This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Thomas Henry Huxley, aka T.H. Huxley and Darwin's Bulldog
I find no difficulty in imagining that, at some former period, this universe was not in existence, and that it made its appearance in consequence of the volition of some pre-existing Being.
Appearance | Difficulty | Existence | Universe |
Love is never abstract. It does not adhere to the universe of the planet or the nation or the institution or the profession, but to the singular sparrows of the street, the lilies of the field, “the least of these my brethren.” Love is not, but its own desire, heroic. It is heroic only when compelled to be. It exists by its willingness to be anonymous, humble and unrewarded.
Upton Sinclair, fully Upton Beall Sinclair, Jr.
My soul is myself; the well-spring or point of consciousness, or center of inner activity… the most real thing in the universe to me; the start of all other knowing, the test by which I judge all other data.
Consciousness | Knowing | Soul | Universe |
Will Durant, fully William James "Will" Durant
I find in the universe so many forms of order, organization, system, law, and adjustment of means to ends, that I believe in a cosmic intelligence and I conceive God as the life, mind, order, and law of the world.
Ends | God | Intelligence | Law | Life | Life | Means | Mind | Order | Organization | System | Universe | World | God |
Thomas Henry Huxley, aka T.H. Huxley and Darwin's Bulldog
The question of questions for mankind - the problem which underlies all others, and is more deeply interesting than any other - is the ascertainment of the placed which man occupies in nature and of his relations to the universe of things. Whence our race has come; what are the limits of our power over nature, and of nature’s power over us; to what goal we are tending; are the problems which present themselves anew and with undiminished interest to every man born into the world.
Man | Mankind | Nature | Power | Present | Problems | Question | Race | Universe | World |
Man is like an island, a circle within circles. Man is separated from these outer circles by his mind, his beliefs, and the limitations put upon him by a life away from the Earth. The circle of man, the island of self, is the place of logic, the ‘I,’ the ego, and the physical self. That is the island that man has chosen to live within today, and in doing so he has created a prison for himself. The walls of the island prison are thick, made up of doubts, logic and lack of belief. His isolation from his greater circles of self is suffocating and prevents him from seeing life clearly and purely. It is a world of ignorance where the flesh is the only reality, the only god... Beyond man’s island of ego, his prison, lies the world of the spirit-that-moves-in-all-things, the force that is found in all things. It is a world that communicates to all entities of Creation and touches the creator. It is a circle of life that houses all man’s instinct, his deepest memory, his power to control his body and mind, and a bridge that helps man transcend flesh. It is a world that expands man’s universe and helps him to fuse himself to the earth. Most of all, it is a world that brings man to his higher self and to spiritual rapture.
Belief | Body | Control | Earth | Ego | Force | God | Ignorance | Instinct | Isolation | Life | Life | Logic | Man | Memory | Mind | Power | Prison | Reality | Self | Spirit | Universe | World |
The man who sat on the ground in his tipi meditating on life and its meaning, accepting the kinship of all creatures and acknowledging unity with the universe of things, was infusing into his being the true essence of civilization. And when native man left off this form of development, his humanization was retarded in growth.
Civilization | Growth | Life | Life | Man | Meaning | Unity | Universe |
To a mind that is still the whole universe surrenders.
If we see the universe as not simply a bunch of dead matter and empty space but actually a living system, then our story may well be one of learning how to live together in a living universe. If we don't have a story to guide us into the future, we're going to pull back into our smaller life stories of the past--stories of nationalism, of ethnic groups, of tribal groups, of geographic groups--and instead of pulling together in cooperation we're going to pull apart in conflict. What I am suggesting is to step back and see the universe as our original, larger home. If we are going to pull together as a human family for a promising future, this is an inclusive project; no one is left out.
Cooperation | Family | Future | Learning | Life | Life | Past | Space | Story | System | Universe |
Is the universe dead or alive at it's foundation? This is a powerful question. Be prepared for strong points of view; people often have an immediate response. Some people view the universe as non-living at the foundations, see space as empty, matter as inert, and believe that we as living creatures have evolved from empty space and inert matter. “It is nothing more than fantasy and superstition to think the whole universe is alive.” Other people respond instantly, saying, “Of course it's alive, how could you think otherwise? It is incomprehensible that the experiences of awe evoked by the universe could arise unless the universe around us is alive
Awe | Nothing | People | Question | Space | Superstition | Universe | Think |
It is crucial to understand and to gain the conviction that the laws of cause and effect govern the universe and all beings. … There are only two way to erase the trace left by a harmful act: either by going through the experience of suffering that is its natural consequence, or by purifying it with the appropriate antidotes before the appearance of its dire effects.
Appearance | Cause | Experience | Suffering | Universe | Govern | Understand |
Douglas Adams, fully Douglas Noel Adams
There is a theory which states that if ever anybody discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened.
Life is inherent in cosmic forces, and as we live and think, so the Universe responds to us. This is prayer, with our life fields or auras carrying an electrical charge to attract negative ions to us and be more stimulated. In this way our life fields remain positively charged and attract the negative particles or ions. This is the secret of life. Retaining communication and unity with the Universe ... our Galaxy, the Milky Way Galaxy … which is energy in harmonic interaction with neighboring galaxies and galaxies beyond into inter-galactic space … ad infinitum … where wave patterns create harmonic chords that can be read like a score of music … and the illusion of matter strung together with electromagnetic and nuclear forces of light.
Energy | Illusion | Life | Life | Music | Space | Unity | Universe |
The universe is but one great city, full of beloved ones, divine and human, by nature endeared to each other.
Our Universe is everlasting, creating the light of eternity within its electromagnetic field, creating light in the atmospheres of planets, heat and life, in the velocity of rotation and speed in orbit about the metagalaxy, a prodigious system within the depths of intergalactic void, the limitless reaches of outer space where the minimum-temperature controls the lives of galaxies, as they orbit in continuous momentum, in ever widening circles, about the nucleus, or electromagnetic hub of the metagalaxy.
Akon said to Elizabeth: “Mind forces, spiritual strength, soul attainment and thoughts are all made up of different speeds in the wave-length of light, or microatoms. Electricity is microatoms of light while sound and colour occur when the microatoms have different speeds, and when micro-atoms are stopped, they create heat. Light is an intelligent energy which can be thought into existence and substance. The pattern of the microatoms of light changes with changing thoughts, when one achieves the formula for the harmonic vibration of light. The key to all life and the Universe lies in the harmonic interaction of light. A mathematical formula for all transportation lies in the vibratory frequencies of light harmonic, with anti-gravity waves and time waves, which are simply the frequency rate between each pulse of the spiral of light.
Attainment | Energy | Existence | Life | Life | Light | Soul | Sound | Thought | Time | Universe | Thought |
These mysteries have a common element: they exhibit a staggering coherence throughout the reaches of space and time.” Furthermore, “There is no reasonable explanation in 'BB [big bang] theory' for the observed flatness of the universe; for the missing mass in it; for the accelerating expansion of galaxies; for the coherence of some basic cosmic ratios; and for the 'horizon problem,' the uniformity of the macrostructures throughout cosmic space. The problem known as the 'tuning of the constants' is particularly vexing. The three dozen or more physical parameters of the universe are so finely tuned that together they create the highly improbable conditions under which life can emerge... These are all puzzles of coherence, and they raise the possibility that this universe did not arise in the context of a random fluctuation of the underlying quantum vacuum. Instead, it may have been born in the womb of a prior 'meta-universe'... [i.e.] a vaster, more fundamental universe that is behind or beyond the universe we observe and inhabit.
Life | Life | Space | Uniformity | Universe |
We are beginning to see the entire universe as a holographically interlinked network of energy and information, organically whole and self referential at all scales of its existence. We, and all things in the universe, are non-locally connected with each other and with all other things in ways that are unfettered by the hitherto known limitations of space and time.
The subtle energies and information that underlie this universe were there before its particles of matter appeared and will be there after these particles disappear.