Proverbs, aphorisms, quotations (English) | by Linux fortune |
Although it is still a truism in industry that "no one was ever fired for buying IBM," Bill O'Neil, the chief technology officer at Drexel Burnham Lambert, says he knows for a fact that someone has been fired for just that reason. He knows it because he fired the guy. "He made a bad decision, and what it came down to was, 'Well, I bought it because I figured it was safe to buy IBM,'" Mr. O'Neil says. "I said, 'No. Wrong. Game over. Next contestant, please.'" -- The Wall Street Journal, December 6, 1989 | |
Goda's Truism: By the time you get to the point where you can make ends meet, somebody moves the ends. | |
Newlan's Truism: An "acceptable" level of unemployment means that the government economist to whom it is acceptable still has a job. | |
Van Roy's Law: Honesty is the best policy - there's less competition. Van Roy's Truism: Life is a whole series of circumstances beyond your control. | |
It is a profoundly erroneous truism, repeated by all copy-books and by eminent people when they are making speeches, that we should cultivate the habit of thinking about what we are doing. The precise opposite is the case. Civilization advances by extending the numbers of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them. Operations of thought are like cavalry charges in battle -- they are strictly limited in number, they require fresh horses, and must only be made at decisive moments. -- Alfred North Whitehead |