…the fundamentally intractable problem of any democratic order is, precisely, authority.

— Alan Jacobs, How to Think

…you shouldn’t hire managers who want to reorg because they read a blog post that said engineering teams work better when structured this particular way or that particular way.

— Marianne Bellotti, Kill It With Fire

When you beat up someone physically, you get exercise and stress relief; when you assault him verbally on the Internet, you just harm yourself.

— Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Bed of Procrustes

Research has shown that we automatically assign to good-looking individuals such favorable traits as talent, kindness, honesty, and intelligence (for a review of this evidence, see Eagly, Ashmore, Makhijani, and Longo, 1991). Furthermore, we make these judgments without being aware that physical attractiveness plays a role in the process.

— Eliezer Yudkowsky, How to Actually Change Your Mind

We abase providence too much by ascribing our own notions to it, being vexed that we can’t understand it. But, again, if it’s impossible to understand it, then, I repeat, it is hard to have to answer for something it is not given to man to understand. And if so, how are they going to judge me for being unable to understand the true will and laws of providence?

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Idiot