Jostein Gaarder Quotes

How terribly sad it was that people are made in such a way that they get used to something as extraordinary as living.

... perhaps the clock hands had become so tired of going in the same direction year after year that they had suddenly begun to go the opposite way instead...

He could very likely have appealed for leniency. At least he could have saved his life by agreeing to leave Athens. But had he done this he would not have been Socrates. He valued his conscience-and the truth- higher than life.

When you realize there is something you don't understand, then you're generally on the right path to understanding all kinds of things.

Wisest is she who knows she does not know.

As long as we are children, we have the ability to experience things around us-but then we grow used to the world. To grow up is to get drunk on sensory experience.

Although you may not stumble across a Martian in the garden, you might stumble across yourself. The day that happens, you'll probably also scream a little. And that'll be perfectly all right, because it's not every day you realize you're a living planet dweller on a little island in the universe.

A philosopher knows that in reality he knows very little. That is why he constantly strives to achieve true insight. Socrates was one of these rare people. He knew that he knew nothing about life and about the world. And now comes the important part: it troubled him that he knew so little.

And although I have seen nothing but black crows in my life, it doesn't mean that there's no such thing as a white crow. Both for a philosopher and for a scientist it can be important not to reject the possibility of finding a white crow. You might almost say that hunting for 'the white crow' is science's principal task.

If just one of [those people] experiences life as a crazy adventure-and I mean that he, or she, experiences this every single day... Then he or she is a joker in a pack of cards.

Kita melahirkan dan dilahirkan oleh sebuah jiwa yang tidak kita kenal
Kita adalah teka-teki yang tak teterka oleh siapa pun.
Kita adalah dongeng yang terperangkap dalam khayalannya sendiri.
Kita adalah apa yang terus berjalan tanpa pernah tiba pada pengertian

It's not him who's disturbed. But he likes to disturb others-to shake them out of their rut.

But understanding will always require some effort. You probably wouldn't admire a friend who was good at everything if it cost her no effort.

A hydrogen atom in a cell at the end of my nose was once part of an elephant's trunk. A carbon atom in my cardiac muscle was once in the tail of a dinosaur.

Kitalah planet yang hidup itu, Sophie! Kitalah kapal besar yang berlayar mengelilingi matahari yang membakar alam raya. Tapi kita masing-masing adalah juga sebuah kapal bermuatan gen-gen yang melayari kehidupan. Jika kita sudah membawa muatan ini dengan selamat ke pelabuhan berikut -berarti hidup kita tidak sia-sia.

People are, generally speaking, either dead certain or totally indifferent (Both types are crawling around deep down in the rabbit's fur!)

A true philosopher must never give up.

Health is the natural condition. When sickness occurs, it is a sign that Nature has gone off course because of a physical or mental imbalance. The road to health for everyone is through moderation, harmony, and a 'sound mind in a sound body'.

If you believed in Christianity or Islam it was called 'faith', but if you believed in astrology or friday the thirteenth it was Superstition!

Man is the measure of all things', said the Sophist Protagora (c. 485-410 B.C.). By that he meant that the question of whether a thing is right or wrong, good or bad, must always be considered in relation to a person's needs.