It Has Been Said

Abstract

IT HAS BEEN SAID and collected by WILLIAM A. SILVERMAN* "I hope this bread cast upon the waters will return as ham sandwiches."— Preston Sturges "Graffiti on a wall: 'Life is one contradiction after another.' Under this another street philosopher wrote: 'It is not!' " "Here are the opinions on which my facts are based."—Anon. "The evils of controversy are temporary, its benefits are permanent."—The Rev. Robert Hall "There is a persistent unwillingness of the human mind to accept persuasion that is in conflict with evidence. All who exercise power find this latter obstinacy by far the most annoying tendency with which they have to contend."—John Kenneth Galbraith "The natural course of the human mind [proceeds] from credulity to skepticism ."—Thomas Jefferson "You can prove almost anything with the evidence of a small enough segment of time. How often in the search for truth the answer of the minute is positive, the answer of the hour qualified, the answers of the year contradictory!"— Edwin Way Teale "Do not do unto others as you would have them do unto you. They may have different tastes."—George Bernard Shaw Material appearing under this title is collected with the aim of making the serious a bit less serious, the ponderous a bit less heavy, and the reading hours a bit more fun. Toward this goal we invite a guest editor of this feature for each issue. Will readers volunteer to share their senses of humor by collecting or recollecting items that have brought smiles to their faces? We invite your participation. Originals are also welcomed. *Address: 90 La Cuesta Drive, Greenbrae, California 94904. 530 It Has Been Said "The dialogue between the 18th century doctor and patient that began with 'What is the matter with you?' has been replaced in the past 150 years with the question, 'Where does it hurt?' "—Michael Foucault "Millions yearn for immortality who do not know what to do with themselves on a rainy Sunday afternoon."—Anon. "The first key to wisdom is called interrogation ... By doubting we are led to inquiry; and from inquiry we perceive the truth."—Peter Abelard "Get your facts first, then you can distort them as much as you please."—Mark Twain "Statistics are like a bikini, what they reveal is suggestive but what they conceal is vital."—Anon. "The unspeakable in pursuit of the inedible."—Oscar Wilde, description ofthe fox hunt "Muckraking, now called investigative reporting, is a public service to Americans , who need their daily muck to feel healthily democratic."—J. K. Fairbank "May you live in interesting times."—Old Chinese Curse "Anecdotalists use statistics the way a drunk uses a lampost—more for support than illumination."—Anon. "16th century view of life and death: life is short—it is a precarious interlude to be endured. Death is a beginning. At present: life is a long protection to be enjoyed. Death is an ending."—Anon. "Nor bring to watch me cease to live Some Doctor, full of phrase and fame To shake his sapient head and give The ill he cannot cure—a name." Matthew Arnold "Opponents of abortion sometimes argue that a fetus 'wants' to grow up into a real person. But every egg and sperm also want to become a person in this sense. And if that is the case, how can one defend either contraception or celibacy, both of which deny life to millions of eggs and sperms that 'want' to become people, and both of which involve repression of 'natural' impulses?"—Christopher Jenks "We are surrounded by priests of yogurt, single causers. God's in his chariot, headed for the Bermuda Triangle. It's enough to clog the corpus callosum."— John Leonard Perspectives in Biology and Medicine, 29, 4 ¦ Summer 1986 \ 53 1 "No paper, once written, remains unpublished."—Chargaff's Rule "The society which scorns excellence in plumbing because plumbing is a humble activity and tolerates shoddiness in philosophy because it is an exalted activity will have neither good plumbing nor good philosophy. Neither its pipes nor its theories will hold water."—John Gardner "... a scientific race to 'get there first' is tremendously wasteful, and . . . anything that lessens the reward for such achievement is...