Turtles All the Way Down

by John Green

Anybody can look at you. It’s quite rare to find someone who sees the same world you see.

“By convention hot, by convention cold, by convention color, but in reality atoms and void.” —DEMOCRITUS When observation fails to align with a truth, what do you trust—your senses or your truth? The Greeks didn’t even have a word for blue. The color didn’t exist to them. Couldn’t see it without a word for it. I think about her all the time. My stomach flips when I see her. But is it love, or just something we don’t have a word for?

“The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.” —WILLIAM JAMES I don’t know what superpower William James enjoyed, but I can no more choose my thoughts than choose my name.