rattus rattus’ blog

There is this wonderful short German phrase about quality being more important than quantity:

Qualität zählt!

Transcribed into English it reads:

Quality counts!

Of course, in English, one could wittily say “Quality matters!” Though, if you search the web for these treasures of linguistic and logical quality you will find similar quantities of texts stating the one or the other ;)

Since many writers even dare to add the statement “less is more” I wonder why they do not just stick to it.

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Linus Torvalds, recently wrote about debugging hell in his private blog. What I read is a wonderful variation of Paul Watzlawick’s story of a man who is looking for his keys where the lantern shines instead of where he lost them:

Torvalds was desperately looking for the solution of a serious problem which seemed to occur only spontaneously and at a time where it could not be observed, analyzed or tracked. Later, a method was found which allowed to trigger the problem but it apparently had “nothing what-so-ever to do with the actual failure itself”. Eventually, colleagues found “the real clue” by looking at one incident where the problem did not occur.

La peste de l’homme, c’est l’opinion de sçavoir. Voylà pourquoy l’ignorance nous est tant recommandée par nostre religion comme piece propre à la creance et à l’obeïssance.
— Michel de Montaigne (1533-1592) in Apologie de Raimond Sebond

R: I just wonder what the meaning of our union is, especially. If there is a love, and it is what we wish it were, is this love?
E: There is no love, but if there were, and it existed as we might wish it doesn’t, then I daresay we are.

— “Human apes” by Ontological Damnation

every time i see the word “misled,” i read it to myself at first as miss-eld and wonder what that word means. and then i think, oh, that’s right. misled.

— Juliet Small Ernst, Touch Touch Publishing Blog, 2008-10-10

Or: The power of silence

i wish i knew or understood this, but i neither understand nor do i know how to deal with it. meaning can be poison, and meaning can kill. there may be power in words, but there is even higher power in what is not said if you allow it any meaning.
— one: the white flag

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“In the age of the internet attaching a famous name to your personal opinion to give more weight to it is a very valid strategy.” — Benjamin Franklin

Quote posted by Anonymous in a comment to a blog post of Bruce Schneier about a misquote.