This weeks’s quotes were mostly devoted to inventions and technology. We wrap things up with the oft-noted idea that technology has a bit of the Frankenstein monster in it…

We live in a society exquisitely dependent on science and technology, in which hardly anyone knows anything about science and technology.
- Carl Sagan

The real problem is not whether machines think but whether men do.
- B.F. Skinner

It is a medium of entertainment which permits millions of people to listen to the same joke at the same time, and yet remain lonesome.
- T.S. Eliot, about radio

The saddest aspect of life right now is that science gathers knowledge faster than society gathers wisdom.
- Isaac Asimov

The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people.
- Karl Marx

The machine does not isolate man from the great problems of nature but plunges him more deeply into them.
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery

If we continue to develop our technology without wisdom or prudence, our servant may prove to be our executioner.
- Omar Bradley

All of the biggest technological inventions created by man – the airplane, the automobile, the computer – says little about his intelligence, but speaks volumes about his laziness.
- Mark Kennedy

Name the greatest of all inventors. Accident.
- Mark Twain

America is a country of inventors, and the greatest of inventors are the newspaper men.
- Alexander Graham Bell

Do you realize if it weren’t for Edison we’d be watching TV by candlelight?
- Al Boliska

Telephone, n. An invention of the devil which abrogates some of the advantages of making a disagreeable person keep his distance.
- Ambrose Bierce

Bill Gates is a very rich man today… and do you want to know why? The answer is one word: versions.
- Dave Barry

Today we have two quotes from inventors that are as grisly and depressing as their inventions:

My machine will take off a head in a twinkling and the victim will feel nothing but a refreshing coolness. We cannot make too much haste, gentlemen, to allow the nation to enjoy this advantage.
- Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, inventor of the Guillotine

No, it will make war impossible.
- Hiram Maxim, inventor of the machine gun, in response to the question “Will this gun not make war more terrible?”

If you’re a fan of 30 Rock, you may recall the the episode where Tracy Jordan said “What is this, Horseville? Because I’m surrounded by naysayers!” Today’s quotes are devoted to epically wrong naysayers. Don’t let the man get you down.

The phonograph has no commercial value at all.
- Thomas Edison

The world potential market for copying machines is 5000 at most.
- IBM (to future founders of Xerox), in 1959.

There is not the slightest indication that nuclear energy will ever be obtainable. It would mean that the atom would have to be shattered at will.
- Albert Einstein, 1932

The cinema is little more than a fad. It’s canned drama.
- Charlie Chaplin, 1916

Television won’t last because people will soon get tired of staring at a plywood box every night.
- Darryl Zanuck, 20th Century Fox, 1946

Who the hell wants to hear actors talk?
- H. M. Warner (co-founder of Warner Bros), 1927

Radio has no future.
- Lord Kelvin

The wireless music box has no imaginable commercial value. Who would pay for a message sent to no one in particular?
- David Sarnoff , Founder of NBC

The inventor of Vaseline ate a spoonful of the product every day.

The word testimony is derived from the fact that men in Ancient Rome would place their right hand on their testicles to take an oath.

The Pacific entrance of the Panama Canal is farther East than the Atlantic entrance.

Women who read romance novels supposedly have sex with their partners 74% more often than women who don’t.

The weight of the garbage that is annually dumped in the world’s oceans is three times the weight of fish that is caught.

The first known contraceptive was crocodile dung, used by the ancient Egyptians.

This must be Thursday. I never could get the hang of Thursdays.
- Douglas Adams

I wish you a tolerable Thursday. That’s all any of us can hope for.
- April Winchell

And God said, ‘Let there be light’ and there was light, but the Electricity Board said He would have to wait until Thursday to be connected.
- Spike Milligan

Today is ‘Take our Daughters to Work Day.’ This is when girls ages Nine to Fifteen go to work. Or, as it’s called at the Nike factory – Thursday.
- Bill Maher

The difference between perseverance and obstinacy is that one comes from a strong will, and the other from a strong won’t.
- Henry Ward Beecher

It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.
- Albert Einstein

Money grows on the tree of persistence.
- Japanese proverb

Ambition is the path to success. Persistence is the vehicle you arrive in.
- Bill Bradley or William Eardley, IV (unverified)

If we are facing in the right direction, all we have to do is keep on walking.
- Buddhist Saying

Comedic entertainer George Jessel had some great things to say about public speaking. Here are two:

If you haven’t struck oil in the first three minutes—stop boring!
- George Jessel

The human brain is a wonderful organ. It starts to work as soon as you are born and doesn’t stop until you get up to deliver a speech.
- George Jessel

We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once.
- Calvin Coolidge

It is not enough to stare up the steps – we must step up the stairs.
- Vance Havner

You don’t have to be great to get started, but you have to get started to be great.
- Les Brown

Can you guess which of these commonly cited “facts” is not true? It’s pretty obvious, but we’ll tell you next week if you can’t figure it out:

There are more plastic flamingos in America than real ones.

An ostrich’s eye is bigger than its brain.

There were no ponies in the Pony Express.

The Sanskrit word for “war” (gavisti) means “desire for more cows.”

The Bee Hummingbird (Mellisuga helenae) weighs less than a penny

A pregnant goldfish is called a twit.