Bryce S. DeWitt Quotes

“Cecile was teaching in Berkeley and I was [at Livermore]. He probably had, could have had, some influence on Teller, [for] Teller was quite generous in allowing me one whole semester off to be at Berkeley to work on something and also a semester off at the Institute for Advanced Study. Then I won the Gravity Research Foundation first prize.”

“For a lot of the time I was in Berkeley, I was single. I was living in a kind of collegiate apartment by myself - it was like a protracted summer vacation. So at least in hindsight, I have gloomy emotions attached to Berkeley, whereas I started coming to New York because I was dating someone, and it was very exciting and romantic.”

“A study of the San Francisco Beat enclave by psychiatrist Dr. Francis Rigney in the late 1950's showed 60 percent "were so psychotic or crippled by tensions, anxiety and neurosis as to be nonfunctional in the competitive world." In contrast, the several studies released so far made of the student radicals at Berkeley show them to be stable, serious, and of above-average intelligence. The point is that the Beats had to "cop out" of the Rat Race because they couldn't perform; the New Left chooses to reject a society it could easily be successful in.”

“...he asked, "Where are you today, right now?"Eagerly, I started talking about myself. However, I noticed that I was still being sidetracked from getting answers to my questions. Still, I told him about my distant and recent past and about my inexplicable depressions. He listened patiently and intently, as if he had all the time in the world, until I finished several hours later."Very well," he said. "But you still have not answered my question about where you are.""Yes I did, remember? I told you how I got to where I am today: by hard work.""Where are you?""What do you mean, where am I?""Where Are you?" he repeated softly."I'm here.""Where is here?""In this office, in this gas station!" I was getting impatient with this game."Where is this gas station?""In Berkeley?""Where is Berkeley?""In California?""Where is California?""In the United States?""On a landmass, one of the continents in the Western Hemisphere. Socrates, I...""Where are the continents?I sighed. "On the earth. Are we done yet?""Where is the earth?""In the solar system, third planet from the sun. The sun is a small star in the Milky Way galaxy, all right?""Where is the Milky Way?""Oh, brother, " I sighed impatiently, rolling my eyes. "In the universe." I sat back and crossed my arms with finality."And where," Socrates smiled, "is the universe?""The universe is well, there are theories about how it's shaped...""That's not what I asked. Where is it?""I don't know - how can I answer that?""That is the point. You cannot answer it, and you never will. There is no knowing about it. You are ignorant of where the universe is, and thus, where you are. In fact, you have no knowledge of where anything is or of What anything is or how is came to be. Life is a mystery."My ignorance is based on this understanding. Your understanding is based on ignorance. This is why I am a humorous fool, and you are a serious jackass.”

“Others indeed may talk, and write, and fight about liberty, and make an outward pretence to it; but the free-thinker alone is truly free.”

“That neither our thoughts, nor passions, nor ideas formed by the imagination, exist without the mind, is what every body will allow.”

“Truth is the cry of all, but the game of few.”

“From my own being, and from the dependency I find in myself and my ideas, I do, by an act of reason, necessarily infer the existence of a God, and of all created things in the mind of God.”

“It was a huge challenge to learn digital painting well enough so that computers don't pop into mind when one sees one.”

“That's the conundrum of cartoon stripping, as opposed to political cartoons. When your anger is the driving force of your drawing hand, failure follows. The anger is OK, but it has to serve the interests of the heart, frankly.”