Surgeons

"...a peculiar condition of the nervous system, induced by a fixed and abstracted attention of the mental and visual eye, on one object, not of an exciting nature."

"...the real origin and essence of the hypnotic condition, is the induction of a habit of abstraction or mental concentration, in which, as in reverie or spontaneous abstraction, the powers of the mind are so much engrossed with a single idea or train of thought, as, for the nonce, to render the individual unconscious of, or indifferently conscious to, all other ideas, impressions, or trains of thought. The hypnotic sleep, therefore, is the very antithesis or opposite mental and physical condition to that which precedes and accompanies common sleep..."

"...by the term Hypnotism, or Nervous Sleep, I mean a peculiar condition of the nervous system, into which it may be thrown by artificial contrivance, and which differs, in several respects, from common sleep or the waking condition. I do not allege that this condition is induced through the transmission of a magnetic or occult influence from my body into that of my patients; nor do I profess, by my processes, to produce the higher [i.e., supernatural] phenomena of the Mesmerists. My pretensions are of a much more humble character, and are all consistent with generally admitted principles in physiological and psychological science. Hypnotism might therefore not inaptly be designated, Rational Mesmerism, in contra-distinction to the Transcendental Mesmerism of the Mesmerists.[ Braid, Observations on Trance or Human Hibernation, 1850, 'Preface."

"...during a period in history psychology was still a branch of academic philosophy. The psychological concepts developed by philosophers of mind, such as “dominant ideas” (akin to the automatic thoughts of Beck’s cognitive therapy) “habit and association” (a subjective precursor of Pavlovian conditioning), and “imitation and sympathy” (which we now call “role-modelling” and “empathy”), are repeatedly mentioned by Braid as the theoretical framework upon which his science of hypnotism, “neuro-hypnology”, was built. Braid’s friend and collaborator, Prof. William B. Carpenter, discusses the theoretical principles of this in his Principles of Mental Physiology (1889), especially in the chapter ‘Of Common Sense’ which concludes by quoting an approving letter from the philosopher John Stuart Mill sent to Carpenter in 1872. Mill agrees with Carpenter’s contention that “common sense”, by which he means a kind of intellectual intuition analogous to the ancient Greek concept of nous, is a combination of innate and acquired judgements, which have a “reflexive” or “automatic” quality and appear to consciousness as “self-evident” truths."

"It is commonly said that seeing is believing, but feeling is the very truth. I shall, therefore, give the result of my experience of hypnotism in my own person. In the middle of September, 1844, I suffered from a most severe attack of rheumatism, implicating the left side of the neck and chest, and the left arm. At first the pain was moderately severe, and I took some medicine to remove it; but, instead of this, it became more and more violent, and had tormented me for three days, and was so excruciating, that it entirely deprived me of sleep for three nights successively, and on the last of the three nights I could not remain in any one posture for five minutes, from the severity of the pain. On the forenoon of the next day, whilst visiting my patients, every jolt of the carriage I could only compare to several sharp instruments being thrust through my shoulder, neck, and chest. A full inspiration was attended with stabbing pain, such as is experienced in pleurisy. When I returned home for dinner I could neither turn my head, lift my arm, nor draw a breath, without suffering extreme pain. In this condition I resolved to try the effects of hypnotism. I requested two friends, who were present, and who both understood the system, to watch the effects, and arouse me when I had passed sufficiently into the condition; and, with their assurance that they would give strict attention to their charge, I sat down and hypnotised myself, extending the extremities. At the expiration of nine minutes they aroused me, and, to my agreeable surprise, I was quite free from pain, being able to move in any way with perfect ease. I say agreeably surprised, on this account; I had seen like results with many patients; but it is one thing to hear of pain, and another to feel it. My suffering was so exquisite that I could not imagine anyone else ever suffered so intensely as myself on that occasion; and, therefore, I merely expected a mitigation, so that I was truly agreeably surprised to find myself quite free from pain. I continued quite easy all the afternoon, slept comfortably all night, and the following morning felt a little stiffness, but no pain. A week thereafter I had a slight return, which I removed by hypnotising myself once more; and I have remained quite free from rheumatism ever since, now nearly six years."

"...have the power of directing or concentrating nervous energy, raising or depressing it in a remarkable degree, at will, locally or generally. That in this state, we have the power of exciting or depressing the force and frequency of the heart's action, and the state of circulation, or generally, in a surprising degree."

"..before being hypnotized, she could not distinguish the capitals in the advertising columns of a newspaper. After being hypnotized, however, she could, in a few minutes, see to read the large and second heading of the newspaper, and next day, to make herself a blond cap, threading her needle WITHOUT the aid of glasses."

"I consequently tried it in such cases, and where there has not been destruction, or irreparable organic injury to the auditory apparatus, I can confidently say, I know of no means equal to hypnotism, for benefiting such cases. Of course, it cannot suit all cases, but I am satisfied it will succeed in a numerous class of cases, and in some which bid defiance to all other known modes of treatment."

"There is, therefore, both positive and negative proof in favour of my mental and suggestive theory, and in opposition to the magnetic, occult, or electric theories of the Mesmerists and electro-biologists. My theory, moreover, has this additional recommendation, that it is level to our comprehension, and adequate to account for all which is demonstrably true, without offering any violence to reason and common sense, or being at variance with generally admitted physiological and psychological principles."

"We must remember, during a period in history when psychology was still a branch of academic philosophy. The psychological concepts developed by philosophers of mind, such as “dominant ideas” (akin to the automatic thoughts of Beck’s cognitive therapy) “habit and association” (a subjective precursor of Pavlovian conditioning), and “imitation and sympathy” (which we now call “role-modelling” and “empathy”), are as the theoretical framework upon which science of hypnotism, “neuro-hypnology”, was built."

"Some individuals may themselves be deceived by the compelling words of other individuals, but a much more significant number fall into the same state after being hypnotised by continuous eye-fixation upon an object and concentration of mind. This state can even be established before the eyelids are closed or a pronounced tendency to sleep has been felt. Suggestibility can also be increased by the sight of other patients in the experiment, and that by virtue of the laws of sympathy and imitation."

"Strictly speaking, the word hypnotism should be reserved only for those patients who actually fall into a state of sleep, and who forget upon awakening all that occurred during this state. When this is lacking, it is a question merely of reverie or dreaming. It would therefore be apposite to establish a terminology, characterising these modifications which result from the hypnotic process; indeed, with regard to those conditions resistant to ordinary medication and suitable for cure by hypnotism, hardly one patient in ten arrives at the unconscious stage of sleep (at least for the whole duration of the process). The word “hypnotism” can then lead them into error and make them believe that they do not benefit in any way from a process of which the characteristic and obvious effects do not appear to be those that the name [i.e., "hypnotic sleep"] indicates."

"...the position of the body significantly influences the emotions and sensations during the desired stage of hypnotism; also, whatever the passion which one wants to express by the attitude of the patient, when the muscles necessary to this expression are brought into play, the passion itself bursts forth suddenly and the whole organism responds accordingly. The upright body, the expanded chest, the contracted extensors, all that suggests the feeling of self-esteem, self-determination, resolve and unconquerable pride. As soon as one decreases the contraction of these muscles, that gives to the patient a depressed attitude, with a sunken chest, the expression of the features changes in a very manifest way, the voice and the whole manner of being of the individual now express humility, abasement and pity."

"In this way, we influence the muscles of physiognomy [facial expression] and it is possible for us to arouse any passion or sentiment whatsoever; the contraction of the interconnected muscles, constituting “the anatomy of expression”, evokes in the brain of the hypnotised person certain impressions just as these, in the waking state, determine the whole facial expression. It is thus merely a reversal of the usual order [of causation] between the emotions and their physical expressions."

"It is however possible, by education, to entirely invert the order of these natural phenomena: suppose that the operator [hypnotist] speaks, with each pass or with each movement that he executes, and that he says in advance what will happen, then what he said in advance can take place instead of what would have occurred naturally."

"All that produces a strong excitation, all that modifies the preliminary state of the thoughts and the feelings, surely also modifies the mental and physical state of the individual, especially if it occurs with confidence, expectation, and concentration of mind. All these phenomena, however extraordinary they are, are only the result of a heightening of the intellectual functions or power, which we all have to an average degree in the ordinary or waking state."

"James Braid credited with the title the “Father of Modern Hypnotism” is a major figure in the history of hypnotism. Hypnosis was not known as it is now before Braid. He freed hypnotism from the occult shadows of mesmerism through his insights into the nature of trance. Braid was born in Kinross, Scotland, and studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh."

"When James Braid introduced the concept of hypnotism, he was not consistent with his proposal. At one time he spoke of hypnotism as a specific sleep-like neurological state comparable to animal hibernation or yogic meditation and at other times he spoke of it as encompassing a number of different stages or states that are an extension of ordinary psychological and physiological process. Braid seems to have moved from a more “specific state” understanding to a more complex “non-state” orientation."

"Modern Hypnotism owes it name and its appearance in the realm of science to the investigations made by Braid…He is its true creator; he made it what it is; and above all, he gave emphasis to the experimental truth by means of which he proved that, when hypnotic phenomena are called into play, they are wholly independent of any supposed influence of the hypnotist upon the hypnotised, and that the hypnotised person simply reacts upon himself by reason of latent capacities in him which are artificially developed…Braid demonstrated that … hypnotism, acting upon a human subject as upon a fallow field, merely set in motion a string of silent faculties which only needed its assistance to reach their development."

"James Braid made a rough distinction between different stages of hypnosis. He first termed them as the first and the second conscious stage of hypnosis. Later he replaced these with a distinction between “sub-hypnotic,” “full-hypnotic,” and “hypnotic coma” stages."

"Around 1840, a patient in the office of James Braid accidentally entered a state of trance while waiting for an eye examination. Braid, as he was aware of the disfavour of mesmerism and animal magnetism coined the terms “hypnotism” and “hypnosis” in 1843. And thus began the serious study of this altered state of awareness."

"I have had occasion recently to look into the history of animal magnetism and hypnotism, and have been greatly struck by the way in which, for a hundred an fifty years, the world has refused to take serious cognizance of the discoveries of Mesmer, Braid, Esdaile, and the rest."

"Although Braid believed that hypnotic suggestion was a valuable remedy in functional nervous disorders, he did not regard it as a rival to other forms of treatment, nor wish in any way to separate its practice from that of medicine in general. He held that whoever talked of a "universal remedy" was either a fool or a knave: similar diseases often arose from opposite pathological conditions, and the treatment ought to be varied accordingly. He objected being called a hypnotist; he was, he said, no more a "hypnotic" than a "castor-oil" doctor."

"Many people still believe that hypnotism originated in the work of Franz Anton Mesmer. However, Mesmer never actually hypnotised anyone. His many followers emphasised the notion of “animal magnetism”, a supernatural force emanating from the body of the mesmerist. However, their claims were widely rejected and repeatedly debunked. James Braid introduced the term “hypnotism” in contrast to “mesmerism” to describe the opposing view: that the effects upon their patients were due to ordinary psychological and physiological factors such as relaxation, focused attention, and suggestion, etc. From the 1840s onwards, Braid’s hypnotism gradually eclipsed mesmerism in popularity and became the basis of modern hypnotherapy."

"Throughout the twentieth century, hypnotism became confused in the public imagination with notions derived from mesmerism. The most common fallacies about hypnosis are that it is a state of unconsciousness and that the subject is completely under the control of the hypnotist, who can make him do what he wishes. Research has shown that holding these misconceptions actually makes people less likely to benefit from hypnosis. However, these are both notions derived from mesmerism. Braid tried to refute from them by emphasising that in his “hypnotism” subjects remained conscious nine times out of ten, and that their consent and collaboration was required. Indeed, Braid soon concluded that his method of hypnotism bore considerably more resemblance to meditation than to mesmerism, and that it was largely self-induced by the subject focusing their attention upon a single dominant train of thought, and doing so with the expectation of producing certain responses."

"Braid passionately emphasised the scientific approach to hypnotherapy. He based his own method upon well-established or common sense principles such as the effect of expectation and vivid imagination, the role of social imitation, and the power of focused attention to increase the effect of certain dominant ideas. These are also emphasised in the modern cognitive-behavioural theory of hypnosis. Braid’s down-to-earth approach therefore provides an ideal foundation for modern scientific study of hypnosis and practical hypnotherapy."

"A hypnotist who has never read James Braid is a bit like a psychoanalyst who’s never read anything by Sigmund Freud. Anyone with an interest in modern cognitive-behavioural hypnotherapy, such as our own Hypno-CBT approach, should start by reading about the “common sense” origins of hypnotism. It’s remarkable that most of Braid’s writings have been out of print since his death, especially his more mature writings which are most relevant today."

"Among Noah's sons was one who covered the shame of his father, but the Hegelians are still tearing away the cloak which time and oblivion had sympathetically thrown over the shame of their Master."

"Whatever the cerebellum is doing, it’s doing a lot of it."

"Amending your own mind is very, very satisfying… amending other people's minds is a fruitless, unsatisfying effort."

"Neurosurgery can be learned... neurosurgery cannot be taught."

"Not all ideas of the ideas that pass from one brain to another brain... are good ideas; some are mistakes. These I call 'mismemes'."

"The existing paradigm about the brain has ceased to function adequately."

"The belief that electricity, the fourth of the modern forces, is the stuff of thought has permeated brain science since the late 1700s. ...while the brain was regarded as 'dry', all other organs were conceived as 'wet'. Doubtless the study of brain electricity helped in understanding the internal circuits of the brain, but it solved few problems of brain disease."

"Brain/body relationships might depend upon a chorus of individual hormones... which are released together to sing hormonal harmonies to the body."

"The double-think of modern science—'Molecules shape the body, but electricity shapes the mind'—ends abruptly with the realization that regulatory hormones control both brain and body functions."

"Pattern recognition is the sine qua non of the genetic code... pattern recognition underlies all immunology... pattern recognition is basic to all the hormone/hormone receptor interactions of cell regulation; and pattern recognition is the highest form of thought. It is the synchrony, the synergism and the spatial juxtaposition of whirling hormonal forces that give life to the human soul. Is this molecular maelstrom divine? I think so: it creates life, it is ubiquitous, it cannot be broken apart, it cannot be contained, it cannot be copied, it is eternal."

"Regulatory messages or hormones flow from specific regions of the brain to specific glands within 'hollow' nerve fibres exactly as Erasistratus, Galen and Descartes had taught."

"The science of neuroendocrinology—the brain-to-pituitary link that was discerned by [Joe] Hinsey, [George] Wislocki, du Vigneaud, and [Geoffrey] Harris—is dependent upon hormones flowing within nerve axons. This phenomenon, axonal flow, was first noted by Ernst and Barta Scharrer... For many decades it was assumed that axonal flow was always 'down'... away from the brain."

"Molecules move not only from the brain to the endocrine system but also from the endocrine system, indeed, from all parts of the body to the brain."

"Every organ is a hormone-producing gland."

"Central to the paradigm that the mind is modulated by hormones is the recognition that the stuff of thought is not caged in the brain but is scattered all over the body; regulatory hormones are ubiquitous."

"Gone are the days when scientists believed one hormone was made by one gland. Insulin, for example... is made in other surprising places, like the brain, and even by tiny one-cell organisms without a pancreas."

"The neatly integrated paradigm for brain water... was derived from experiments done by Walter Dandy... Most brain scientists and brain physicians honour the Dandy paradigm as a navigator honours the North Star. ...yet new scientific evidence makes it difficult, if not impossible, to accept... It is a mismeme; the experimental facts no longer allow it to be 'true', and we need a paradigm switch."

"Dandy's experiments were done in the fast lane of science... performed with no control animals, with no record of the number of animals operated on, with no regard for inter-species variability, with no record of the time base, with no histological correlation, with no attempt to quantify the differences and with no involvement with a neutral scientist."

"If the powerful hormone vasopressin, or ADH, is injected into the blood, the body will retain water. If ADH is injected into the ventricle the opposite happens: the body loses water."

"Those at the top in brain science gained their pedestals by knowing more and more about less and less."

"Few would have predicted that the discovery of the circulation of the blood would have changed the way philosophers view the world, theologians conceive of God, or astronomers look at the stars, yet all of that happened."

"If the question, 'Why is the heart hollow?', had a profound impact on all intellectual disciplines, would you expect any less of the question, 'Why is the brain hollow?'"

"In the past decade, as regulating hormones have been found throughout the body, the soul has lost its home. It is scattered everywhere—in the brain, the gut, the ovary, the pituitary and the adrenal; if paracrinologists are correct, every cell contains the well-chiselled molecules that give life to the soul and guidance to the mind."

"It would be easier... if all animals spoke the same endocrine language, for then correlations made in the laboratory could be quickly moved to the bedside. Unfortunately, such is not the case. The hormone prolactin, for example, has at least seventy-eight different functions in seventy-eight different species"

"The brain has all the characteristics of a gland except one—leaky capillaries—the sturdy brain capillaries are collectively called the 'blood-brain-barrier'. This barrier can easily be demonstrated by injecting a blue dye into an animal; every other organ (except the testicle) turns blue, but the blood-brain barrier keeps the brain as white as snow."

"As hormonal amplification is the hallmark of all of the brain-to-gland relationships of neuroendocrinology, hormonal deamplification is the hallmark of all gland-to-brain relationships of endocrine neurology. This is the fundamental difference between the two sciences."

"Some kinds of hormones, the 'steroids', pass readily into the brain, but the 'peptide' hormones produced by the pituitary, the gut, and any other glands do not easily pass through the walls of brain capillaries."

"The brain remains silently separated from the noisy endocrine consequences."

"The measurement of hormones in the bloodstream of patients will not reflect the endocrine activity of the brain."

"The greatest array of brain hormones is found in the ventricle, not in the spinal fluid."

"In decades to come ventricular catheterization performed to measure hormone concentrations will become as routine as the measurement of lumbar 'pressure' is today."

"The ventricles of the human brain... are filled with hormones, and until the hormones swimming in these oceans are dredged out, countless millions of our fellows will remain with brain illnesses that can be neither understood nor treated. Many of their hormone-hungry brains may be fixed as easily as hormone-hungry bodies are fixed with thyroid hormone, insulin, oestrogen and testosterone, but that work cannot begin until cause and effect relationships between brain hormones and brain diseases have been established."

"Miracles of inner healing are everyday occurrences."

"The brain is a gland of unity: the brain is one with the body."

"Neurosurgeons perform ventricular taps with great frequency. …While this is not something to be done lightly, the risks are no greater than those for cardiac catheterization."

"Twenty years from now, the disease, 'presenile dementia' will be understood as well as diabetes is today."

"If a 'memory peptide' could be found to be deficient in patients with dementia, these patients could be treated in the same way that patients with diabetes are treated with insulin."

"Scientists have mastered the techniques of hormone analysis, measurement and manufacture. What is lacking is the correlation between a specific brain disease and a specific brain hormone. …these correlations can only come from a medical team of co-operating physicians."

"Animal experiments have confirmed the necessity of delivering hormones into the ventricle: the powerful hormone endorphin does not change behaviour if it is given intravenously; vasopressin will improve memory in animals only if it given into the ventricles; insulin given through the bloodstream does not control appetite but it is the best hormone for such control if given into the brain; and bombesin... only stops stomach ulceration if given into the brain."

"Genetic engineers are powerless in all of this without some cooperative effort from people working in allied fields."

"Already in animals, some gland-like cells have been transplanted from the adrenal gland into the brain, where they not only survive but continue their secretions."

"By placing… cell-containing soup in bullet-shaped cell cages formed out of permeable plastics, a single population of cells can be introduced into the brain. ...the hormones that are produced by the cells make their way... into the brain. ...'artificial glands' …with no fear of cell migration."

"As it is possible that the memory loss of senile dementia may stem from a deficiency of 'memory peptide', obesity may result from a deficiency of either bombesin, somatostatin, cholecystokinen, gastrin, or insulin."

"Despite the evidence that ventricular hormones do not make their way out of the ventricle, the presence of large ventricles in many schizophrenic patients, and the ability of two-dimensional gels to provide a profile of peptides in the ventricle, not a single catheter has been placed into the ventricle of a schizophrenic patient to measure the peptides in the ventricle. ...There is no animal model for this disease, the answer can only come from human studies."

"Many endocrine diseases of the body entail the production of 'crooked molecules'—molecules that are made in the wrong way by the cell. It is fairly common for a cancer cell to begin the production of a 'crooked' hormone that evokes dramatic changes in other body functions."

"Electroconvulsive therapy, or ECT, is the best therapy for unipolar depression that exists. ...they have found that the smile will return to the face of the patient on the very same day that cortisol dynamics return to normal."

"During electroconvulsive therapy the blood-brain barrier is opened and during the time that it remains open there are heroically high levels of circulating pituitary hormones. Thus there is every reason to believe that... it delivers hormones to the brain..."

"Despite the effectiveness of electroconvulsive therapy... it may cause long-lasting problems with short-term memory. …Yet despite the protests, the ability of cortisol studies to identify patients who will benefit from ECT guarantees that more patients will receive it."

"Patients with uncontrolled epilepsy have an evaluation that usually begins with electrical studies of the surface of the brain. …A hole is drilled in the skull, and electrical measurements made from within the depths of the brain. A large flap of the skull is then lifted up, electrodes placed on the surface of the brain, and the flap sewn back into place so that more electrical studies can be done. The risks... are far greater than those associated with the ventricular taps needed for hormone studies. …If the team of doctors.. can help... areas of the brain that are sending 'bad' signals would be identified and removed... large portions of the brain might be taken away."

"Somehow the same nurses, physicians, administrators and legal ombudsmen who prevented the study of the ventricular fluid of a patient with senile dementia, or obesity, or depression, or schizophrenia, because of the risks, will encourage diagnostic tests and therapy for patients with epilepsy that are far more destructive and immutable than the measurement and manipulation of hormones in the ventricle."

"The hormonal genies that have lived unnoticed in the brain since humankind began have escaped; there is no way that they can be put back."

"Physicians and scientists will measure brain hormones—in ventricular fluid and elsewhere—will link these to specific diseases, and will devise space-age techniques to restock the mind's hormonal pantries. The only question is, When?'"

"As a surgeon and scientist, my father was always a visionary and a renegade. Being mentored by legends of neuroscience gave my father both the credibility and desire to push new boundaries."

"Richard Bergland, a neurosurgeon, asked what role the CSF and the brain's ventricular system could play in the brain's physiology. Using paper chromatography, a method that separates substances dissolved in a fluid, he observed more than 300 different peptides and amino acids in the CSF. He induced seizures in sheep, extracted CSF from the ventricles, and found these substances to substantially increase in variety and amount after seizures."

"There are debates in neuroscience about what the basic "stuff of thought" is, even within a materialist framework. Neurosurgeon Richard Bergland... argues that the stuff of thought is not electricity at all, but hormones. He rejects the view that the brain is an electronic computer; the brain is "wet"—bathed in "wet" molecules such as endocrine hormones. "Thinking," for Bergland, can occur in the ovaries and testicles. He believes that the "brain as a gland" hypothesis will revolutionize the study of mental illness. Computational models of mind contribute little to this study."

"The chapter is poisoning the minds of little children. They will not respect their own religion in future. They will not turn out to be good Hindus and it will cause harm to the nation."

"Neither our houses and businesses nor our daughters and sisters are safe in places such as Hyderabad, Bhopal and Meerut. Development is important, but what will be its use when Hindus won’t be there at homes, and like Hindus in Kashmir, they are thrown out of their motherland."

"There are secular forces that want to convert India into a graveyard like Kashmir. I am proud of VHP."

"A Hindu cannot be a Talib, jehadi or kafir because a Hindu is one who is a hundred times more refined, cultured, more honest, more religious and more balanced in his outlook. Hinduism is the culmination of the cultural evolution of mankind. As a Hindu, I see God in every individual."

"A Talib is one who cannot tolerate the Bamiyan Buddha; a jehadi is one who kills and displaces the innocent Kashmiri Pandits; a kafir is one who is intolerant like Osama and his followers. Osama's religion misguided him to be a terrorist. Had Osama been a Hindu, as per this religion, he would have been running a Rama- Krishna matha somewhere in the Hindukush Mountains for the welfare of the needy rather than plotting the massacre of thousands of innocents in the 9/11 tragedy."

"VHP is “running more than 8,000 social service projects through out the length and breadth of India. Those who are trying to defame an organisation like this are only paving way for ruining India”."

"What is wrong if some organisations like the VHP, RSS and Shiv Sena believe that the Vedic culture of a society that believes in plurality and unity in diversity, has to be retained? If we are saving a civilisation that preserves 1100 religions and 1600 dialects, defending it against the totalitarian and violent religious belief system within democratic set- up, is it wrong?"

"We are fighting against such people who are trying to destroy the Hindu society with their totalitarian attitude that only promotes the Church paradigm of the 17th and 18th century Europe. We are exposing the grand design of Pakistan and the ISI to destabilise India. If we are being critic ised for that, it means that the secularists are supporting the plans of Musharraf and Macaulay both against the unity of India."

"Violence of any type by anyone and anywhere should be vehemently condemned. I feel that Muslims haven't condemned the violence in Godhra and Kashmir the way they did in Gujarat-an undemocratic act. When the secularists selectively condemn the Gujarat violence, it seems that without Sita haran (Sita's abduction) the Lanka dahan (Lanka's burning) is imagined. So if you have to criticise the Gujarat carnage, you must also condemn the Kashmir killings as well as the Godhra massacre. If you are only condemning Gujarat, you are inviting the jehadi terrorists and Musharraf to attack Akshardham538 with a red carpet welcome."

"Muslims have also contributed to the youth who are willing to be cannon fodder in the name of jehad. I believe that most of the Muslims want to live peacefully and have nothing to do with vandalism. It's very unfortunate that not even 10 Muslim leaders have marched to resettle the displaced Kashmiri Pandits while on the other hand Hindu leaders marched for rehabilitating Muslims who have suffered in Gujarat. After the Gujarat violence, there was an outcry by the Hindu leaders but not a fatwa has been issued till date by the Muslim ulama against the 70,000 people killed in Kashmir."

"First, all Hindus and Muslims should accept one reality - that we are ethnically and culturally the same. No one from the Hindu-Muslim society must suffer German-Jew paradigm. Each and every Muslim of India emanates ancestorily from the gene, RBC, bone, blood and flesh of a Hindu. If there is something in Hindu dharma that hurts Muslims, I, as a Hindu leader, am ready to reform that."

"In the same manner Muslims must think about the closed concepts of Darul Islam, kufr, jehad etc that have resulted in Pakistan, the ethnic cleansing of Kashmiri Pandits and other global acts of terrorism . Muslims should also come forward and accept plurality rather than totality for peaceful co-existence. Each Indian Muslim should project a Mohammed (PBUH), a Ram, a Christ and a Guru Nanak in him."

"Physiologists have usually represented that our species holds a middle rank, in the masticatory and digestive apparatus, between the flesh-eating and the herbivorous animals; — a statement which seems rather to have been deduced from what we have learned by experience on this subject, than to result fairly from an actual comparison of man and animals. … The teeth of man have not the slightest resemblance to those of the carnivorous animals, except that their enamel is confined to the external surface. He possesses, indeed, teeth called canine, but they do not exceed the level of the others, and are obviously unsuited to the purposes which the corresponding teeth execute in carnivorous animals. … Thus we find that, whether we consider the teeth and jaws, or the immediate instruments of digestion, the human structure closely resembles that of the simiæ; all of which, in their natural state, are completely herbivorous."

"I am not scared of dying and I am not scared of contempt of court punishment. My fight is against Gopal Parajuli, not other judges. If I have erred it was not a deliberate mistake, please forgive me."'"

"Religion as a whole is but a form of loyalty to the interests of English property."

"Taking, then, this fact as established, it suggests itself as probable that circumcision was by Divine command made obligatory upon the Jews, not solely as a religious ordinance, but also with a view to the protection of health.... One is led to ask, witnessing the frightful ravages of syphilis in the present day, whether it might not be worth while for Christians to adopt the practice."

"Diabetes is now the leading cause of blindness among working-age adults in Australia. The concerning thing is that blindness due to diabetes is virtually all preventable or treatable."

"When I left Sinde, I carried with me two gold watches belonging to the Ameers to be repaired ; but one of my servants having by chance hinted that there was a Hindoo in fihooj who was qua- lified for the task, they were not consigned to my charge, till I gave a pledge that they should notpass into the hands of an accursed JBoot Puriist, or worshipper of idols. Among the inscriptions inlaid in gold on a highly-valuable Damascus sword, with which their Highnesses presented me, there is a verse written by their vizier, and high- ly applauded by themselves, containing a prayer that a hundred thousand Hindoos may perish by its edge."

"A spirit of religious toleration cannot be enumerated among the few virtues of the Sinde government or its subjects ; and in no respect whatever is the oppression of the Ameers more apparent than in their zeal for the propagation of the Mahommedan faith. It is really difficult to conceive how any Hindoos should have continued to reside in the country ; and the fact can only be accounted for by that attachment, which man shares with the vegetable, to the soil in which he is reared. The indignities they suffer are of the most exasperating description. They are even forced to adopt the Mahom- medan dress, and to wear beards. Till lately, none of this class were permitted to ride on horse- back; and amongst the few who now enjoy the privilege, a small number only in the immediate service of government are allowed the comfort and honour, as it is esteemed, of a saddle. Merchants of wealth and respectability may be seen mounted on asses and mules ; animals considered so unclean, that none but the vilest outcasts in other countries can touch them with impunity : and, even from this humble conveyance, they are obliged to descend and stand aside when any bloated Mussulman passes by."

"The Mahomniedans are encouraged and exhorted to destroy all the emblems of idolatry they may see in Sinde. The degraded and unfortunate follower of Brahma, is denied the free exercise of his religion ; the tom-tom is seldom heard, being only beat when permission is granted ; and although there are a few temples without images at Hyderabad, the sound of music never echoes from their walls. It is in the power of any two " true believers, by declaring that a Hindoo has repeated a verse from the Koran, or the words ** Ala- hommed the Prophet, to procure his immediate circumcision. This is the most common, and, by the persecuted class themselves, considered the most cruel of all their calamities ; while, as it is resorted to on the slightest pretence, and always performed with a mockery of its being for the eternal happiness of the sufferer, mental agony is made to add its bitterness to bodily infliction."

"The Ameers heard me with great politeness ; expressed their regret at the circumstance ; and begged to know who the person was that had given me so much annoyance. I replied, a Hindoo. The name acted like a charm : Mourad Ali stop- ped me at once by pronouncing any investigation perfectly unnecessary, and forthwith issued his commands that the offender should be confined and admitted into the bosom of the faith ; an order which I observed several persons run with alacrity to perform. On my remonstrating against this extremity, his Highness replied with a savage grin, " You do not know the Hindoos of Sinde ; they are all blackguards and rascals.""

"The evils of intolerance I have mentioned, are so glaring that it is scarcely possible for a stranger to be a week in the country without their being obtruded on his notice. The Hindoo vakeel who accompanied me, was the butt of every species of ribaldry and wit that could enter the imaginations of my conductors, or their followers, on the march ; and amongst the many who secretly pray for such a consummation, none seemed to have a more devout wish to see the British colours flying on the bastions of Hyderabad, than the Hindoos of respectability; who, uninvited, entered on the subject of their grievances, and discoursed largely of the cruelties and indignities to which they were subjected."

"My message to teen mom’s: you made a mistake, so what! No one is perfect, everyone makes mistakes. Pick yourself up and be a boss babe. Building a beautiful life and empire for you and your kids. Take the obstacles in your life and use them as building blocks for an amazing life. Have a vision for your life and set specific goals with deadlines to achieve those goals. Trust in God and believe in yourself. Have confidence, be brave. You are amazing and you are worthy. You can do anything if you set your mind to it. You have to be willing to work day and night to achieve your dreams."

"I always believed in myself. I always believed I could do anything I wanted to do. There was never a doubt in my mind that I could do anything."

"To the young teenage mother, you are not damaged goods. God loves you as you are. Have a plan for your life and work hard to achieve your goals not only for you but for your child. Build a support system around you. We need each other to succeed. I always say it took a village to make Zimbabwe’s first abdominal transplant and hepato biliary trained surgeon."

"I didn’t know how I was going to ever fulfill my dream."

"She fought her way to the top in a male-dominated field despite hearing discouraging comments like, “Girls don’t belong in an operating room,” from some attending physicians."

"When I was studying neurosurgery, I didn't have any women role models to look up to or approach for advice. This was a major challenge. That's why I want to be there for others now. I want them to know that if I did it, they also can."

"Whatever you do in life do it to your best because it gives you more opportunities and more doors open."

"Seeing people lose lives in the course of my field of work has given me a totally different outlook on death and acceptance and learning to live in the moment, learning to do what needs to be done now, because tomorrow is not assured."

"The cliffs of Ballybunian are even less remarkable for their dimensions, than they are for the singular form of rocks, which seem as if carved by the hand of man; and, independently of the lofty mural precipices, whose angular proportions present every variety of arrangement, as in Smuggler's Bay, where they oftentimes are semicircularly arranged, like the groin-work of an arch, or the tablets or small strings running round a window, or are piled above one another in regular succession, presenting a geological phenomenon of great grandeur and magnificence, they have also other distinct beauties, which originate frequently in similar causes."

"it took time, but if you have the passion and the perseverance to stick around,you make it for sure , girls need help, they need to be pushed, they need to be supported , we need more role model, we need more successful women to reach back to these young women."

"Do not let anybody tell you that it is impossible, you can achieve anything."

"It took time, but if you have the passion, and the perseverance to stick around, you make it for sure."

"For anyone in science or not in science, doing what you love is the key, it is the first thing."

"The woman of today is courageous, willing to follow their dream."

"Girls need help, they need to be pushed, they need to be supported, we need more role models, we need more successful women to reach back to these young women."

"Teaching science for a woman is as normal as it is for men, since we both have the capacity."

"What make some other girls succeed in sciences is having the mentality that they are not that difficult."

"Poverty, illiteracy, religious fanaticism and lack of family planning, etc. are mainly responsible for the growth of EBOM population. Lack of education, child marriage, polygamy, poverty, etc. are making the population issue more complex … the illiterate char-chapori people believe that more children can eradicate their poverty and hence more children is the answer to their poverty. Added to it, religious fanaticism and superstitions are galore—they believe that children are the greatest gifts of Allah and He will also provide food and shelter to them. Human beings have nothing to do—they are just means. Hence they consider birth control exercises as anti-Islamic practices."

"Dr Ali further said, [C]hild marriage or marriage of the non-adults remain a dangerous practice in char-chapori areas. For the immigrant Muslims, girls are forced to get married at the age of 12–14, as if this becomes their main agenda of social reforms. Girls are forced to get married at an early stage and they become mother of two-three children at a very tender age. As a result their health never recovers. Majority of them suffer from malnutrition and anaemia. Their life cycle is also very less. Majority of the women are exploited, subju- gated and neglected … in addition domestic violence, abuses are day-to-day phenomenon of the Muslim immigrant women. Currently, they are also becoming the main source of income for the family. Women daily-wage earners have been disproportionately increasing. In cities like Guwahati and other metros, the immigrant women-labourers with kids at their lap come regularly along with male counterparts to work as daily-wage earners."

"Take every experience as a learning process and make a conscious effort to read widely because the world has become so globalised, it would be disastrous if we failed to recognize that. And in all these, we should pray to God for inspiration."

"To get my ideas working, I need to let them understand what I stand for, and intend doing for them: even when they are not pleased with the way I do things. I have to live by examples."

"I gained admission to the Wesley Girls High School (WeyGeyHey) Cape Coast, and pursued both my Ordinary (O) and Advanced (A) Levels and the University of Ghana Medical School subsequently."

"I was an unusually reserved young lady, for which I was teased by friends, I shrugged off that trait later, to the surprise of many. She became the Assistant Girls Prefect at Wesley Girls, in her final year."

"However, the icy hands of death took away her father, in her first year at the Medical School in 1971. This was a catastrophic and traumatic experience."

"His death affected my academic performance that semester. I pulled myself together after his burial, and told myself – I will not fail."

"I intend to transform Korle Bu into a centre of excellence where everybody will receive equal services from our medical staff. Patients will be received with open arms irrespective of the class or status, just as is done in the advanced countries."

"I want to be a team player, and hopes to get everybody working with me, and to encourage them to do things right, and at the right time; no matter how difficult."

"Sometimes tough, especially when I wants something done. Most of the people who I have worked with understand me."

"Do not procrastinate. I believe the youth of today have numerous opportunities which they must explore but is worried that many are not patient."

"I lamented how quickly they want to amass wealth for themselves, disregarding wealth of experiences of the elderly and appreciating the need for hard work to achieve laurels."

"Working as a Paedi­atric Surgeon was God’s plan for my life because l was told by my par­ents that at the age of four, l had indicated l would become a paediatric surgeon. It is so surprising that l knew nothing about it so l inferred that it was God who had directed my thoughts."

"It was an arduous task working continuously as a paediatric surgeon with no time to rest. Later, she had to recruit more doctors and nurses to assist her in the department and ensured that the staff were exposed to some of the best practices outside the country."

"I have never wavered going through all the disciplines in medicine."

"In paediatric surgery, a child comes to the hospital with a problem and when you operate on the child or you correct the problem, the next day the child is ready to go and play football. In this situation, the anxious parents would like to find out wheth­er the child should be allowed to play or not."

"There was no regret working as a Paediatric Surgeon because I attached professionalism to my work and the relief given to par­ents and their sick children had provided me a lot of satisfaction. Additionally, working with my hands to see a little child get better was a wonderful activity which she took delight in."

"The Paediatric Surgery Depart­ment took care of newborn babies up to 13 years."

"The challenges in the department included the clinical condition the patient was identified with, you could diagnose the condition and prescribe medication for the patient, but the parents could not purchase the medicine, and having completed a nice job, the post-operative man­agement of the case could be problematic because the parents could not provide the needed items."

"I intimat­ed that there were occasions I had to use my money in support of needy children on admission in the hospital, and this situation had occasioned the establishment of a Special Fund in the department in support of needy children."

"One of my sons had expressed concern that there were many students who had applied to the medical schools in Ghana with good grades but could not gain admission to the public medical schools because of the cut-off point, so he asked why couldn’t the family establish a school to cater for some of these students."

"My family decid­ed to manage the academic part of the university while other stakeholders provide the financial part. That was the vision to get stakehold­ers who would provide the needed funds for this laudable project, hence the coming into being of the Accra Col­lege of Medicine."

"By the grace of God, the school has graduated 28 medical doctors from three batches. The main thing is about their work ethics and high character."

"I urged Ghanaians to de­sist from telling lies and do what they would like to do if nobody was watching them."

"The other exception has to do with a rather peculiar case of psychic phenomena, one which I find myself unable to classify, and which I would like very much to narrate more fully …. I was brought in contact with it, in the summer of 1911, and I have had it under my observation more or less ever since, having been present at probably 250 of the night sessions, many of which have been attended by a stenographer who made voluminous notes. … This man is utterly unconscious, wholly oblivious to what takes place, and, unless told about it subsequently, never knows that he has been used as a sort of clearing house for the coming and going of alleged extra-planetary personalities. … The communications which have been written, or which we have had the opportunity to hear spoken, are made by a vast order of alleged beings who claim to come from other planets to visit this world, to stop here as student visitors for study and observation when they are en route from one universe to another or from one planet to another. … Its philosophy is consistent. It is essentially Christian and is, on the whole, entirely harmonious with the known scientific facts and truths of this age."

"We decided to start out with questions pertaining to the origin of the cosmos, Deity, creation, and such other subjects as were far beyond the present-day knowledge of all humankind. The following Sunday several hundred questions were brought in. We sorted out these questions, discarding duplicates, and in a general way, classifying them. Shortly thereafter, the first Urantia Paper appeared in answer to these questions. From first to last, when the Papers appeared, the questions disappeared. This was the procedure followed throughout the many years of the reception of the Urantia Papers. No questions—no Papers."

"Among elderly Urantians who knew Sadler, several legends have taken shape about miraculous ways in which some UB documents came into Sadler's possession. Instead of being written or spoken by Wilfred, then typed by a secretary, it is claimed that Sadler once wrote down some questions and put them in his desk drawer. The next day, to his astonishment, the questions had been mysteriously replaced by answers. … It is said that Sadler checked the handwriting against the scripts of those in the Contact Commission and the Forum. There were no matches."

"After examining all of the evidence, the conclusion that makes the most sense is that Sadler was the channel for The Urantia Book. No other person was present, led the group, had the skill set, or spoke about being connected to the cosmic mind as Sadler."

"It could be that one of the reasons that Dr Sadler was chosen for his service to the revelation was that his mind was already prepared for some of the revelatory concepts in The Urantia Book as a result of his association with the Adventist church. His mind-set made him the perfect person to accept these new concepts, as he had fewer elements of traditional and authoritarian Christianity to transcend."

"The source of all evil lies in the race, the Celtic race of Ireland. There is no getting over historical facts. Look at Wales, look at Caledonia; it is ever the same. [...] The race must be forced from the soil; by fair means, if possible; still they must leave. The Orange club of Ireland is a Saxon confederation for the clearing the land of all Papists and Jacobites; this means Celts. If left to themselves, they would clear them out, as Cromwell proposed, by the sword; it would not require six weeks to accomplish the work. But the Encumbered Estates Relief Bill will do it better."

"When Mr. Canning made his celebrated boast in Parliament, that he had created the republics of Mexico and Peru, Columbia, Bolivia, and Argentine, I made, to some friends, the remark, that to create races of men was beyond his power, and that the result of his measure would merely be to precipitate that return, sure to come at last, the return to the aboriginal Indian population, from whom no good could come, from whom nothing could be expected; a race whose vital energies were wound up; expiring: hastening onwards also to ultimate extinction."

"[T]he Dutch families who settled in Southern Africa three hundred years ago, are now as fair, and as pure in Saxon blood, as the native Hollander; the slightest change in structure or colour can at once he traced to intermarriage. By intermarriage an individual is produced, intermediate generally, and partaking of each parent; but this mulatto man or woman is a monstrosity of nature — there is no place for such a family: no such race exists on the earth, however closely affiliated the parents may be. To maintain it would require a systematic course of intermarriage, with constant draughts from the pure races whence the mixed race derives its origin. Now, such an arrangement is impossible. Since the earliest recorded times, such mixtures have been attempted and always failed; with Celt and Saxon it is the same as with Hottentot and Saxon, Caffre and Hottentot. The Slavonian race or races have been deeply intercalated for more than twice ten centuries with the South German, the pure Scandinavian, the Sarmatian, and even somewhat with the Celt, and with the Italian as conquerors: have they intermingled? Do you know of any mixed race the result of such admixture? Is it in Bohemia? or Saxony? or Prussia? or Finland?"

"But the land of Egypt still abounds with its ancient monuments; the race was quite peculiar, and was, I think, African, or at least allied to the African races. The mouth and lips all but prove this. Nevertheless, their identity with a great section of the present Jewish race cannot be doubted; the young Jew of London or Amsterdam might readily sit for a likeness of the bust of Amenoph."

"If the two great nations, India and England, cannot be united by political chords, the ties of spiritual and intellectual co-operation will certainly prove a stronger bond of union."

"There is not perhaps any man so good a judge of the difficulty of writing a book, as an actual author. He soon discovers how many qualifications are necessary, how much science is required, and which are the points of most difficult access. He soon finds out his own deficiencies; and, as regards his powers, that some difficulties may be insurmountable. That essay, which sometimes originates in study and amusement, gets insensibly into growth, and is perpetuated. For, having been undertaken in the spirit of an inquirer, it is frequently carried on in the capacity of a student. This student, however, soon assumes the master, and pronounces his decisions on critical subjects, as authoritatively as if all learning and languages were at his fingers ends. ...No man’s industry is mis-spent, if he merely clear the obstruction from any path ; and the very attempt to shew what's right, frequently exposes that which is wrong; so that the immediate blunders of one person rectify those of another; and he ever must deserve well of society who attempts improvement. ...Bibliography is a dry occupation,—a caput mortuum,—it is a borrowed production, which brings very little grist to the mill; and so difficult and tedious is the object, of laying before our eyes all the real or reported copies or editions of the works enumerated, that almost every line of our reports may be suspected of falsehood. How are we to collect, how to produce, how to examine, the originals? Many books are so scarce, so sequestered in private hands, or in the mansions of the great, that even the keen eyes of lucriferous booksellers cannot find them. And if they cannot, who the deuce can?"

"My kingdom is my sweetheart’s face, And these the boundaries I trace: Northward her forehead fair; Beyond, a wilderness of auburn hair; A rosy cheek to east and west; Her little mouth The sunny south. It is the south that I love best.Her eyes, two crystal lakes, Rippling with light, Caught from the sun by day, The stars by night. The dimples in Her cheeks and chin Are snares which Love hath set, And I have fallen in!"

"I want to be remembered for serving my community, whether it is through providing quality surgical care or helping mentor the next generation of surgeons. Everything about the match is special. It will be a dream come true."

"Je le pansai, Dieu le guérit."

"Women can do whatever they wish when they are by themselves, but when they are members of society they must behave in such a way that their behavior is accepted by the society at large"

"Lord Dawson of Penn Has killed lots of men. So that's why we sing God save the King."

"Some Physiologists will have it that the Stomach is a Mill;—others, that it is a fermenting Vat;—others, again, that it is a Stew-pan;—but in my view of the matter, it is neither a Mill, a fermenting Vat, nor a Stew-pan—but a STOMACH, gentlemen, a STOMACH."

"It is a new discipline in medicine which focuses on access to surgery and improving quality of care and outcomes. I like to describe it as the interface between surgical services and surgical systems."

"My research is working on improving perinatal outcomes and stillbirth auditing across Africa. In many countries, we don’t know what the real numbers are at the end of the day, so we have to start counting."

"More importantly though, the role of women in their societies can tell us a lot. Communities that protect their women seem to have better health outcomes."

"t's always the elephant in the room. When you walk into a room, and you don't see anyone that looks like you, sometimes you don't know if you are welcome or not. Luckily, i am comfortable with situations where I am minority."

"But I am very clear about what my expertise is. It is also a sense of pressure and responsibility because I often feel that if a wrong decision is made, I am not speaking just for me, but for many."

"That’s right, I was born with mid-frequency hearing loss and struggled with inter-personal communication as a child without knowing what was wrong. In fact, I wasn’t diagnosed until I was 33 years old."

"Yes, hearing impairment is associated with superstitions in many communities, which feed into both. However, the major reason for the issue’s neglect and, so to speak, ‘invisibility’ is the fact that it is not associated with significant mortality."

"Nigeria, like most developing countries, is greatly influenced by global health priorities and funding programmes, which tend to prioritise reducing mortality or ensuring survival rather than supporting or promoting well-being."

"One key finding was the contribution of severe neonatal jaundice to the incidence of hearing loss."

"Children living with disabilities need the support of a wide range of specialists, including paediatricians, psychologists, neurologists, audiologist and otorhinolaryngologists – to name just a few."

"I welcome the opportunity to serve as a member of the iRAP Board to help make safer roads a reality in the African region. Many African countries combine young and burgeoning populations with rapid and poorly planned urbanisation and motorisation."

"The resulting toll of road traffic crashes and injuries is a heavy cost on communities and countries. iRAP’s work on making roads safer for all road users will be key to the region’s efforts to reduce the crippling burden of unsafe roads."

"While there might be a lot of pain and sacrifice, we certainly see joy as well. We save more patients than we lose, we get to help a lot of people, and that more than makes up for the bad times. In my field, ‘Accident & Emergency’, it is possible to see a patient turn around in a few minutes, and that makes it worth it."

"The cost of mismanaged medical services culminating in lives needlessly lost was always before me. It was more evident during my year as the Acting Head of the Accident & Emergency at Mulago National Referral Hospital. Frustrated at the many needless injuries, especially from road traffic crashes, I chose to take on trauma care and injury prevention as the focus of my career."

"That also enabled me to see beyond the immediate problems, to the bigger ones that hamper care in LMICs. In trauma, patients are still getting debilitating osteomyelitis because there is not enough saline to carry out a decent debridement (the process of removing unhealthy tissue from the body). Perhaps the surgical community needs to begin addressing upstream factors which make our surgical practice an impossible task."

"Neurosurgeons are not just brain surgeons, they are medically trained neurosurgical specialists who can also help patients suffering from back and neck pain as well as a host of other illnesses ranging from trigeminal neuralgia to head injury and Parkinson’s disease."

"I will say this categorically — that you cannot change your sex. Your sex actually is there in every single cell in the body; you have a chromosomal sex, you have genetic sex, you have hormonal sex, you have... psychological brain sex."

"I tried to be...not hard, but durable."

"I was proud to be a role model, not because I have done so much, but to say to young people that it can be done."

"Brown's determination, beliefs, and values helped her to break through barriers in other aspects of her life too."

"She had been told, You’re a girl, you’re Black, you’re poor, and it just can’t be done. But she persevered, and she succeeded."

"Her background and training as a surgeon, I believe, made her a courageous champion for children, civil rights, and reproductive rights."

"Dr. Brown faced barriers because of her race and because of her gender. Yet she persisted and pursued her dreams as a surgeon, as a teacher, and as a legislator."

"There is a moral as well as a physical character to all animal life, however humble it may be, enveloped indeed in obscurity, and with a mysterious solemnity, which must ever belong to the secrets of the Eternal. Let us then approach with caution the unknown character of the brute, as being an emanation from Himself; and treat with tenderness and respect the helpless creatures derived from such a source."

"Some of his suggestions with regard to operations were important advances in abdominal and pelvic surgery. He was, lastly, noted as a great teacher of surgery and a consummate operator."

"He was a man of very clear judgment, of ripe experience, of solid wisdom, and deservedly occupies a place as one of the greatest of French surgeons of the nineteenth century."

"Surgeons deserve all the necessary resources to do the work we love. As passionate as we were in 2022, the ACS will be even more vocal in 2023 in advocating and lobbying for fair and equitable funding for our profession, and we will propose new ways to assess the value of a surgeon that reflect our contributions to the healthcare system."

"Graduating was not just my accomplishment but ours."

"What will help you thrive are your relationships with the people who love and support you, who, without exception, want what is best for you,"

"Some of the challenges I have faced have been in getting trained in pediatric surgery and in pediatric surgical oncology. When I applied to be a pediatric surgery fellow, I did not match the first time, second time or third time because there were no other Black pediatric surgeons. I am the first board-certified U.S. Black female pediatric surgeon. This was a huge hurdle to overcome. It was challenging at first, but I love my profession now."

"Even though I wasn’t sure of the effectiveness, I was sure that doing nothing wasn’t going to make anything better,"

"It takes 10-14 hours, sometimes 20 hours. The longest operation I’ve done is 22 hours. That individual had over 2,000 tumors"

"My greatest satisfaction is being able to treat children all over the world for a disease that a few years ago, was considered hopeless."

"Don’t wait for permission — make your place, and then open the door for others."

"I will always be thankful for Dr seta for using his experience and for allowing and trusting me during my initiation in the field of surgery."

"There was a need for a national to continue neurosurgery services in the country so I joined so the could train me further."

"I’ve learned to take time to enjoy the small moments in life. The little smiles or gurgles from my baby, Olivia, can make my entire day. It’s important to find those kinds of moments at work, in your marriage or with your friends. It’s all about the small things in life."

"I usually wake up with the baby between 4 and 5 a.m. I feed her and I try to sneak in a ½ hour nap before I have to get up. I get ready to go to the hospital by around 7 a.m. I either go directly to the operating room or I see patients in the office. Some days I get called in to Fox to talk about a breaking news story or study."

"There are not many places in this world that take your education and training as seriously as this university. It achieves excellence, because it cares."

"I see no mileage at all in being average. We owe it to the patients that we treat to be the best that we can be,” continued Professor Wood, who also told graduates that they needed to contribute to the body of knowledge in their fields."

"Collectively, we learn today to make tomorrow a better place for us and for everyone across the world."

"The well-informed surgeon must not consider it an unnecessary condescension to occupy himself with cares which the vulgar consider too minute and unimportant, but which, if neglected and forgotten, so often entail the most disastrous results."

"He was an excellent observer and a great worker, who knew how to adopt and adapt others' ideas very practically."

"While it is true that, in the US, one person dies every minute due to a shortage of organs for transplantation and that the country needs to find a solution to this pressing issue, it is also essential to safeguard the rights and wishes of individuals who, while still mentally competent, have considered the sensitive question of how they wish to be cared for (or not cared for) in the final stages of their lives and how they wish their body to be disposed of. The new measures have received enthusiastic support from a large part of the US transplant community, despite bioethics experts warning of the risk that the law could turn individuals who would not have wished to do so into organ donors, force certain family members to accept decisions they do not agree with, and even encourage doctors not to administer certain medications to terminally ill patients for fear of damaging the quality of organs that would otherwise be available for harvesting and transplantation. These concerns may be exaggerated, but they are entirely legitimate. For decades, efforts have been made to close the gap between organ demand and supply, but this does not mean that we should not proceed with the utmost caution. It may seem obvious to point out a fundamental principle, but we must always bear in mind that it is not acceptable to place more value on one life than on another – in this case, on the life of a man or woman on the transplant waiting list than on the life of a person who is nearing the end of their life on an intensive care unit. We must act with caution, demonstrating that the ultimate concern is always, and only, the respect and health of citizens, at whatever stage of life they are, at whatever age, and in whatever situation."

"Indeed, throughout human history, the end of life has always coincided with the cessation of the heartbeat: every hero worthy of the name has died because their heart stopped beating. Literature, works of art, and old medical textbooks provide ample evidence of this. [...] With the first cardiac surgery procedures and the invention of extracorporeal circulation, it became clear that the function of the heart could be replaced by an artificial mechanism: the person continued to live without a beating heart in his chest, as long as blood continued to flow to their brain. Doctors had recorded numerous signs, and the idea that the brain played a crucial role in human life was already well established. Based on these assumptions, a debate developed at Harvard that brought together not only doctors but also lawyers, philosophers and representatives of different faiths, as the aim was to find a definition of death that took into account the ethical concerns and the context at a given point in history. Since the Harvard guidelines, death is certified when all vital brain functions have irreversibly ceased."

"Therefore, the new definition of death was not merely the result of a discussion between scientists; above all, it was the first shared bioethical statement to have a tangible impact worldwide. Indeed, brain death formed the basis for the development of transplant medicine as we know it today; it enabled organ donation and harvesting from donors whose hearts were still beating. And it is thanks to that work that, today, tens of thousands of organ transplants are performed worldwide each year, and that, thanks to this treatment, countless patients who would otherwise be facing certain death are saved. Therefore, the definition of death is based on scientific certainties that there is no reason to question. Moreover, it is clear that if a doctor had the slightest doubt about a person's death, they would never proceed with organ harvesting."

"Some people currently argue that the definition of death should be revised in light of the technological innovations that have transformed the world of medicine. Personally, I believe that the way in which the end of life is defined is scientifically correct. More importantly, however, I believe that if anyone has doubts, they should raise them in the appropriate forums and present the scientific arguments that support their position to everyone. Otherwise, suggesting that an individual who has hitherto been defined as dead is no longer dead is an irresponsible act that risks jeopardising the opportunity to save hundreds of thousands of lives through post-mortem organ donation, a generous act motivated solely by a sense of solidarity between human beings."

"In the USA, I have always refused to perform transplants from altruistic donors, although such transplants were carried out, albeit rarely, at the centres I have managed. On the other hand, I have always supported, performed and encouraged transplants from living donors with whom there is an emotional bond. I am not convinced that it is right to subject someone who is not related to the recipient to the risk of surgery. I wouldn't go so far as to ban them, but I'm not convinced that they are an ethical approach or a solution to the appallingly long waiting lists, especially for kidney transplants."

"I said that five years ago, the then mayor, (Gianni Alemanno) , ran for office with a campaign focused on the issue of security. He had a vision of a film, the 'sheriff mayor' film, but it turned into a different film, the 'all talk and no action' sheriff film."