World class is a phrase used by provincial cities and second-rate entertainment events, as well as a wide variety of insecure individuals, to assert that they are not provincial or second-rate, thereby confirming that they are.

I have a theory of statistics: if you can double them or halve them and they still work, they are really good statistics.

Faith: The opposite of dogmatism.

The faithful witness, like...Socrates, Voltaire, and Swift and Christ himself, is at his best when he is questioning and clarifying and avoiding the specialists obsession with solution. He betrays society when he is silent...He is true to himself and to people when his clarity causes disquiet.

In a society of ideological believers, nothing is more ridiculous than the individual who doubts and does not conform.

The citizen's job is to be rude - to pierce the comfort of professional intercourse by boorish expressions of doubt.

In general, democracy and individualism have advanced in spite of and often against specific economic interest. Both democracy and individualism have been based upon financial sacrifice, not gain. Even in Athens, a large part of the 7,000 citizens who participated regularly in assemblies were farmers who had to give up several days' work to go into town to talk and listen.