#cal

It is only when you watch the dense mass of thousands of ants, crowded together around the Hill, blackening the ground, that you begin to see the whole beast, and now you observe it thinking, planning, calculating. It is an intelligence, a kind of live computer, with crawling bits for its wits. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#around #beast #begin #bits #calculating

Medical knowledge and technical savvy are biodegradable. The sort of medicine that was practiced in Boston or New York or Atlanta fifty years ago would be as strange to a medical student or intern today as the ceremonial dance of a !Kung San tribe would seem to a rock festival audience in Hackensack. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#atlanta #audience #boston #ceremonial #dance

My father was a doctor, and I admired him and got along well with him. He took me with him on house calls. We were living in Flushing, which was then a sleepy village of 25,000 - before the subway got there. I've been sure I wanted to be a doctor since I was about 12. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#admired #along #been #before #calls

Statistically, the probability of any one of us being here is so small that you'd think the mere fact of existing would keep us all in a contented dazzlement of surprise. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#being #contented #existing #fact #here

We're as clever as we think we are, but we'll be a lot cleverer when we learn to use not just one brain but to pool huge numbers of brains. We're at a level technologically where we can share information and think collectively about our problems. We do it in science all the time - there's no reason why we can't do it in other endeavors. ↗

— Lewis Thomas

#brain #brains #clever #collectively #endeavors

I get called all kinds of things - an investigative comedian, a comedian activist - I've lost track of what my job title is. ↗

— Mark Thomas

#called #comedian #get #i #investigative

We're quite lucky that we've got political freedoms. We should be using them. ↗

— Mark Thomas

#got #lucky #political #quite #should

Today, all patients accepted for treatment at St. Jude's are treated without regard for the family's ability to pay. Everything beyond what is covered by insurance is taken care of, and for those without insurance, all of the medical costs are absorbed by the hospital. ↗

— Marlo Thomas

#accepted #beyond #care #costs #covered

If we are able to get inside the music and inhabit it convincingly enough, it will cause everyone to find each other in this new psychological space. And that's most exciting. ↗

— Michael Tilson Thomas

#cause #convincingly #each #enough #everyone

I can't do pieces I only admire technically. I have to feel some direct contact with them. ↗

— Michael Tilson Thomas

#contact #direct #direct contact #feel #i