Themes

"We cannot say just because the United Nations...Who said that the United Nations is a credible institution? first of all, Who said? we know that you have the double standard in the world, in the United States policy, in the United Nations that is controlled by the United States and this so, it has no credibility. So, it's about evidences and documents, whenever they have we can discuss it just to discuss the report that we don't see in reality related to it. It is just a waste of time[...]for one reason, they haven't implemented, they never implemented any of the resolutions that related to the Arab world for example the Palestinians to the Syrian land. Why don't they, if they talk about human rights, what about the Palestinians suffering in the occupied territory? what about my land...my people? that leave their land because it's occupied by Israel..."

"It may be said that the actual birth of World Government coincided with the formation of the United Nations Organization, and with the desperate wish to invest it with real authority. So the embryonic World Government is potentially already there, founded essentially upon the heritage of the League of Nations. What shape it eventually takes, whether it becomes an enlargement of former tyrannies, or whether in fact it will prove to be the instrument by means of which we shall produce our promised Golden Age, depends upon ourselves, the people. Only by appreciating possibilities shall we know for what to strive. In this respect we are not in such an inferior position to the experts as we might think, because we are living in a time of transition, when everything is going to be so different that the experts are possibly more handicapped by their traditional time-worn knowledge than are we, untrained and with minds empty of red tape and orthodoxy. It is possible that the truths and values of the coming new world conditions will be more easily and correctly apprehended by the man in the street to-day than by the tired politicians and economists. p. 23-24"

"Eagerly, musician, Sweep your string, So we may sing, Elated, optative, Our several voices Interblending, Playfully contending, Not interfering But co-inhering, For all within The cincture of the sound Is holy ground, Where all are Brothers, None faceless Others. Let mortals beware Of words, for With words we lie, Can say peace When we mean war, Foul thought speak fair And promise falsely, But song is true: Let music for peace Be the paradigm, For peace means to change At the right time, As the World Clock, Goes Tick and Tock. So may the story Of our human city Presently move Like music, when Begotten notes New notes beget, Making the flowing Of time a growing,Till what it could be, At last it is, Where even sadness Is a form of gladness, Where Fate is Freedom,Grace and Surprise."

"My friends, our challenge today is not to save Western civilization — or Eastern, for that matter. All civilization is at stake, and we can save it only if all peoples join together in the task. You Americans did so much, in the last century, to build an effective multilateral system, with the United Nations at its heart. Do you need it less today, and does it need you less, than 60 years ago? Surely not. More than ever today, Americans, like the rest of humanity, need a functioning global system through which the world’s peoples can face global challenges together. And in order to function more effectively, the system still cries out for far-sighted American leadership, in the Truman tradition. I hope and pray that the American leaders of today, and tomorrow, will provide it."

"Eradication of extreme poverty has been identified as a priority, and specific targets have been set for prescribed measures. Many said the potential benefits of globalization are understood but people have yet to feel them. It is agreed that part of the solution lies in sovereign States giving priority to the needs of their people, especially the poorest. States, however, must work with the private sector and civil society to solve the problems of globalization. A more equitable world economy has been called for, one where those who have more do more for those who have less."

"The distribution of the world's resources and the settled unity of the peoples of the world are in reality one and the same thing, for behind all modern wars lies a fundamental economic problem. Solve that and wars will very largely cease. In considering, therefore, the preservation of peace, as sought for and emphasized by the United Nations at this time, it becomes immediately apparent that peace, security and world stability are primarily tied up with the economic problem. When there is freedom from want, one of the major causes of war will disappear. Where there is uneven distribution of the world's riches and where there is a situation in which some nations have or take everything and other nations lack the necessities of life, it is obvious that there is a trouble-breeding factor there and that something must be done. Therefore we should deal with world unity and peace primarily from the angle of the economic problem."

"Since the creation of the United Nations in 1945, over 100 major conflicts around the world have left some 20 million dead."

"to unite our strength to maintain international peace and security, and"

"to ensure, by the acceptance of principles and the institution of methods, that armed force shall not be used, save in the common interest, and"

"to practice tolerance and live together in peace with one another as good neighbours, and"

"to employ international machinery for the promotion of the economic and social advancement of all peoples,"

"to promote social progress and better standards of life in larger freedom,"

"More than ever before in human history, we share a common destiny. We can master it only if we face it together. And that, my friends, is why we have the United Nations. Through the United Nations, we are working together to preserve peace; to outlaw weapons that kill and maim indiscriminately; to bring mass murderers and war criminals to justice. Through the United Nations, we are working together to defeat Aids and other epidemics; to control climate change; to make clean air and water available to everyone. Through the United Nations, we are working together to ensure that the global market benefits all of us, allowing the poor to lift themselves out of poverty."

"Memos about the sexual abuse in the Central African Republic were "passed from desk to desk, inbox to inbox, across multiple UN offices, with no one willing to take responsibility", the report found. It added: "The welfare of the victims and the accountability of the perpetrators appeared to be an afterthought, if considered at all." The investigation revealed that French peacekeepers from the UN's children agency, UNICEF, failed to act on reports of sexual abuse in early 2014 in the midst of civil war. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon expressed "profound regret that these children were betrayed by the very people sent to protect them" and said he accepted the panel's broad findings. No one has been arrested more than a year and a half after UN authorities were made aware of the sexual abuse allegations. Four French soldiers were questioned last week and released without charge. It took almost a year for UN staff to respond to allegations of rape by six children. One child reported he had been "orally and anally raped.""

"Through the United Nations, we are working together to make human rights a reality for everyone - to give all human beings real choices in life, and a real say in decisions that affect their lives. In all these areas and more, the United Nations is working for you. But it can do little without you. After all, it belongs to you, the peoples of the world. And therefore it can work much better with your help and your ideas. My friends, the new millennium need not be a time of fear or anxiety. If we work together and have faith in our own abilities, it can be a time of hope and opportunity. It's up to us to make it so."

"When it comes with [United Nations] Security Council my opininion is very clear, from now on, I do not accept the Security Council as up now. I call on all nations to stop recognizing the Security Council as up now. Its existence is illegal, unacceptable, and non-democratic. We will not attend its sessions, we will not recognize it at all. I call upon the world to stop recognizing the Security Council from now on in its current form, it is useless! 65 wars have happened and the Security Council did not deter the aggressions, what is the Security Council? it is the tool in the hands of major powers using it to serve their exclusive interests."

"It has been said that the United Nations was not created in order to bring us to heaven, but in order to save us from hell."

"Mathematics is the science of the infinite, its goal the symbolic comprehension of the infinite with human, that is finite, means."

"In the Timaeus Plato had expounded a theory that outside the universe, which he regarded as bounded and spherical, there was an infinite empty space."

"Buzz Lightyear: To infinity and beyond!"

"During the Middle Ages the universe was regarded as finite, with the earth at its centre. The idea was abandoned during the Scientific Renaissance, and the universe came to be pictured as an indefinitely large number of stars scattered throughout infinite Euclidean space. This conception appeared to be a necessary consequence of the theory of gravitation; for, as Newton pointed out, a finite material universe in infinite space would tend to concentrate in one massive lump."

"For all who have in anywise reflected on the divine nature deny that God has a body. Of this they find excellent proof in the fact that we understand by body a definite quantity... bounded by a certain shape, and it is the height of absurdity to predicate such a thing of God, a being absolutely infinite. But meanwhile... they think corporeal or extended substance wholly apart from the divine nature, and say it was created by God. ...I myself have proved... that no substance can be produced or created by anything other than itself. Further I showed... that besides God, no substance can be granted or conceived. Hence we drew the conclusion that extended substance is one of the infinite attributes of God. However, ...I will refute the arguments of my adversaries, which all start from the following points:— Extended substance, in so far as it is substance, consists... in parts, wherefore they deny that it can be infinite, or, consequently, that it can appertain to God. This they illustrate... If extended substance, they say, is infinite, let it be conceived to be divided into two [equal] parts; each part will then be either finite or infinite. If the former, then infinite substance is composed of two finite parts, which is absurd. If the latter, then one [the original] infinite will be twice as large as another infinite [the part], which is also absurd. Further, if an infinite line be measured out in foot lengths, it will consist of an infinite number of such parts; it would equally consist of an infinite number of parts, if each part measured only an inch: therefore, one infinity would be twelve times as great as the other. Lastly, if from a single point there be conceived to be drawn two diverging lines which at first are at a definite distance apart, but are produced to infinity, it is certain that the distance between the two lines will be continually increased, until at length it changes from definite to indefinable. As these absurdities follow, it is said, from considering quantity as infinite, the conclusion is drawn, that extended substance must necessarily be finite, and consequently, cannot appertain to the nature of God. ... God, it is said, inasmuch as he is a supremely perfect being, cannot be passive; but extended substance, in so far as it is divisible, is passive. It follows, therefore, that extended substance does not appertain to the essence of God. ... I have already answered their propositions; for all their arguments are founded on the hypothesis that extended substance is composed of parts, and such a hypothesis I have shown... to be absurd. ...all these absurdities ...from which it is sought to extract the conclusion that extended substance is finite, do not at all follow from the notion of an infinite quantity, but merely from the notion that an infinite quantity is measureable, and composed of finite parts: therefore ...infinite quantity is not measureable, and cannot be composed of finite parts. This is exactly what we have already proved... Wherefore the weapon which they aimed at us has in reality recoiled upon themselves. ...For ...taking extended substance, which can only be conceived as infinite, one, and indivisible... they assert, in order to prove that it is finite, that it is composed of finite parts, and that it can be multiplied and divided. ... ...If ...we regard quantity as it is represented in our imagination... we shall find that it is finite, divisible, and compounded of parts; but if we regard it as it is represented in our intellect... we shall then, as I have sufficiently proved, find that it is infinite, one, and indivisible. This will be plain enough... if it be remembered, that matter is everywhere the same, that its parts are not distinguishable, except in so far as we conceive matter as diversely modified, whence its parts are distinguished, not really, but modally. For instance... water, in so far as it is water, is produced and corrupted; but in so far as it is substance, it is neither produced nor corrupted. ...inasmuch as besides God... no substance can be granted, wherefrom it could receive its modifications. All things... are in God, and all things... come to pass solely through the laws of the infinite nature of God, and follow... from the necessity of his essence. Wherefore it can in nowise be said, that God is passive in respect to anything other than himself, or that extended substance is unworthy of the Divine nature, even if it be supposed divisible, so long as it is granted to be infinite and eternal."

"From the necessity of the divine nature must follow an infinite number of things in infinite ways—that is, all things which can fall within the sphere of infinite intellect."

"It is properly debated whether irrational numbers are true numbers or fictions. ...where we might try to subject them to numeration [decimal representation] and to make them proportional to rational numbers, we find that they flee perpetually, so that none of them in itself can be freely grasped: a fact that we perceive in the resolving of them... Moreover, it is not possible to call that a true number which is such as to lack precision and which has no known proportion to true numbers. Just as an infinite number is not a number, so an irrational number is not a true number and is hidden under a sort of cloud of infinity. And thus the ratio of an irrational number to a rational number is no less uncertain than that of an infinite to a finite."

"The matter which we suppose to be the main constituent of the universe is built out of small self-contained building-blocks, the chemical atoms. It cannot be repeated too often that the word "atom" is nowadays detached from any of the old philosophical speculations: we know precisely that the atoms with which we are dealing are in no sense the simplest conceivable components of the universe. On the contrary, a number of phenomena, especially in the area of spectroscopy, lead to the conclusion that atoms are very complicated structures. So far as modern science is concerned, we have to abandon completely the idea that by going into the realm of the small we shall reach the ultimate foundations of the universe. I believe we can abandon this idea without any regret. The universe is infinite in all directions, not only above us in the large but also below us in the small. If we start from our human scale of existence and explore the content of the universe further and further, we finally arrive, both in the large and in the small, at misty distances where first our senses and then even our concepts fail us."

"Infinity is the end. End without infinity is but a new beginning."

"Concerning the things needful to be known... we must first take care not to commit ourselves to a search, going back to infinity—that is, in order to discover the best method for finding out the truth, there is no need of another method to discover such method; nor of a third method for discovering the second, and so on to infinity. By such proceedings, we should never arrive at the knowledge of the truth, or indeed at any knowledge at all."

"What does infinity mean to you? Are you not infinity and yourself?"

"Things regarded in themselves, and in relation to God, are neither ugly nor beautiful. ...Perfection and imperfection are names which do not differ much from the names beauty and ugliness. ... This I know, that between finite and infinite there is no comparison; so that the difference between God and the greatest and most excellent created thing is no less than the difference between God and the least created thing."

"We know by actual observation only a comparatively small part of the whole universe. I will call this "our neighborhood." Even within the confines of this province our knowledge decreases very rapidly as we get away from our own particular position in space and time. It is only within the solar system that our empirical knowledge extends to the second order of small quantities (and that only for g44 and not for the other gαβ), the first order corresponding to about 10-8. How the gαβ outside our neighborhood are, we do not know, and how they are at infinity of space or time we shall never know. Infinity is not a physical but a mathematical concept, introduced to make our equations more symmetrical and elegant. From the physical point of view everything that is outside our neighborhood is pure extrapolation, and we are entirely free to make this extrapolation as we please to suit our philosophical or aesthetical predilections—or prejudices. It is true that some of these prejudices are so deeply rooted that we can hardly avoid believing them to be above any possible suspicion of doubt, but this belief is not founded on any physical basis. One of these convictions, on which extrapolation is naturally based, is that the particular part of the universe where we happen to be, is in no way exceptional or privileged; in other words, that the universe, when considered on a large enough scale, is isotropic and homogeneous."

"It is only by intuition that the infinite can be apprehended. But why is this? Why cannot the infinite be apprehended by concepts? To see this we must understand that the word "infinite," in the religious sense, has nothing at all to do with that sense of the word in which it is applied to space, time, and the number series. We may call this latter the mathematical infinite to distinguish it from the religious infinite. And it is the confusion between these two which misled us into the false trail of supposing that the infinity of God's mind refers to the amount of His knowledge and that the finitude of man's mind refers to his ignorance. The religious infinite, or in other words the infinity of God, means that than 'which there is no other'. In this sense neither space nor time could be infinite, since space is an "other" to time, and time is an "other" to space."

"By God, I mean a being absolutely infinite — that is, a substance consisting in infinite attributes, of which each expresses eternal and infinite essentiality. Explanation — I say absolutely infinite, not infinite after its kind: for, of a thing infinite only after its kind, infinite attributes may be denied; but that which is absolutely infinite, contains in its essence whatever expresses reality, and involves no negation."

"A child might be overawed by a great city, but a civil engineer knows that he might demolish it and rebuild it himself. Husserl's philosophy has the same aim: to show us that, although we may have been thrust into this world without a 'by your leave,' we are mistaken to assume that it exists independently of us. It is true that reality exists apart from us; but what we mistake for the world is actually a world constituted by us, selected from an infinitely complex reality."

"If we have only to classify a finite number of objects, it is easy to preserve these classifications without change. If the number of objects is indefinite, ...[i.e.,] if we are constantly liable to find new and unforeseen objects springing up, it may happen that the appearance of a new object will oblige us to modify the classification, and it is thus that we are exposed to antinomies. There is no actual infinity. The Cantorians forgot this, and so fell into contradiction. It is true that Cantorism has been useful, but that was when it was applied to a real problem, whose terms were clearly defined, and then it was possible to advance without danger. Like the Cantorians, the logicians have forgotten the fact, and they have met with the same difficulties. ...[B]elief in an actual infinity is essential in the Russellian logic, and this... distinguishes it from the Hilbertian logic. Hilbert takes the... view of extension... to avoid the Cantorian antimonies. Russell takes the... view of comprehension... to regard the infinite as actual. And we have not only infinite classes; when we pass from the genus to the species... the number of conditions is still infinite, for they generally express that the object... is in... relation with all the objects of an infinite class. But all this is ."

"Euler's step was daring. In strict logic, it was an outright fallacy... Yet it was justified by analogy, by the analogy of the most successful achievements of a rising science that he called... "Analysis of the Infinite." Other mathematicians, before Euler, passed from finite differences to infinitely small differences, from sums with a finite number of terms to sums with an infinity of terms, from finite products to infinite products. And so Euler passed from equations of a finite degree (algebraic equations) to equations of infinite degree, applying the rules made for the finite... This analogy... is beset with pitfalls. How did Euler avoid them? ...Euler's reasons are not demonstrative. Euler does not reexamine the grounds for his conjecture... only its consequences. ...He examines also the consequences of closely related analogous conjectures... Euler's reasons are, in fact, inductive."

"This procedure is the demonstration by recurrence. We first establish a theorem for n = 1; then we show that if it is true of n - 1, it is true of n, and thence conclude that it is true for all the whole numbers. ..Here then we have the mathematical reasoning par excellence, and we must examine it more closely. ...The essential characteristic of reasoning by recurrence is that it contains, condensed, so to speak, in a single formula, an infinity of syllogisms. ...to arrive at the smallest theorem [we] can not dispense with the aid of reasoning by recurrence, for this is an instrument which enables us to pass from the finite to the infinite. This instrument is always useful, for, allowing us to overleap at a bound as many stages as we wish, it spares us verifications, long, irksome and monotonous, which would quickly become impracticable. But it becomes indispensable as soon as we aim at the general theorem... In this domain of arithmetic,.. the mathematical infinite already plays a preponderant rôle, and without it there would be no science, because there would be nothing general."

"God created infinity, and man, unable to understand infinity, had to invent s."

"We must relax our minds a little; but this opens the door to debauchery. Let us mark the limits. There are no limits in things. Laws would put them there, and the mind cannot suffer it."

"He who proclaims the existence of the Infinite, and none can avoid it — accumulates in that affirmation more of the supernatural than is to be found in all the miracles of all the religions; for the notion of the Infinite presents that double character that forces itself upon us and yet is incomprehensible. When this notion seizes upon our understanding we can but kneel ... I see everywhere the inevitable expression of the Infinite in the world; through it the supernatural is at the bottom of every heart. The idea of God is a form of the idea of the Infinite. As long as the mystery of the infinite weighs on human thought, temples will be erected for the worship of the Infinite, whether God is called Brahma, Allah, Jehovah, or Jesus; and on the pavement of these temples, men will be seen kneeling, prostrated, annihilated by the thought of the Infinite."

"All that is not thought is pure nothingness...And yet—strange contradiction for those who believe in time—geologic history shows us that life is only a short episode between two eternities of death, and that, even in this episode, conscious thought has lasted and will last only a moment. Thought is only a gleam in the midst of a long night. But it is this gleam which is everything."

"This I have tested too frequently to be mistaken by offering to indifferent spectators forms of equal abstract beauty in half tint, relieved, the one against dark sky, the other against a bright distance. The preference is invariably given to the latter... the same preference is unhesitatingly accorded to the same effect in Nature herself. Whatever beauty there may result from effects of light on foreground objects... there is yet a light which the eye invariably seeks with a deeper feeling of the beautiful, the light of the declining or breaking day, and the flakes of scarlet cloud burning like watch-fires in the green sky of the horizon; a deeper feeling... having more of spiritual hope and longing, less of animal and present life... I am willing to let it rest on the determination of every reader, whether the pleasure which he has received from these effects of calm and luminous distance be not the most singular and memorable of which he has been conscious... It is not then by nobler form, it is not by positiveness of hue, it is not by intensity of light... that this strange distant space possesses its attractive power. But there is one thing that it has, or suggests, which no other object of sight suggests in equal degree, and that is—Infinity. It is of all visible things the least material, the least finite, the farthest withdrawn from the earth prison-house, the most typical of the nature of God, the most suggestive of the glory of his dwelling-place. For the sky of night, though we may know it boundless, is dark; it is a studded vault, a roof that seems to shut us in and down; but the bright distance has no limit, we feel its infinity, as we rejoice in its purity of light. ...this expression of infinity in distance... is of that value that no other forms will altogether recompense us for its loss; and... no work of any art, in which this expression of infinity is possible, can be perfect or supremely elevated, without it, and that, in proportion to its presence, it will exalt and render impressive even the most tame and trivial themes. And I think if there be any one grand division, by which it is at all possible to set the productions of painting, so far as their mere plan or system is concerned, on our right and left hands, it is this of light and dark background, of heaven light or of object light."

"We know that there is an infinite, and are ignorant of its nature. As we know it to be false that numbers are finite, it is therefore true that there is an infinity in number. But we do not know what it is. It is false that it is even, it is false that it is odd; for the addition of a unit can make no change in its nature. Yet it is a number, and every number is odd or even (this is certainly true of every finite number). So we may well know that there is a God without knowing what He is. Is there not one substantial truth, seeing there are so many things which are not the truth itself?"

"We know then the existence and nature of the finite, because we also are finite and have extension. We know the existence of the infinite, and are ignorant of its nature, because it has extension like us, but not limits like us. But we know neither the existence nor the nature of God, because He has neither extension nor limits."

"When we would pursue virtues to their extremes on either side, vices present themselves insensibly there, in their insensible journeys towards the infinitely little; and vices present themselves in a crowd towards the infinitely great, so that we lose ourselves in them, and no longer see virtues."

"Those who assumed innumerable worlds, e.g., Anaximander, Leukippos, Demokritos, and, later on, Epicurus, assumed that they came into being and passed away ad infinitum, some always coming into being and others passing away."

"When you reach the top of the mountain, keep climbing."

"Let man then contemplate the whole of nature in her full and grand majesty, and turn his vision from the low objects which surround him. Let him gaze on that brilliant light, set like an eternal lamp to illumine the universe; let the earth appear to him a point in comparison with the vast circle described by the sun; and let him wonder at the fact that this vast circle is itself but a very fine point in comparison with that described by the stars in their revolution round the firmament. But if our view be arrested there, let our imagination pass beyond; it will sooner exhaust the power of conception than nature that of supplying material for conception. The whole visible world is only an imperceptible atom in the ample bosom of nature. No idea approaches it. We may enlarge our conceptions beyond all imaginable space; we only produce atoms in comparison with the reality of things. It is an infinite sphere, the center of which is everywhere, the circumference nowhere. In short it is the greatest sensible mark of the almighty power of God, that imagination loses itself in that thought."

"For after all what is man in nature? A nothing in relation to infinity, all in relation to nothing, a central point between nothing and all and infinitely far from understanding either. The ends of things and their beginnings are impregnably concealed from him in an impenetrable secret. He is equally incapable of seeing the nothingness out of which he was drawn and the infinite in which he is engulfed."

"I fear what I have said of Infinities, will seem obscure to you; but it is enough if you understand, that Infinities when considered absolutely without any Restriction or Limitation, are neither equal nor unequal, nor have any Proportion one to another, and therefore the Principle that all Infinities are equal, is a precarious one."

"...as nature has graven her image and that of her Author on all things, they almost all partake of her double infinity. Thus we see that all the sciences are infinite in the extent of their researches. For who doubts that geometry, for instance, has an infinite infinity of problems to solve? They are also infinite in the multitude and fineness of their premises; for it is clear that those which are put forward as ultimate are not self-supporting, but are based on others which, again having others for their support, do not permit of finality. ...Of these two Infinites of science, that of greatness is the most palpable, and hence a few persons have pretended to know all things. ...the infinitely little is the least obvious. Philosophers have much oftener claimed to have reached it, and it is here they have all stumbled. ...We need no less capacity for attaining the Nothing than the All. Infinite capacity is required for both, and it seems to me that whoever shall have understood the ultimate principles of being might also attain to the knowledge of the Infinite. The one depends on the other, and one leads to the other. These extremes meet and reunite by force of distance, and find each other in God, and in God alone."