Quotes About Definition

In this statement, my Scipio, I build on your own admirable definition, that there can be no community, properly so called, unless it be regulated by a combination of rights. And by this definition it appears that a multitude of men may be just as tyrannical as a single despot and indeed this is the most odious of all tyrannies, since no monster can be more barbarous than the mob, which assumes the name and mask of the people.

After a great deal of discussion in Soviet literature about the correct definition of a combination, it was decided that from the point of view of a methodical approach it was best to settle on this definition - A combination is a forced variation with a sacrifice.

99 per cent of your life recognises things without definition, a baby recognises its mother's face without having it defined. It's just an arbitrary rule this rule of definition that Socrates set down.

No man, not even a doctor, ever gives any other definition of what a nurse should be than this-'devoted and obedient.' This definition would do just as well for a porter. It might even do for a horse. It would not do for a policeman.

I don't read the Bible as the literal word of God; I don't view Jesus as a God. I've rejected both those statements. I view Jesus as a model for how we should live, and by that definition I do consider myself a Christian.

My definition of love is being full. Complete. It makes everything lighter. Beauty is something you see. Love is something you feel.

I don't think feminism, as I understand the definition, implies the rejection of maternal values, nurturing children, caring about the men in your life. That is just nonsense to me.

The definition of terrorism has to be more precise, so that we are able to discriminate between, for example, what it is that the Palestinians are doing to fight the Israeli military occupation and terrorism of the sort that resulted in the World Trade Center bombing.

Myths, by their definition, involve transformations, struggles through various worlds or layers of reality and of obscuration.

Mosts scientist are unable to arrive at a specific definition of biological evolution. “Biological evolution is… change in the properties of populations of organisms (you and me) that [happen during] the lifetime of a single individual. The changes in populations that are considered evolutionary are those that are inheritable via the genetic material from one generation to the next

Obviously, I believe that to pursue the American Dream is not only futile but self-destructive because ultimately it destroys everything and everyone involved with it. By definition it must, because it nurtures everything except those things that are important: integrity, ethics, truth, our very heart and soul. Why? The reason is simple: because Life/life is giving, not getting.

A fan is always an outsider. Most sportswriters are not, by this definition, fans. They capitalize on access to athletes. They spoke to Kobe last night, and Kobe says his finger is going to be fine. They spent three days fly-fishing with Brett Favre in March, and Brett says he's definitely coming back for another season.

To be wrong, and to be carefully wrong, that is the definition of decadence.

It's not easy having a good marriage--but I don't want easy. Easy doesn't make you grow. Easy doesn't make you think. I thank God everyday that I am married to a man who makes me think. That's my definition of true love.

I look white to a lot of people. And I'm not. I'm African-American. I'm mixed. I like to call myself Mulatto because that definition fits. So, you know, I've dealt with the conflict my whole life between how I look and my actual ethnic and racial identity.

For the record, feminism by definition is: 'The belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities. It is the theory of the political, economic and social equality of the sexes.'

My briefest ever definition of science fiction is 'Hubris clobbered by Nemesis.'

This was the definition of eternity; it was the space of time devised by the Great God Om to ensure that everyone got the punishment that was due to them.

The most important definition of an actor, the job of the actor, is to serve the writer, not yourself. Way too many actors serve themselves.

I will give you a definition of a proud man: he is a man who has neither vanity nor wisdom one filled with hatreds cannot be vain, neither can he be wise.

I think we need to sort of broaden our definition of poetry, which maybe it's a good thing that they just gave this Nobel Prize to [Bob] Dylan because blurring the lines of song lyrics and also hip-hop for me is like some of the greatest uses - most innovative uses of language in my lifetime.

They say the definition of ambivalence is watching your mother-in-law drive over a cliff in your new Cadillac.

I have a type of bipolar that swings up and down all day long. There are significant mood swings within a day, within a week, within a month. I go through at least four major episodes a year. That's really the definition of bipolar rapid cycle. But I have ultra-rapid, so I have tiny little episodes all day long.

Definition of love: capacity to forgive endlessly.

Under capitalism, we can't have democracy by definition. Capitalism is a system in which the central institutions of society are in principle under autocratic control.

Many people believe that decentralization means loss of control. That's simply not true. You can improve control if you look at control as the control of events and not people. Then, the more people you have controlling events - the more people you have that care about controlling the events, the more people you have proactively working to create favorable events - the more control you have within the organization, by definition.

The essence of man is imperfection. Failure is simply a price we pay to achieve success. If we learn to embrace that new definition of failure, then we are free to start moving ahead - and failing forward.

If God is Love, He is, by definition, something more than mere kindness. And it appears, from all the records, that though He has often rebuked us and condemned us, He has never regarded us with contempt. He has paid us the intolerable compliment of loving us, in the deepest, most tragic, most inexorable sense.

The very idea of "managing" a forest in the first place is oxymoronic, because a forest is an ecosystem that is by definition self-managing.

My definition of learning is to remember what you are interested in. If you don't remember something, you haven't learned it, and you are never going to remember something unless you are interested in it. These words dance together. 'Interest' is another holy word and drives 'memory'. Combine them and you have learning.

The world has never had a good definition of the word liberty, and the American people, just now, are much in want of one. We all declare for liberty; but in using the same word we do not all mean the same thing.

If Aristotle, Livy, and Harrington knew what a republic was, the British constitution is much more like a republic than an empire. They define a republic to be a government of laws, and not of men. If this definition is just, the British constitution is nothing more or less than a republic, in which the king is first magistrate. This office being hereditary, and being possessed of such ample and splendid prerogatives, is no objection to the government's being a republic, as long as it is bound by fixed laws, which the people have a voice in making, and a right to defend.

When the media defines something, you have to question: Is it the definition that you want applied to your culture? I'm trying to determine who's leaving the legacy, and if the legacy that is being left is a positive one.

The single definition of government I've ever seen that makes sense is that it's the organization which claims the right to kill people who won't do what it wants.

One would expect that private property taken by eminent domain would become land available for public use such as parks and roads. Unfortunately, this decision creates a loophole for government to manipulate the definition of public use simply to generate greater tax revenue.

Our task, of course, is to transmute the anger that is affliction into the anger that is determination to bring about change. I think, in fact, that one could give that as a definition of revolution.

On Facebook, the definition of great content is not the content that makes the most sales, but the content that people most want to share with others.

Proponents of same-sex marriage regularly label opponents 'radical' and 'extremist.' However, given that no society in thousands of years has allowed same-sex marriage, it is, by definition, the proponents of same-sex marriage whose position is radical and extreme.

Love can't be pinned down by a definition, and it certainly can't be proved, any more than anything else important in life can be proved.

The man who knows governments most completely is he who troubles himself least about a definition which shall give their essence. Enjoying an intimate acquaintance with all their particularities in turn, he would naturally regard an abstract conception in which these were unified as a thing more misleading than enlightening.

Sanity and enlightenment...I've been reading a new book Dogen's Genjo Koan: Three Commentaries, and it contains a commentary on Genjo Koan by Shunryu Suzuki, the author who wrote Zen Mind, Beginners Mind. He doesn't mention sanity at all but I think that one possible definition of enlightenment would be a kind of profound sanity, where being insane is no longer an option.

My definition of innovative is providing value to the customer.

There is one class of mind that loves to lean on rules and definitions, and another that discards them as far as possible. A faddist will generally ask for a definition of faddism, and one who is not a faddist will be impatient of being asked to give one.

The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, selfappointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.

In this society, the norm of masculinity is phallic aggression. Male sexuality is, by definition, intensely and rigidly phallic. A man's identity is located in his conception of himself as the possessor of a phallus; a man's worth is located in his pride in phallic identity. The main characteristic of phallic identity is that worth is entirely contingent on the possession of a phallus. Since men have no other criteria for worth, no other notion of identity, those who do not have phalluses are not recognized as fully human.

I've never used High Definition video, never, ever, ever, ever, ever. And I never will. I can't stand that crap.

Friendship- my definition- is built on two things. Respect and trust. Both elements have to be there. And it has to be mutual. You can have respect for someone, but if you don't have trust, the friendship will crumble.

In politics, the definition of a real man is different from, I would say, outside Washington or outside the establishment. I don't think that's even arguable. But human nature is what it is, and men (straight men) want women. And it's always a challenge. It's never a piece of cake. You're rejected. You know Woody Allen? One funny thing he really said. Somebody said, "Woody, what has success meant?" He said, "It means being rejected by a higher class of woman." Life is filled with rejection. Men - nobody - women, they don't like rejection.