#venti

By focusing on the interior of a speaker's larynx and using infrared, he was able to convert the visible vibrations of the vocal cords into sound of fair quality, but that did not satisfy him. He worked for a while on vibrations picked up from panes of glass in windows and on framed pictures, and he experimented briefly with the diaphragms in speaker systems, intercoms and telephones. He kept on into October without stopping, and finally achieved a device that would give tinny but recognizable sound from any vibrating surface - a wall, a floor, even the speaker's own cheek or forehead. ↗

— Damon Knight

#inventions #science-fiction #sounds #vibrations #experience

Sanity is only that which is within the frame of reference of conventional thought. ↗

— Erich Fromm

#frame #only #reference #sanity #thought

I've been offered proof of God's existence at regular intervals in my life through experiences so profound they've given goose bumps to atheists. ↗

— Jennifer Skiff

#divine #divine-intervention #god #profound-realizations #proof-of-god

In our day the conventional element in literature is elaborately disguised by a law of copyright pretending that every work of art is an invention distinctive enough to be patented. ↗

— Northrop Frye

#conventional #copyright #day #disguised #distinctive

Conventional dogmas, even if endowed with the authority of an Aristotle - ancient or modern - must be tested vigorously. If they are found wanting, we need not bother with them. But if they are found to be substantially correct, we may not overlook them. ↗

— Norman Lamm

#aristotle #authority #bother #conventional #correct

The problem with a popular art form is that those who want something more are in a hopeless minority compared with the millions who are always seeing it for the first time, or for the reassurance and gratification of seeing the conventions fulfilled again. ↗

— Pauline Kael

#conventionality #quality #repetitiveness #standards #art

Feminine virtue is nothing but a convenient masculine invention. ↗

— Ninon de L'Enclos

#feminine #invention #masculine #nothing #virtue

An extraordinary amount of arrogance is present in any claim of having been the first in inventing something. ↗

— Benoit Mandelbrot

#any #arrogance #been #claim #extraordinary

But if inventions have increased man's power over nature very much, then the real value of money is better measured for some purposes in labour than in commodities. ↗

— Alfred Marshall

#commodities #increased #inventions #labour #man

As obesity creeps into preschools, and hypertension and type II diabetes become pediatric problems for the very first time, the case for starting preventive health care in the cradle has become too compelling to keep ignoring. ↗

— Heidi Murkoff

#care #case #compelling #cradle #creeps