Mind's Eye Quotes

“Unless you truly believed in something to the deepest depth of your being, as did Delamater, all men were whores in the end. There was an old joke that had always struck Delamater as defining of the human species. A man asks a woman if she would sleep with him for ten million dollars. She agrees. He then asks if she would sleep with him for a dollar. She is aghast. “What kind of woman do you take me for?” she asks. To that, the man responds, “We have established what you are, madam. Now we’re just haggling over the price.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must seem inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; and when far away, we must make him believe we are near.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“studied.” “The cocktail party effect?” “Right.” “Good name for it,” said Megan with a smile. “So how does it work?” “The gist of it is that people soak up far more information than we realize. All the time. At the subconscious level, we’re monitoring everything. But our subconscious can’t bring all of it to our conscious attention or we’d drown. Too much information. So in the party example, your brain is taking in all of the conversations around you, but sparing you from having to deal with them. So you can focus on your own conversation. But when your subconscious hears your name, or the words, ‘run, the house is on fire,’ or something else of great interest to you, it decides that this is important information and brings it to your conscious attention. It seems like magic. It’s not that you’re suddenly paying attention. Part of you was always paying attention. You just didn’t know it.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“was reality? Was anything real? Didn’t every schizophrenic convince themselves that their reality was self-consistent and rational?”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Socialism is great—but eventually you run out of other people’s money.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“And while looks deteriorated with time, a great personality and great chemistry only strengthened.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“when you didn’t know what you didn’t know, you could fool yourself pretty easily.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“But it gradually dawned on her that she wasn’t an idiot. Not totally. In math and science, yes. But in the realm of creative thinking, she came to realize she was a sighted person in the kingdom of the blind. Because as much as she seemed unable to process algebra and geometry, she was a savant when it came to pure creativity. And not just in graphic design. In everything. Coming up with ideas for the company picnic. Throwing parties. Wording invitations. Writing poetry. She came to be thought of as a one-woman idea machine. The kind who could take four or five mundane office items and turn them into fifteen different stunning decorations. And she could figure out the most complex fictional mysteries. She was almost always able to see the coming plot twists, even when those who excelled at academics missed them entirely. So maybe she did have a different style of intellect. She thought her self-esteem had become off the charts high, but Hall’s offhanded remark had shown her that the scars of her early struggles in school still remained, as did deep-seated doubts.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Humanity,” he said sadly. “Sometimes it’s really hard to be a fan.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“We’ve lost a lot of privacy already. There are cameras everywhere, and everyone is a narcissist. Our generation grew up thinking that everyone wants us to Tweet them our every thought. We can’t wait to post pictures of a date on Facebook, before the date is even over. Or go on reality television and expose every facet of our lives. Or sext each other naked pictures which end up in cyberspace for all eternity. The privacy that our parents knew is long gone. “But at least we still have some control,” continued Hall. “We can still hide our thoughts. We can choose what to post on Facebook. So while we’ve gone a long way toward eliminating our own privacy, the mind is the last bastion of privacy we have.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Now that I’ve depressed us both, I should probably mention that it isn’t like the species is beyond redemption. It goes without saying that I’ve read a lot of positive thoughts and emotions as well. Selflessness. People going out of their way to please, or help, or surprise each other. Devotion to kids or parents. Generosity and compassion. I’ve read all of this too. Some of it is faked for outsiders, but a lot of it is real.” “So do positive thoughts outweigh venomous thoughts?” Hall laughed. “I haven’t really done that experiment. And most thoughts are neutral. You know, like, ‘I wonder if it will rain tomorrow?’ But regardless of the good will that would come from reading each other’s positive thoughts, nothing could mitigate the total disaster that mind reading would cause.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“sexual thoughts are only the beginning of why it would be a disaster if we could read each other’s minds,” continued Hall, right on cue. “And I’m not talking about just being able to read each other’s surface thoughts, which would be bad enough, but being able to read each other’s innermost thoughts. The problem goes far beyond just reading all the white lies we tell each other dozens of times a day to spare each other’s feelings.” “Like telling your friend you like her new outfit when you actually despise it?” “Right. You could argue that these lies are at least told for the right reasons. But what I’m talking about is far worse. People wishing other people were dead. Wives learning what their husbands are really thinking about when they’re pretending to be listening to them, and vice versa. Or what their partners are thinking about during sex. Spouses learning of the sordid details of past infidelities, both real and fantasized. Subordinates who despise their bosses. You think there are any employees only pretending to laugh at the bosses’ jokes? Coworkers who badmouth colleagues behind their backs. Kids learning what their parents really think about their fifth grade art projects, and their general criticisms and disappointments. And parents reading the hatred toward them that nearly all kids feel at one time or another. And revealed prejudices, even among the best and most open-minded of us. Not necessarily just against blacks, or whites, or Asians, or homosexuals, or Arabs. But against the obese. Rednecks. Snobs. Sluts. Believe me, I’ve been reading minds. I know.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“There was a long silence, during which Hall seemed lost in thought. “Who knows,” he mused finally, almost to himself. “Maybe you’ve got some Neanderthal DNA in you somewhere.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“In the 1950s,” she began, “James Olds and Peter Milner implanted electrodes in rats. In the nucleus accumbens. Which has also been called the pleasure center of the brain. This region plays a role in sexual arousal and the high people get from certain drugs. In later versions of this experiment, rats could cause this region to be stimulated by pressing down on a lever.” She shuddered involuntarily. “Turns out the rats would repeatedly hit the lever, as many as seven hundred times an hour, ignoring food and water. Until they died from exhaustion.” Fyfe”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“And while looks deteriorated with time, a great personality and great chemistry only strengthened”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“But he had no doubt that any inconvenience felt by Delamater would be redirected his way, ten-fold. And that would be very, very bad.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Which brings to mind a quote from Margaret Thatcher: ‘Socialism is great—but eventually you run out of other people’s money.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Taqiyya,”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“inimical”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“This Fyfe kept a very low profile. He must have been worth tens of millions, minimum, but there was very little about him online—Altschuler had checked. Occasionally he was written up for donating to this charity or that, but he managed to keep his business interests strictly out of the public eye.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“A man asks a woman if she would sleep with him for ten million dollars. She agrees. He then asks if she would sleep with him for a dollar. She is aghast. “What kind of woman do you take me for?” she asks. To that, the man responds, “We have established what you are, madam. Now we’re just haggling over the price.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“To make sure Kelvin is sent to the chair,”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“woman do you take me for?”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Hall shook his head. “Humanity,” he said sadly. “Sometimes it’s really hard to be a fan.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Upton Sinclair?” “Yes. The quote is something like, ‘It’s difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“And you can’t be told the essence of a person, anyway. That’s something you have to experience”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Thanks for reading MIND’S EYE!  I hope that you enjoyed it. If so, Nick Hall will return in BRAINWEB, available in February of 2015. When”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“There were two diametrically opposed male stereotypes that had been around forever. The dumb jock stereotype. And the brilliant, socially awkward, unattractive, uncoordinated geek—with bad eyesight—stereotype.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“Also, I’ll want to scan your brain using the ultra-high-resolution MRI at our main facility. I need to confirm Kelvin’s data as to the final positioning of your implants.”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye

“everyone is a narcissist. Our generation grew up thinking that everyone wants us to Tweet them our every thought. We can’t wait to post pictures of a date on Facebook, before the date is even over. Or go on reality television and expose every facet of our lives. Or sext each other naked pictures which end up in cyberspace for all eternity. The privacy that our parents knew is long gone. “But at least we still”
― Douglas E. Richards, Mind's Eye