Mike Ertel famous quotes

Last updated: Sep 5, 2024

  • Get up now and go and find Robert Kilroy-Silk. Smile in a warm, friendly sort of way, then punch him on the nose. Now go and find Robert on television, despite my best endeavours, this is still relatively easy to do. Wait for a close-up, same smile, and punch him on the nose. If you followed the instructions carefully, you will have noticed a distinct difference. On the one hand, you were suffused with a sense of public-spirited righteousness; on the other, you're probably dribbling blood. That's the difference between reality in life and reality on television.

  • We hope we're better. The reality is we had a pretty darn good team last year. But you can't just throw your gloves out there and be good again. We want to take that next step as a team.

  • Reality is painful -- it's so much easier to keep doing stuff you know you're good at or else to pick something so hard there's no point at which it's obvious you're failing -- but it's impossible to get better without confronting it.

  • Action is the only reality; not only reality, but morality as well.

  • Like most parents, I've been stumped by homework, the big questions, such as: 'What is the point of geography - the pilot always knows where we are going?'. Answer: 'If you didn't know any geography, people would think you were an American, and you wouldn't be able to put them right because you wouldn't know where they live.'

  • Facts are what pedantic, dull people have instead of opinions.

  • Universities are not here to be mediums for the coercion of other people, they're here to be mediums for the free exchange of ideas.

  • I have known some quite good people who were unhappy, but never an interested person who was unhappy.

  • Science fiction is a field of writing where, month after month, every printed word implies to hundreds of thousands of people: 'There is change. Look, today's fantastic story is tomorrow's fact.

  • Persuasion, kind, unassuming persuasion, should be adopted to influence the conduct of men. The opposite course would be a reversal of human nature, which is God's decree and can never be reversed.

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