The human mind works at low efficiency. Twenty percent is the figure usually given. When, momentarily, there is a flash of greater power, it is termed a hunch, or insight, or intuition.
Interpretation
The human mind often operates below its potential, and moments of clarity or insight are exceptions to this norm.
Isaac Asimov highlights the disparity between the normal functioning of the human mind and the exceptional moments of insight or intuition. He suggests that while we typically utilize only a fraction of our mental capacity, there are rare instances where we experience a surge in clarity and understanding, which can lead to significant realizations or creative breakthroughs.
In practice
During a motivational speech about understanding our potential.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people into the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. It doesn't matter if someone dies.
Science does not promise absolute truth, nor does it consider that such a thing necessarily exists. Science does not even promise that everything in the Universe is amenable to the scientific process.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation.
Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
The squirrel that you kill in jest, dies in earnest.
Put the argument into a concrete shape, into an image, some hard phrase, round and solid as a ball, which they can see and handle and carry home with them, and the cause is half won.
O Seeker, pain and suffering make one aware of God.
Integrity is the factor that determines which one will prevail. We struggle daily with situations that demand decisions between what we want to do and what we ought to do. Integrity establishes the ground rules for resolving these tensions. it determines who we are and how we will respond before the conflict even appears. Integrity welds what we say, think, and do, into a whole person so that permission is never granted for one of these to be out of sync.
Some critics will write 'Maya Angelou is a natural writer' - which is right after being a natural heart surgeon.
Better a little which is well done, than a great deal imperfectly.
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