Necessary Elements Quotes

A career is like a house: it's made of many bricks, and each brick has the same value, because without any one of them, the house would collapse.

By irreducibly complex I mean a single system composed of several well-matched, interacting parts that contribute to the basic function, wherein the removal of any one of the parts causes the system to effectively cease functioning.

You can't just leave out one part; the bread won't rise if the yeast isn't there.

There is a difference between something being essential, and it being necessary. If you take your favorite book and strip it down to what is merely essential to tell the story, it would be butchery. The end result would horrify you. Essential is the bones of the story, but the soul lives somewhere else.

Potatoes are to food what sensible shoes are to fashion.

The principle of parsimony is valid esthetically in that the artist must not go beyond what is needed for his purpose.

An invention or new combination can be successful only if all if the elements necessary for the recombination are present in the culture.

General principles are not the less true or important because from their nature they elude immediate observation; they are like the air, which is not the less necessary because we neither see nor feel it.