Simple Truth Quotes

It was easier to make excuses, to look for reasons and flaws, than to just admit the simple truth. ~ Romina Russell

The ultimate Truth is so simple. It is nothing more than being in the pristine state. This is all that need be said. till, it is a wonder that to teach this simple Truth there should come into being so many religions, creeds, methods and disputes among them and so on! Oh the pity! Oh the pity! ~ Ramana Maharshi

It was a simple truth; the Creator made women so men would not find life too easy. ~ Robert Jordan

This simple truth is the essence of my message to Muslims throughout the world: know who you are, who you want to be, and start talking and working with whom you are not. Find common values and build with fellow citizens a society based on diversity and equality. ~ Tariq Ramadan

Humans enter this world and awaken to a simple truth: We must find our story with this great epic of being. ~ Brian Swimme

It is far from simple to show the truth, yet the truth is simple. ~ Dziga Vertov

Government has never increased the standard of living of one single human being in civilization's history. For some reason that simple truth has evaded everybody. ~ Steve Wynn

Things weren't ever what they were supposed to be; they were what they were, and that was the simple truth of it, a truth that didn't change just because you wanted it to. ~ Dennis Lehane

But the simple truth is that we've lost control of our own borders, and no nation can do that and survive. ~ Ronald Reagan

If they understand that their paativratyam and fidelity are like these sand pots, they will be able to live in peace.'
Sita was confused.
'To make this pot, you need a lot of concentration. Those who did not know this thought I was making a miracle happen by virtue of my chastity, my paativratyam. Since there was no flaw in my character anyway, I let them think what they liked. Concentration can be broken at any time. The cause may be anything. In my case, a man became the cause of distraction. My husband was enraged. He believed that my paativratyam was violated by the mere act of looking at that man. A good pot is a product of many things - practice, concentration, sand, the right amount of water and so on. Sage Jamadagni was a man of great wisdom, yet he did not understand such a simple truth. But such is the wisdom of these spiritual seekers. No matter how much wisdom they earn through penance, they continue to have a dogmatic view on the paativratyam of their wives.'
Sarcasm was evident in Renuka's voice. ~ Volga

The first of a thousand lies. Truth flowed to Micah Quill, was sucked in and disappeared, and emerged again looking ever so much like it used to, but changed subtly, at the edges, where none would notice, so that simple truth became a complicated fabric indeed, one that could wrap you up so tightly and close you off from the air until you suffocated in it. ~ Orson Scott Card

Darwin's Bestiary

PROLOGUE


Animals tame and animals feral
prowled the Dark Ages in search of a moral:
the canine was Loyal, the lion was Virile,
rabbits were Potent and gryphons were Sterile.
Sloth, Envy, Gluttony, Pride - every peril
was fleshed into something phantasmic and rural,
while Courage, Devotion, Thrift - every bright laurel
crowned a creature in some mythological mural.


Scientists think there is something immoral
in singular brutes having meat that is plural:
beasts are mere beasts, just as flowers are floral.
Yet between the lines there's an implicit demurral;
the habit stays with us, albeit it's puerile:
when Darwin saw squirrels, he saw more than Squirrel.



1. THE ANT


The ant, Darwin reminded us,
defies all simple-mindedness:
Take nothing (says the ant) on faith,
and never trust a simple truth.
The PR men of bestiaries
eulogized for centuries
this busy little paragon,
nature's proletarian -
but look here, Darwin said: some ants
make slaves of smaller ants, and end
exploiting in their peonages
the sweating brows of their tiny drudges.


Thus the ant speaks out of both
sides of its mealy little mouth:
its example is extolled
to the workers of the world,
but its habits also preach
the virtues of ~ Philip Appleman

they seem unable to retain this very simple truth for long, although they have been told again and again, and this is because of another and most powerful feature of their thinking, which is that anything they are told is distorted to fit their own particular personal or group bias and then added, like another pebble to the pile of the half-truths they already cherish. ~ Doris Lessing

I have no aspiration here to reclaim mystery and paradox from whatever territory they might inhabit, for there is, indeed, often a killing in a kiss, a mercy in the slap that heats your face . . . There is, nevertheless, a particular poverty in those alloplasts who, addressing tragedy, seek to subdistinguish motives beyond those we have best, because nearest, at hand, and so it is with love and hate--emotions upon whose necks, whether wrung or wreathed, may be found the oldest fingerprints of man. A simple truth intrudes: the basic instincts of every man to every man are known. But who knows when or where or how? For the answers to such questions, summon Augurello, your personal jurisconsult and theological wiseacre, to teach you about primal reality and then to dispel those complexities and cabals you crouch behind in this sad, psychiatric century you call your own. It is the anti-labyrinths of the world that scare. Here is a story for you. Your chair. ~ Alexander Theroux

Compensation is counterintuitive: The more treasure you give away to those who serve well, the more treasure will return to you. But few people perceive this simple truth. Most try to keep as much as they can for themselves and give little away. That's why their purses refuse to fatten. ~ Toyotomi Hideyoshi

It's just a pretty song until the singer starts. Then something happens. I don't know shit about music, so I couldn't tell you if it's the key she's singing in, or the way her voice slides in between the notes like she's flirting with them, or just the simple truth of her sorrow, coming straight out of her mouth, but whatever it is, the song lays me down and eases all my blissfully aching muscles. It creeps inside my heart, circulates into my bloodstream. ~ Daniel Jose Older

The simple truth is that every human being should be born with basic human rights without suffering from discrimination. ~ Leta B.

Such audacity could never be faked - Locke had to feel it, summon it from somewhere inside, cloak himself in arrogance as though it were an old familiar garment. Locke Lamora became a shadow in his own mind... Locke's complicated lies were this new man's simple truth. ~ Scott Lynch

The simple truth is that happy people generally don't get sick ~ Bernie Siegel

The simple truth of the matter is that people who complain about a peaceful parade which lasts at best one hour in a particular place - ONCE in a whole year - do so out of hatred and intolerance. it isn't just the parade, it is seeing gay and trans people in public - and gay and trans people BEING gay and trans in public. And that is the root of the problem - they HATE gay and trans people. ~ Christina Engela

But I think the thing that takes
me the most courage is realizing that as many oceans as I
might cross, the stupid simple truth will always be on the
other side. ~ Ava Dellaira

The remedy for speech that is false is speech that is true. This is the ordinary course in a free society. The response to the unreasoned is the rational; to the uninformed, the enlightened; to the straight-out lie, the simple truth. ~ Anthony Kennedy

Roosevelt returned to this theme in his fourth inaugural address in 1945: We have learned the simple truth, as Emerson said, that "The only way to have a friend is to be one." We can gain no lasting peace if we approach it with suspicion and mistrust or with fear. ~ Henry Kissinger

Happiness is not the simple purpose of life but it is the ultimate purpose of all purposes of life. ~ Debasish Mridha

The truth is so simple that it is regarded as a pretentious banality. ~ Dag Hammarskjold

Once you acknowledge the simple truth that the key to your own personal joy is nothing more than an emotion that resides within you and can only ever be experienced in the present moment – the Prize of Happiness will be yours. ~ D.S. Luca

The truth is simple, you do not die from love. You only wish you did. ~ Erica Jong

The words of truth are simple. ~ Aeschylus

Anybody who says "I know how to get to God and you don't, do this and do that and go here and go there" is going to become 1. very powerful and 2. very rich. The simple truth is, if I am with God, no less can you be with God at the same time as I am. ~ C. JoyBell C.

This We Have Now

This we have no
is not imagination.

This is not
grief or joy.

Not a judging state,
or an elation,
or sadness.

Those come
and go.

This is the presence
that doesn't.

It's dawn, Husam,
here in the splendor of coral,
inside the Friend, the simple truth
of what Hallaj said.

What else could human beings want?

When grapes turn to wine
they're wanting
this.

When the nightsky pours by,
it's really a crowd of beggars,
and they all want some of this!

This
that we are now
created the body, cell by cell,
like bees building a honeycomb.

The human body and the universe
grew from this, not this
from the universe and the human body. ~ Jalaluddin Rumi

Vivid simplicity is the articulation, the nature of genius. Wisdom is greater than intelligence; intelligence is greater than philosobabble. ~ Criss Jami

The perfect beauty of the pattern that each raindrop makes as it joins its puddle. ~ Jay Woodman

While the notion that torture works has been glorified in television shows and movies, the simple truth is this: torture has never been an effective interrogation method. ~ Jerrold Nadler

Here was the shattering of the second wall: I had read the Bible many times through, and I saw for myself that it had a holy Author; I saw for myself that it was a canonized collection of sixty-six books with a unified biblical revelation. I heard for myself that when the words "this is mine" came out of my mouth in congregational singing, I was attesting to this one, simple truth: that the line of communication that God ordained for his people required this wrestling with Scripture, and that I truly wanted both to hear God's voice breathed in my life, and I wanted God to hear my pleas. The fog burned away. The whole Bible, each jot and tittle, was my open highway to a holy God. ~ Rosaria Champagne Butterfield

When a man loses superiority, he loses potency. That's what all this talk about castrating women is about. Castrating women are those who refuse to pretend men are better than they are and better than women are. The simple truth - that men are only equal - can undermine a culture more devastatingly than any bomb. Subversion is telling the truth. ~ Marilyn French

Children are happy because they have the power of finding happiness in the simplest things. ~ Debasish Mridha

One of the great truths of Scientology is that increased awareness is the only factor which offers any road out. That is an awfully simple truth, but you'll find out that people don't know that. They think that less awareness is the road out - and that is the road down into the basement. ~ L. Ron Hubbard

It is a mistake easily made by every man, saint or scholar, Church leader or day laborer. Ultimately, we come to expect God to accept our understanding of what his will ought to be and to help us fulfill that, instead of learning to see and accept his will in the real situations in which he places us daily. The simple soul who each day makes a morning offering of "all the prayers, works, joys, and sufferings of this day" - and who then acts upon it by accepting unquestioningly and responding lovingly to all the situations of the day as truly sent by God - has perceived with an almost childlike faith the profound truth about the will of God. To predict what God's will is going to be, to rationalize about what his will must be, is at once a work of human folly and yet the subtlest of all temptations. The plain and simple truth is that his will is that he actually wills to send us each day, in the way of circumstances, places, people, and problems. The trick is to learn to see that - not just in theory, or not just occasionally in a flash of insight granted by God's grace, but every day. ~ Father Walter J. Ciszek

Our eyes tell us what we want to believe, but our heart tells us only the simple truth ~ Karla M. Nashar

It is so simple, to be happy think happiness. ~ Debasish Mridha

Observing the stream of eternal and simple truth is the same for all who look upon the fountainhead of consciousness. ~ Bryant McGill

I am fascinated by language in daily life: the way it can evoke an emotion, a visual image, a complex idea, or a simple truth. ~ Amy Tan

Can it be that a generation of school children is growing up heedless of the simple truth that the Pentagon's centrla role for many years has been to buy weapons that don't work, against threats that don't exist? ~ Alexander Cockburn

One of the principles that we operate on in this country is that leaders are held accountable. The simple truth is that we went into Iraq on the basis of some intuition, some fear, and some exaggerated rhetoric and some very, very scanty evidence. ~ Wesley Clark

Happiness isn't some thing in the material world that can be acquired and stored and used when needed or wanted. If it were, I'd give you a lifetime supply that would guarantee a happy life. No - happiness is an attitude that comes from within you. It's accessible when you place in your imagination an I am statement that reflects your attunement with the simple truth that happiness is indeed an inside job. Happiness is an inner belief that you bring to everyone and everything you undertake, rather than expecting your happiness to come to you from others or from your accomplishments and acquisitions. There is no way to happiness, happiness is the way. ~ Wayne W. Dyer

While she cut the mushrooms, she cried more than she had at the grave, the most so far, because she found the saddest thing of all to be the simple truth of her capacity to move on. ~ Aimee Bender

Men always believe they are in control of everything around them. When they find out they are not, they think they have failed, instead of learning a simple truth women already know. ~ Robert Jordan

There is no ready vocabulary to describe the ways in which artists become artists, no recognition that artists must learn to be who they are (even as they cannot help being who they are.) We have a language that reflects how we learn to paint, but not how we learn to paint our paintings. How do you describe the [reader to place words here] that changes when craft swells to art?

"Artists come together with the clear knowledge that when all is said and done, they will return to their studio and practice art alone. Period. That simple truth may be the deepest bond we share. The message across time from the painted bison and the carved ivory seal speaks not of the differences between the makers of that art and ourselves, but of the similarities. Today these similarities lay hidden beneath urban complexity -- audience, critics, economics, trivia -- in a self-conscious world. Only in those moments when we are truly working on our own work do we recover the fundamental connection we share with all makers of art. The rest may be necessary, but it's not art. Your job is to draw a line from your art to your life that is straight and clear. ~ David Bayles

Boiled down to its core, the truth is always a simple, solid thing ~ David Simon

Recruiters, for terrorist cells and police forces and armies, relied on this simple truth: if you got people young enough, they could be made to do just about anything. ~ Louise Penny

The simple truth is that love is a part of who we are, not something that others "give" to us if we're worthy of it. We're taught that if we just find that right person, and that person "falls in love" with us, everything will be fine. We're not taught about recognizing the love that is a part of our spirits, the love that we radiate when we recognize the beauty and need in all the people that surround us. Love is ours to share, at all moments and in all situations, but for some reason we fear doing so. ~ Tom Walsh

I would like to say that I have software that allows me to model worlds to a high degree of scientific plausibility. I'd also like to be six foot two and fifteen years into my reign as Emperor of Europa. The simple truth is that past the character's name and a long history of making my own body cover distances, I did very little in the way of targeted research. ~ Robert Reed

On both sides thus is simple truth suppressed. ~ William Shakespeare

Most people live in fear of some terrible event changing their lives, the death of a loved one or a serious illness. For the chronically ill, this terrible event has already happened, and we have been let in on an amazing secret: You survive. You adapt, and your life changes, but in the end you go on, with whatever compromises you have been forced to make, whatever losses you have been forced to endure. You learn to balance your fears with the simple truth that you must go on living. ~ Jamie Weisman

What's Your Purple Goldfish? busts a myth and reveals a simple truth about customer service. Stan uncovers the recipe for creating signature added value that increases customer satisfaction and drives positive word of mouth. ~ Barry Moltz

The simple truth is ordinary, open and shared by all. ~ Cheryl Abram

That's the problem with any 'simple truth' - it always takes a gaggle of complete idiots or a team of all-knowing geniuses to miss it. ~ Ali Sheikh

There is nothing so strong or safe in an emergency of life as the simple truth. ~ Charles Dickens

It has to be simple, but then you deliver them a principle: The simple truth is, as a matter of principle, we cannot spend more than we take in. Something - that changes the tone of the debate. ~ Frank Luntz

She'd always known a simple truth: Intimacy was the heart of marriage. Not just sex. Intimacy meant doing things together, and being together. In marriage, you were no longer just one person, but two-in-one. Part of a greater whole. Both halves needed to make sacrifices for the union to work, but in the best marriages, those sacrifices were small, because the two halves were so even, and so compatible. ~ Deborah Davitt

It is the simple truth that man does differ from the brutes in kind and not in degree; and the proof of it is here; that it sounds like a truism to say that the most primitive man drew a picture of a monkey and that it sounds like a joke to say that the most intelligent monkey drew a picture of a man. Something of division and disproportion has appeared; and it is unique. Art is the signature of man. ~ G.K. Chesterton

...we all face similar pressures to forget the simple truth of who we are. Particularly the truths that don't jive with what we see around us. As time wears us down we can forget who we once were. ~ Ted Dekker

Live simply so that others may simply live was marvelously observed by St. Elizabeth Seton . If this simple truth could only be programmed into the human DNA, imagine the possibilities. Until than, the education of the human heart is the answer and our only hope. ~ Adam Kovacevic

We are turning against boys and forgetting a simple truth: that the energy, competitiveness, and corporal daring of normal, decent males is responsible for much of what is right in the world. ~ Christina Hoff Sommers

I would prefer," Pat said, his voice a little stiff, as if he expected resistance, "that I be the cosigner on the loan, if you go through with this. I know I'm not a famous billionaire, but I think my credit's just as good."
No, you're wrong about that," Tess said, shaking her head.
What?"
As far as I'm concerned, it's better. I'd much rather do business with you."
They shook on it. It was a deal, after all, not a time for hugging.
Favors, Arnie Vasso had once said. Your father knows all about favors. He had meant it as an insult, a sly reference to the corners the Monaghans and Weinsteins cut here and there. Now Tess saw it for the simple truth it was: Her father understood favors. How to do them, how to accept them, how to walk away when the price was too steep. It was a lesson she wouldn't mind learning someday.
Maybe this was the place to start. ~ Laura Lippman

It is a simple truth that if we identify ourselves as being fundamentally pure, strong, and capable we will actually develop these qualities, but if we continue to think of ourselves as dull and foolish, that is what we will become. ~ Thubten Yeshe

The pure and simple truth, it has been said, is rarely pure and never simple. ~ Ben Mercer

It's the simple truth that mortal men cannot understand why the gods shape events as they do. Why some men and women are cut off in fullest flower, while others live to dwindle into shadows of themselves. Why virtue must sometimes be trampled and evil flourish amidst the beauty of a country garden. Why chance, sheer random chance, plays such an overwhelming role in the life lines and fate lines of men. ~ Guy Gavriel Kay

Alice knew that being different would always be difficult; she knew that there was no magic that would erase narrow-mindedness or iron out the inequities in life. But Alice was also beginning to learn that life was never lived in absolutes. People would both love her and rebuff her; they would show both kindness and prejudice. The simple truth was that Alice would always be different - but to be different was to be extraordinary, and to be extraordinary was an adventure. It no longer mattered how the world saw her; what mattered was how Alice saw herself. Alice ~ Tahereh Mafi

Man has gone long enough, or even too long, without being man enough to face the simple truth that the trouble with man is man. ~ James Thurber

The simple truth is that our businessmen do not want a government that will let business alone. They want a government they can use. ~ Albert J. Nock

A joke is a good camouflage. Next best comes sentiment ... But the best camouflage of all - in my opinion - is the plain and simple truth. Because nobody ever believes it. ~ Max Frisch

All great truths are simple in final analysis, and easily understood; if they are not, they are not great truths. ~ Napoleon Hill

You need nothing more than the experience you are having right now. It is enough. It is plenty. It is perfect just as it is. It was designed for you, given to you for your experience. All you have to do, and all you have ever had to do is accept this gift. Take it and let it in. Let yourself experience the present moment just as it is. It doesn't get any better than this. This is the simple truth the ego refuses to accept, and it will suffer as long as that is the case. ~ Gina Lake

I was in control of what people thought of me, but I had no control over what they thought of my mother. When I asked my mother, 'How do I tell people about you?' her answer was, 'Tell the truth'. But of course, the truth is never simple. ~ Jeannette Walls

However much the universe and its mysteries might call him, this was where he was born and where he belonged. It would never satisfy him, yet always he would return. He had gone half-way across the Galaxy to learn this simple truth. ~ Arthur C. Clarke

How torturous is the "churchly" language one must speak in church - the tone, style, habit. It is all artificial; there is a total absence of a simple human language. With what a sigh of relief one leaves this world of cassocks, and kissing and church gossip. As soon as one leaves, one sees: wet bare branches, fog which floats over fields, trees, homes. Sky. Early dusk. And it all tells an incredibly simple truth. ~ Alexander Schmemann

Historians desiring to write the actions of men, ought to set down the simple truth, and not say anything for love or hatred; also to choose such an opportunity for writing as it may be lawful to think what they will, and write what they think, which is a rare happiness of the time. ~ Walter Raleigh

What is the point of our lives? There isn't any. I can't seem to decide how much horror and how much joy lies within that simple truth, but I know it is both of those things at once. ~ Ashly Lorenzana

It's not possible to have a problem without believing a prior thought. To notice this simple truth is the beginning of peace. ~ Byron Katie

Gender is a way to hide from the simple truth we all tell: 'Hey, I'm here, I have a body.' ~ Susan Griffin

Later, I began to succeed in decisive games. Perhaps because I realized a very simple truth: not only was I worried, but also my opponent ~ Mikhail Tal

The simple truth is that the Web the Internet, does one thing. It speeds up the retrieval and dissemination of information, partially eliminating such chores as going outdoors to the mailbox or the adult bookstore, or having to pick up the phone to get hold of your stockbroker or some buddies to shoot the breeze with. That one thing the Internet does, and only that. All the rest is Digibabble. ~ Tom Wolfe

Here's the simple truth that isn't so simple: Raising kids to be different from the world really does make them different from the world. ~ Kristen Welch

Note well! Whenever you present the actual, simple truth, it is, somehow, always denounced as a lie: they disown it, cast it off, throw it on the parish; whereas the product of your own imagination, the mere figment, the sheer fiction, is adopted, petted, termed pretty, proper, sweetly natural: the little, spurious wretch gets all the comfits, - the honest, lawful bantling, all the cuffs. Such ~ Charlotte Bronte

He awakened to the simple truth that it is never what a person says or does that affects him, it is his reaction to what is said or done that matters. ~ Joseph Murphy

Why do you dwell on things that don't matter when there are so many things that do? ~ Dennis Sharpe

Because all the societies, all the nations, all the cultures, have taken it for granted that the individuals exist for them, not vice-versa. To me, just the opposite is the case: the society exists for the individual, the culture exists for the individual, the nation exists for the individual. Everything can be sacrificed, but the individual cannot be sacrificed for anything. Individuality is the very flowering of existence - nothing is higher than it. But no culture, no society, no civilization is ready to accept a simple truth. ~ Rajneesh

It's a simple truth that a secret is something you're ashamed of. ~ Deb Caletti

The simple truth is, the short-term solution is for the FDA to allow more importation of safe vaccines from other nations. But the long-term solution is to get more vaccine production within the U.S. ~ Larry Craig

Here's a secret: Everyone, if they live long enough, will lose their way at some point. You will lose your way, you will wake up one morning and find yourself lost. This is a hard, simple truth. If it hasn't happened to you yet, consider yourself lucky. When it does, when one day you look around and nothing is recognizable, when you find yourself alone in a dark wood having lost the way, you may find it easier to blame it on someone else
an errant lover, a missing father, a bad childhood
or it may be easier to blame the map you were given
folded too many times, out-of-date, tiny print
but mostly, if you are honest, you will only be able to blame yourself.
One day I'll tell my daughter a story about a dark time, the dark days before she was born, and how her coming was a ray of light. We got lost for a while, the story will begin, but then we found our way. ~ Nick Flynn

There is just the simple truth that you must forgive yourself for only being able to make your own choices, and no one else's. ~ Susan Meissner

The simple truth is that being a creative artist takes courage; it's not a job for the faint of heart. It takes courage each and every time you put a book or poem or painting before the public, because it is, in fact, enormously revealing. ~ Terri Windling

Peeking in the rearview mirror as she pulled away, she saw that Dawson was still standing where she'd left him, as if hoping she'd change her mind and turn the car around. She felt the stirrings of something dangerous, something she'd been trying to deny. He still loved her, she was certain of that now, and the realization was intoxicating. She knew it was wrong, and she tried to force the feeling away, but Dawson and their past had taken root once more, and she could no longer deny the simple truth that for the first time in years, she'd felt like she'd finally come home. ~ Nicholas Sparks

The pure and simple truth is rarely pure and never simple. ~ Oscar Wilde

The Limoges set has brought us more joy in its absence than it ever did in our cupboards. Of course, we no longer own a set of china to pass down to our kids, but that's okay. Francois and I plan on giving our children something more valuable, the simple truth that the best way to go through life is to be a major donor of kindness. We'll tell them that it's possible to own a whole bunch of beautiful, valuable things and still be miserable. But sometimes just having a recipe for chocolate Bunt cake can make a person far, far happier. ~ Firoozeh Dumas

The science of the spirit and its relationship to the body in which it indwells is a complex conundrum. Life is not what it appears to be. Life is wholesome, and this unison of synergistic amalgamations persuade the common view that one thing is the other. But one thing is many things - at the one time - and this simple truth goes to the essence of all life with its manifold complexities. ~ Gabriel Brunsdon

It is a simple logic truth that, short of mass emigration into space, with rockets taking off at the rate of several million per second, uncontrolled birth-rates are bound to lead to horribly increased death –rates. It is hard to believe that this simple truth is not understood by those leaders who forbid their followers to use effective contraceptive methods. They express a preference for 'natural' methods of population limitation, and a natural method is exactly what they are going to get. It is called starvation. ~ Richard Dawkins

he came to realize a simple truth: Working right trumps finding the right work. He didn't need to have a perfect job to find occupational happiness - he needed instead a better approach to the work already available to him. ~ Cal Newport

The human brain has the computational efficiency of 10^-26. You are an abacus of horse guts and shiny beads beside me. You do not understand. Cannot comprehend. And I have no time to bend the meat inside your skull and make it grasp the simple truth that still somehow eludes you. ~ Amie Kaufman