Gregory Benford Quotes

Whether we and our politicians know it or not, Nature is party to all our deals and decisions, and she has more votes, a longer memory, and a sterner sense of justice than we do.

I discovered that the people of the North are different and there's no way you can make a person from the North similar to a Southerner. They're two different worlds.

I think we are bound to, and by, nature. We may want to deny this connection and try to believe we control the external world, but every time there's a snowstorm or drought, we know our fate is tied to the world around us.

At the descriptive level, certainly, you would expect different cultures to develop different sorts of ethics and obviously they have; that doesn't mean that you can't think of overarching ethical principles you would want people to follow in all kinds of places.

I feel American comedy is a little too light. World cinema, and Latin cinema, is much more comfortable with darker emotions.

American audiences and European and Asian audiences are so different.

I feel like that nature has this great power.

There are those who argue that the concept of human rights is not applicable to all cultures. We in the National League for Democracy believe that human rights are of universal relevance. But even those who do not believe in human rights must certainly agree that the rule of law is most important. Without the rule of law there can be no peace.

There is the philosophy embedded in the culture we are living. It is quite clear for example that Arabs have a different culture than Malaysians.

When I go to Europe or South America, they laugh at things that are totally different than what Americans would laugh at. It's just so crazy how we're so different in personalities with other people.

Each man calls barbarism whatever is not his own practice; for indeed it seems we have no other test of truth and reason than the example and pattern of the opinions and customs of the country we live in

We studied a mosque, and this is when we were at Notre Dame, and in this mosque they had people from a variety of countries, most of them immigrants. In some of the countries, when you go into a mosque you remove your shoes. To not do so could be punishable even by death in that nation. In other countries, it would be a great offense to remove their shoes when they come into the mosque, a sign of disrespect.

One of the real challenges, since we're working in so many places - Mexico, Japan, Brazil - is understanding variations, both in terms of culture and context.

There is nothing so extreme that is not allowed by the custom of some nation or other.

Islam does give human dignity, certainly. The point I wanted to make is that it is great foolishness to try to impose our notions of democracy. They have their own traditions.

If we had to take a million immigrants in, say Zulus, next year, or Englishmen, and put them up in Virginia, what group would be easier to assimilate and would cause less problems for the people of Virginia?

I just think you Westerners should take over this country if you are so smart.

In traditional societies, nature was seen as one’s wife, but the modern West turned it into a prostitute.

The key to community is the acceptance, in fact the celebration of our individual and cultural differences. It is also the key to world peace

In the vaunted works of Art, The master-stroke is Nature's part.

There's no reason to trade insults. We have our way of life and they have theirs. I wouldn't live as they do, but disrespect seems pointless. I'm sure there are good people among them.

A culture is the sum of all the things about which humanity can choose to differ.

This sign I give you: every people speaks its tongue of good and evil, which the neighbor does not understand. It has invented its own language of customs and rights.

Man is the broken giant, and in all his weakness both his body and his mind are invigorated by habits of conversation with nature.

No difference exists between American and European manners. A proletarian from Chicago can be just as Philistine as an English duke.