In a man devoted to knowledge, pity seems almost ridiculous, like delicate hands on a cyclops.
When I reflect on the pompous titles bestowed on unworthy men, I feel an indignity that instructs me to despise the absurdity. The Honourable plunderer of his country, or the Right Honourable murderer of mankind, create such a contrast of ideas as exhibit a monster rather than a man. Virtue is inflamed at the violation, and sober reason calls it nonsense.
Postmodernism, the school of 'thought' that proclaimed 'There are no truths, only interpretations' has largely played itself out in absurdity, but it has left behind a generation of academics in the humanities disabled by their distrust of the very idea of truth and their disrespect for evidence, settling for 'conversations' in which nobody is wrong and nothing can be confirmed, only asserted with whatever style you can muster.
If the whole universe has no meaning, we should never have found out that it has no meaning: just as, if there were no light in the universe and therefore no creatures with eyes, we should never know it was dark. Dark would be without meaning.
Life doesn't make any sense, and we all pretend it does. Comedy's job is to point out that it doesn't make sense, and that it doesn't make much difference anyway.
He who can lead you to believe an absurdity can lead you to commit an atrocity.
So then you’re free?’ ‘Yes, I’m free,’ said Karl, and nothing seemed more worthless than his freedom.
The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't.
I'm glad the universe is pointless. It means if I get to the end of my life, the universe can't turn to me and go, 'What have you been doing, you idiot? That's not the point!
Having killed God, the atheist is left with no reason for being, no morality to espouse, no meaning to life, and no hope beyond the grave.
I'm a very observational type of comedian that points out everyday absurdities.
When the whole world is crazy, it doesn't pay to be sane.
The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd.
In the space of one hundred and seventy-six years the Mississippi has shortened itself two hundred and forty-two miles. Therefore, in the Old Silurian Period the Mississippi River was upward of one million three hundred thousand miles long, seven hundred and forty-two years from now the Mississippi will be only a mile and three-quarters long. There is something fascinating about science. One gets such wholesome returns of conjecture out of such a trifling investment of fact.
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former.
The two most common elements in the universe are hydrogen and stupidity.
Going to war without France is like going hunting without an accordion.
Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities.
If God had wanted man to play soccer, he wouldn't have given us arms.
Gentlemen, let us suppose that man is not stupid. (Indeed one cannot refuse to suppose that, if only from the one consideration, that, if man is stupid, then who is wise?) But if he is not stupid, he is monstrously ungrateful! Phenomenally ungrateful. In fact, I believe that the best definition of man is the ungrateful biped.
Since all life is futility, then the decision to exist must be the most irrational of all.
I believe in nothing.
The more serious the situation, the funnier the comedy can be. The greatest comedy plays against the greatest tragedy. Comedy is a red rubber ball and if you throw it against a soft, funny wall, it will not come back. But if you throw it against the hard wall of ultimate reality, it will bounce back and be very lively. Very, very few people understand this.
I'm definitely a centrist and feel like both parties can be absurd.
I'd hate to die twice. It's so boring.
