to you ~ David Levithan

A week goes by and I don't call Lucy or Dylan. I want to drift away from them - more than anything, I want to drift away. I sometimes imagine myself totally alone and I enjoy the feeling. And I mean something by alone, something more than the word holds. I mean something blank and pure and vacant, plus me. And also moral. This blank and pure vacancy that includes me that is also moral is so empty, it is so no one, that my presence in it makes me not exist, although I am still there, and that's what lifts all the weight. ~ Patrick Somerville

You're only gonna get in trouble, so why even bother?"
"I bother because it's wrong. I bother because you don't deserve it. I bother because you fucking mean something to the girl I'm head over heels for and Eric, I bother because you mean something to me. ~ Melyssa Winchester

You know, this dialogue is only helpful when we come, both of us, to a point and realize that no dialogue is possible, that no dialogue is necessary. When I say 'understanding', 'seeing', they mean something different to me. Understanding is a state of being where the question isn't there any more; there is nothing there that says "now I understand!" - that's the basic difficulty between us. By understanding what I am saying, you are not going to get anywhere. ~ U.G. Krishnamurti

The promise of change doesn't always mean something changes. ~ John Travolta

Be respectful of words. They mean something. ~ Katherine Anne Porter

As I am sure you know, when people say 'It's my pleasure,' they usually mean something along the lines of, 'There's nothing on Earth I would rather do less.' [ ... ] ~ Lemony Snicket

But I'm ravenous for news, any kind of news; even if it's false news, it must mean something. We ~ Margaret Atwood

...And no one is asking you to choose because of a whiteboard or a sex dream."

"I know."

"But you still feel pressured to choose?"

"I feel pressure to assess," I say. "It all has to mean something. ~ Courtney C. Stevens

. . . [A] creationist spy named Luther Sunderland snuck into a closed scientific meeting of the Systematics Discussion Group at the American Museum in 1981 with a hidden tape recorder. . . . My friend, the distinguished paleoichthyologist Colin Patterson of the British Museum in London, was talking about pattern cladism and how he had abandoned many of the assumptions about evolution that he had once held, including the recognition of ancestors in the fossil record. He was now only interested in the simplest hypotheses that were easily tested, such as cladograms. But, of course, taken out of context, it sounds as though Colin doubted that evolution had taken place, yet he said nothing of the sort! Colin was speaking in a kind of "shorthand" that makes sense to the scientists who understand the subtleties of the debate, but mean something entirely different when taken out of context. I was at that meeting and was stunned to read afterward about Sunderland's account of what had happened because I remembered Colin's ideas clearly and could not imagine how they could be misinterpreted. For decades afterward, Colin had to explain over and over again what he had meant, and why he did not doubt the fact that evolution had occurred, only that he no longer accepted a lot of the other assumptions about evolution that Neo-Darwinists had made. Unfortunately, Colin died in 1998 while he was still in his scientific prime, unable to continue fighting these misinterpretations of his ideas th ~ Donald R. Prothero

The danger we have is that we want to water down what Jesus said to make it mean something that aligns with our common sense. ~ Oswald Chambers

So the gods must mean something else," said Jix.
"God, not gods!" insisted Johnnie.
Nick threw up his hands. "God, gods, or whatever," said Nick. "Right now, it doesn't matter whether it's Jesus, or Kukulcan, or a dancing bear at the end of the tunnel. What matters is that we have a clue, and we have to figure it out."
"Why?" Johnnie asked again. "Why does God – excuse me, I mean 'the Light of Universal Whatever'- why does it just give us a freakin' impossible clue? Why can't it just tell us what we're supposed to do?"
"Because," said Mikey. "the Dancing Bear wants us to suffer. ~ Neal Shusterman

I used to think it would be neat to play my whole career with one team. But as a baseball player you want to come to the ballpark every day knowing you have a chance to win and that the games mean something. ~ Carlos Beltran

and the uniform jacket he wore was so tattered and dirty that there could only be one reason he still had it. It must mean something to him, hold some particular importance. ~ Noor Al-Shanti

INITIATIVE, AGGRESSION, AIR DISCIPLINE, and TEAM WORK are words that MEAN something in Air Fighting. ~ Adolph Malan

I do believe Jesus died so we could feel freed up to go after life to the full, so we would feel equpped to take risks and not beat ourselves up when we fail. He didn't die to make our lives look perfect. He died so we could stop feeling as if our lives have to be perfect for them to mean something. ~ Mandy Steward

I like films to have something inside, I don't mean a message, I mean something from the soul. ~ Dario Argento

You're going to tell me that last night shouldn't have happened.
No. I'm glad it happened. For too long, I've been telling myself that I could spend all this time with yo and flirt with you and not have it mean anything. It does mean something. You mean something to me. But I'm not in love with you. ~ Claudia Gray

Clothes are never a frivolity: they always mean something. ~ James Laver

I'm very, very concerned about the Bush presidency. I'm worried about the kinds of cuts in domestic programs that mean something to a lot of people, including members of my family, who depend on certain things from the government. ~ Sarah Jessica Parker

I love the word 'fashion.' That's why I'm using it in the title of this book. Fashion is about change and about creating clothes within a historical context. To me, dismissing fashion as silly or unimportant seems like a denial of history and frequently a show of sexism
as if something that's traditionally a concern of women isn't valid as a field of academic inquiry. When the Parsons fashion department was founded in 1906, it was called 'costume design,' because fashion was then a verb: to fashion. But the word 'fashion' has evolved to mean something much more profound, and those who resist it seem to me to be on the wrong side of history. ~ Tim Gunn

We're all Poseidon's children, Geoffrey: whether we like it or not."

"Poseidon's children," he repeated. "Is that supposed to mean something?"

"We came through. That's all. We weathered the absolute worst that history could throw at us, and we thrived. Now it's time to start doing something useful with our lives. ~ Alastair Reynolds

An impractical man
which he not only seems to be, but really is
will always be unreliable and unpredictable in his dealings with others. He will engage in actions that mean something else to him than to others, but he is at peace with himself about everything as long as he can make it all come together in a fine idea. ~ Robert Musil

Well, it's really no use our talking in the way we have been doing if the words we use mean something different to each of us ... and nothing. ~ Malcolm Bradbury

Listen and learn: you need fourteen characters, minimum. Use random letters, not words. Here's a tip: think of a sentence, and use the first letter in each of those words. Mix it up between upper and lower case. Then pick two numbers that mean something to you – not dates – and stick them somewhere between the letters. Put a punctuation mark at the beginning of the password and then a symbol, like a dollar sign, at the end. ~ Julie James

America today is in danger of drifting from its best traditions. We have allowed false prophets of selfishness to obscure our vision. We have grown numb to a creeping cynicism about progress and public life. We crave human connection yet hide behind walls. We worship the money chase yet decry the toll it exacts on us. We allow the market to dominate our lives, relationships, yearnings and aspirations. We indulge in nostalgia and irony and addictive entertainment, then purge from our hearts any true idealism or passion, any notion that being American should mean something more than "everyday low prices" or "every man for himself." In the midst of this dislocation and disorientation, so many Americans today yearn for higher purpose, for calling
for some assurance that life matters. We wish to believe there is more to our days than is revealed on our screens. Make no mistake: this is a spiritual crisis. ~ Eric Liu

My sister deserves the world," Max agreed. "She's not willing to take it for herself, though. Someone is going to have to give it to her. And, for someone to give it to her, she's going to have to let that someone get close to her. The only one who has even made it through her front door is you. That has to mean something. ~ Lily Harper Hart

Life is funny. You start out with limitless potential, but time is always shaving away the possibilities. Every choice you make is the choice not to do a thousand other things. What's important, when all is said and done, is that you made a difference. Your choices, and everything undone, have to mean something. Otherwise, what was the point? I'm lucky that way. My path was already there. I had only to walk it. I often thought even if no one knew of the good I had done with my life, it didn't matter. That it was done is all that counts in the end. But then I died. And I hadn't gotten to do any of it yet. ~ Brian Clevinger

I am trying to give the best performance possible in 400 pages. I want readers to be scared; I want them to be moved. Entertainment doesn't necessarily mean something trivial, but it does mean people wanting to get to the end of a book. ~ Mark Billingham

The witch reached into the picnic basket and pulled out a light brown chamois bag about the size of a playing card. "Maybe this will help you. It'll boost your self-esteem."
Now we're getting somewhere. Riley took the bag and opened it. She looked to the bottom to find ... nothing.
"Ah, it's empty."
"Of course," Ayden replied. "It's up to you to fill it. Find things that mean something to you, that represent times where you've overcome an obstacle, learned something important. Put those items in the bag and they'll help you find your strength. ~ Jana Oliver

Despite the best efforts of apologists like William Lane Craig, the 'evidence' for Christianity's truth is, in truth, not the kind that science will or should ever admit. We believers mean something different by the word: something that puts faith permanently in the category of irreproducible results. ~ Francis Spufford

But we were interested in how our lives could mean something to the past. We sailed into the past. ~ Michael Ondaatje

We are making sure that the courses we offer at MITx and HarvardX are quintessential MIT and Harvard courses. They are not watered down. They are not MIT Lite or Harvard Lite. These are hard courses. These are the exact same courses, so the certificate will mean something. ~ Anant Agarwal

My goal is not to win a straw poll that doesn't mean something. It's to win the election that means everything for the future of the country. ~ Mike Huckabee

I have already spent roughly five thousand hours asleep next to you. This has to mean something. ~ David Levithan

What does it mean if we're afraid? Does it mean something bad is going to happen to us? No, it doesn't mean something bad is going to happen. It just means that we have the chance to be brave! ~ Jose N Harris

If my life is going to mean something, I've got to live it myself ~ Rick Riordan

A person's innocence is precious and beautiful and when you share that piece of yourself, in my opinion, it's supposed to mean something. ~ Lauren Hammond

The world ain't ready for true black genius. In every nigger is a cup of African blood from kings and queens of divine nature, mathematicians, craftsmen, men and women of the land. I have known some sisters and brothers would scare Einstein back into East European caves with the magnificence of their minds. We are a people with a practical nature and great vision. We have built nations, discovered treasures for everyday use. Our people are a great race of people, and though the Europeans raped and plundered, we have kept inner riches. You got a cup of African blood and that mean something, means you got a responsibility to be proud of it and use your talents or suffer self-destruction. ~ Shay Youngblood

The memory of him tracing the lines of my face filled me. I remembered the touch of his sensitive fingers, following my jawline, running down my neck to follow the curves of my body. I remembered his warmth, his laughter, and his eyes sparkling when I twisted a phrase to mean something entirely new and naughty. I remembered the way he made me feel needed, appreciated for who and what I was, never having to apologize for it, and the contentment I found in sharing ourselves. We'd been happy together. It had been great. ~ Kim Harrison

HAMM: We're not beginning to ... to ... mean something?
CLOV: Mean something! You and I, mean something!
(Brief laugh.) Ah that's a good one! ~ Samuel Beckett

You're the insane one. You don't even love the world you created. So how can you expect us to love and respect you?
An endless repetition of natural destruction and stupid, meaningless wars. Because we don't understand it, we have no way to stop it.
We may be stupid and not know what to do ... But we fight to move forward towards that which we think is right. Not just sticking to the arbitrary boundaries you created.
We make lots of mistakes, and get hurt ... But we keep believing in miracles. Looking for a truth we can't yet see.
We do it our own way. Because we believe our lives mean something. ~ Kaori Yuki

When an experience is so powerful that it motivates people to change the whole pattern of their lives, we call that a breakthrough, or an epiphany. The value of an epiphany doesn't lie just in some new or exciting insight. You might be walking down the street and pass a stranger. Your eyes meet, and for some reason there is a connection. It isn't sexual or romantic or even a suspicion that this person could mean something in your life. Instead, the epiphany is that you are that stranger - your experiencer merges with his. Call this a feeling or a thought, it doesn't matter which - it's the sudden expansion that counts. You are flung outside your narrow boundaries, if only for a moment, and that makes all the difference. You have tasted a hidden dimension. Compared to the habit of shutting yourself behind the walls of ego, this new dimension feels freer and lighter. You have a sense that your body can't contain you anymore. ~ Deepak Chopra

If I'm going to spend a lifetime writing my story, I want it to mean something. ~ Mari Serebrov

A musician has to find a way to make his music mean something special - spiritually or however you can. ~ Charlie Byrd

I don't care what they say, we are only to love those who deserve our love and love them to the degree that they deserve it! You see, we are not God. Only God can love people undeserving without spoiling them. Us, on the other hand, can love someone so undeserving, and actually turn the person into someone so vile who is convinced that they were always entitled to every bit of it! Mamma mia! And what about giving? Yes, they all want us to give and expect nothing in return, they all have many scriptures to lay on our tables when it is they who are at the receiving end! But when the tables are turned and we are the ones at the receiving end, suddenly all the scriptures mean something else! And all the times they were on our end and we gave to them- suddenly are all forgotten! ~ C. JoyBell C.

Commitment to each other is critical. Let's make our deadlines and due dates mean something. For changes to occur, we have to embrace them over and over. Take it step by step
but keep moving forward
and a year from now, we'll find we've moved from here to there. ~ Rhonda Abrams

Nothing fortified me, and simple loneliness all but destroyed me, yet I felt swamped by the belief that life must mean something- otherwise why was it there? Why was anything anything? ~ Morrissey

Several times when we tried to talk about our future, she told me she had the feeling that now my last great chance was presenting itself, and that I must not miss it. Did she really just mean the paralyzing compromises we had gotten ensnared in, out of indifference or false respect, and which now no longer bound us because a higher power had severed them? Or did she mean something beyond these fetters, which, after all, are only fetters if they are experienced as such and perhaps are beneficent fetters because they deceive us about the time spent waiting for the hour of fulfillment - did Misi also mean that the terrible desert of preparation had been traversed? ~ Hans Erich Nossack

The basic answer is that I wasn't happy or fulfilled by the job I had and I wanted my life to mean something to me, so I searched my life experience and realized that acting and performing were activities that I enjoyed all aspects of. ~ Gil Gerard

I recently forced myself to read a book on quantum physics, just to try and learn something new. I was confused by the middle of the first sentence and it all went downhill from there. The only thing I can remember learning is that a parallel universe can theoretically be contained on the head of a needle. I don't really know what that means, but I am now more careful handling needles. ~ Stephan Pastis

Yes, it would really mean something to be kissed by Jenno. ~ Peter St. John

And one day my quotes will mean something to someone, and they will be inspired to be more than society dictates. Even though I am Sam the unknown author ~ Samuel Colbran

Because English has so many words of foreign origin, and words that look the same but mean something different depending on their context, and words that are in flux, opening and closing like flowers in time-lapse photography, the human element is especially important if we are to stay on top of the computers, which, in their determination to do our job for us, make decisions so subversive that even professional wordsmiths are taken by surprise. ~ Mary Norris

I love talking about movies that mean something to me. ~ Jena Malone

When people talk to me about the weather, I always feel they mean something else. ~ Oscar Wilde

More than that, I remember the guy who spends almost every night on the phone with me talking about nothing and everything. The one who loves to make me smile. Yeah, he pisses me off sometimes, and I'm sure I piss him off, but we mean something. We actually mean a lot. ~ Angie Thomas

I guess I don't really know any other way to do it, it just feels like the natural way to do things for me. Like - if I'm writing a song - it has to have some sort of value. Or it only has some kind of value to me, if it's something really personal. It has to mean something to me. I guess it is a little uncomfortable, or it's a little embarrassing sometimes, to know that stuff that honest is out there. But, when I hand off the thing, when it's totally done and mastered and sent, I kinda feel like it doesn't belong to me anymore. ~ Panda Bear

Last time I said something perhaps I shouldn't have, something that's been taken the wrong way: "The poor are always with you." At that moment, back then, I wanted my friends' attention. I meant I was going to die soon, but they would have the rest of their lives to care for the poor. But the rich have twisted my words to mean something quite different: that there's nothing you can do about the poor. That the poor are part of life, like disease or accidents or hurricanes or getting old. Poverty is natural. You'll never get rid of it, so forget about trying. Don't worry that the poor have so much less than you do. Go eat your big meal, go drive your big car, go sleep in your big house. Let the poor look in the windows. Jesus says it's OK. Well, Jesus doesn't say it's OK. OK? P ~ Tony Hendra

Maybe even the smallest places mean something. ~ Jennifer Niven

There's a great expression in Twelve Step programs: Act as if. Act as if you're a writer. Sit down and begin. Act as if you might just create something beautiful, and by beautiful I mean something authentic and universal. Don't wait for anybody to tell you it's okay. Take that shimmer and show us our humanity. That's your job. ~ Dani Shapiro

Thing is, for me a woman has to have a certain amount of muffling, you know what I mean? Something between you, in the way of insulation. Otherwise, you're right up against her naked soul. ~ Jonathan Lethem

If I had questioned Harris further - "What do you mean when you say sex doesn't have to mean anything? Do people engage in it for no reason at all? Does it just happen, like a gurgle in the stomach, a can rattling down the street, or a screen door blowing shut in the breeze?" - perhaps he would have conceded that sex does have trivial meanings: a little pleasure, a little fun, a little relief from boredom and desire. This wouldn't be much of a concession. Sex would mean something, but only in the way that eating a peanut means something, chewing on an ice cube means something, scratching an itch means something. There would be no more call to rhapsodize about the touch of a man and a woman than to compose sonnets about the communion of a picnicker with his mayonnaise. ~ J. Budziszewski

I want my name to mean something after I'm dead. ~ V.C. Andrews

For the purposes of science, information had to mean something special. Three centuries earlier, the new discipline of physics could not proceed until Isaac Newton appropriated words that were ancient and vague - force, mass, motion, and even time - and gave them new meanings. Newton made these terms into quantities, suitable for use in mathematical formulas. Until then, motion (for example) had been just as soft and inclusive a term as information. For Aristotelians, motion covered a far-flung family of phenomena: a peach ripening, a stone falling, a child growing, a body decaying. That was too rich. Most varieties of motion had to be tossed out before Newton's laws could apply and the Scientific Revolution could succeed. In the nineteenth century, energy began to undergo a similar transformation: natural philosophers adapted a word meaning vigor or intensity. They mathematicized it, giving energy its fundamental place in the physicists' view of nature.

It was the same with information. A rite of purification became necessary.

And then, when it was made simple, distilled, counted in bits, information was found to be everywhere. ~ James Gleick

Sometimes I wonder if we shall ever grow up in our politics and say definite things which mean something, or whether we shall always go on using generalities to which everyone can subscribe, and which mean very little. ~ Eleanor Roosevelt

Looking back down the vale of the ages at the endless recurrence of their reincarnations, before they were forced to drink their vials of forgetting and all became obscure to them again, they could see no pattern at all to their efforts; if the gods had a plan, or even a set of procedures, if the long train of transmigrations was supposed to add up to anything, if it was not just mindless repetition, time itself nothing but a succession of chaoses, no one could discern it; and the story of their transmigrations, rather than being a narrative without death, as the first experiences of reincarnation perhaps seemed to suggest, had become instead a veritable charnel house. Why read on? Why pick up their book from the far wall where it has been thrown away in disgust and pain, and read on? Why submit to such cruelty, such bad karma, such bad plotting?

The reason is simple: these things happened. They happened countless times, just like this. The oceans are salt with our tears. No one can deny that these things happened.

And so there is no choice in the matter. They cannot escape the wheel of birth and death, not in the experience of it, or in the contemplation of it afterwards; and their anthologist, Old Red Ink himself, must tell their stories honestly, must deal in reality, or else the stories mean nothing. And it is crucial that the stories mean something. ~ Kim Stanley Robinson

My music is a mix of everything, mostly my own life. I just write about things that mean something and that I can write about. There's no point in pretending. ~ Imelda May

Yankees don't understand that the Southern way of talking is a language of nuance. What we can do in the South is we can take a word and change it just a little bit and make it mean something altogether different. ~ Lewis Grizzard

"What does it mean if i'm afraid? Does it mean something bad is going to happen?" "No, it doesn't mean something bad is going to happen. It just means that you have the chance to be brave. ~ C. JoyBell C.

You're a survivor. Voron put you on the edge of that cliff again and again until he conditioned you to claw onto life. You'll do whatever you have to do to survive, and I'm your only chance of getting out. At first you'll balk, but with every passing hour my offer will look better and better. You'll convince yourself that dying will accomplish nothing and you should at least go out with a bang. You'll tell yourself that you're accepting my offer just so you can stick that broken sword into my chest and feel it cut through my heart. Even if you die afterward, the fact that I'll stop breathing makes your death mean something. So you'll call me. And you'll try to kill me. Except you've gone three days without food, and that body . . ." He tilted his head and looked me over slowly. "That body burns through calories like fire goes through gasoline. You're running out of reserves. I can put you down with one hit."
"You're right about the sword. You broke mine. I owe you one."
He tapped his naked chest over his heart. "This is the spot. Give it a shot, Kate. Let's see what happens. ~ Ilona Andrews

Probably only an art-worlder like me could assign deeper meaning to something as simple and silly as Tebowing. But, to us, anytime people repeat a stance or a little dance, alone or together, we see that it can mean something. Imagistic and unspoken language is our thing. ~ Jerry Saltz

Dear you,
Yes, you. The person reading this right now.
If you're anything like me, sometimes you might feel like you don't matter. Like you're completely ordinary, unremarkable, boring, invisible. Like if you disappeared, nobody would notice.
Don't.
Don't feel that way.
You are extraordinary. You are remarkable. You are interesting. You are dazzling. Your presence is noticed and appreciated. You are moonbeams and starlight, a sugar rush, the sound of laughter like bells. You are a soft breeze on a sweltering summer day, the wonder of a year's first snow, and the magic of a million smiling faces.
You mean something to someone out there. You mean something to someone right here. You are important, and the footprints you leave in this world make a difference. Even though you might not always realize it, you are wonderful.
You matter. And I am happy you exist. ~ Emily Trunko

Words cant explain everything.But silence never fails to mean something ~ Anonymous

I care about the records I make and I love writing songs and some songs are really dear to me and they mean something. But the memory of making the records and the activities surrounding the records, the people involved in them is actually a bigger thing to me. ~ Joel Plaskett

I was 23 when I learned how to cook; I grew up around the same time. It was precisely then that Thanksgiving started to mean something more. Growing up, Christmas was always about me, and eventually you, when I finally started to enjoy the giving part. But Thanksgiving is always about us. ~ Rosecrans Baldwin

To have something does not mean to understand it. ~ Sunday Adelaja

My therapist says it's because I have 'daddy' issues. Like that's supposed to mean something to me. How can I have daddy issues when I barely knew the prick? ~ C.M. Stunich