Buckminster Fuller (d. 1983)

The Universe consists of non-simultaneously apprehended events.

As quoted by Robert Anton Wilson in Maybe Logic - The Lives and Ideas of Robert Anton Wilson (2003), 2003

I am convinced all of humanity is born with more gifts than we know. Most are born geniuses and just get de-geniused rapidly.

Statement made in 1974, quoted in People magazine. In Thomas T. K. Zung, "Buckminster Fuller: Anthology for the New Millenium" (2002), 174., 2002

You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.

As quoted in Beyond Civilization: Humanity's Next Great Adventure (1999), by Daniel Quinn, p. 137, 1999

Politicians are always realistically maneuvering for the next election. They are obsolete as fundamental problem-solvers.

As quoted in Synergetics Dictionary : The Mind of Buckminster Fuller (1986) by E. J. Applewhite, 1986

Nature never "fails." Nature complies with its own laws. Nature is the law. When Man lacks understanding of Nature's laws and a Man-contrived structure buckles unexpectedly, it does not fail. It only demonstrates that Man did not understand Nature's laws and behaviors. Nothing failed. Man's knowledge or estimating was inadequate.

In "How Little I Know", in Saturday Review (12 Nov 1966), 152. Excerpted in Buckminster Fuller and Answar Dil, Humans in Universe (1983), 31., 1983

Realistic thinking accrues only after mistake making, which is the cosmic wisdom's most cogent way of teaching each of us how to carry on.

In Buckminster Fuller and Answar Dil, Humans in Universe (1983), 218., 1983

World Game finds that 60 percent of all the jobs in the U.S.A. are not producing any real wealth—i.e., real life support. They are in fear - underwriting industries or are checking-on-other-checkers, etc.

Pg 223. - Google Books Result https://books.google.com/books?isbn=0312174918 - 1982 - ‎History, 1981

Up to the Twentieth Century, reality was everything humans could touch, smell, see, and hear. Since the initial publication of the chart of the electromagnetic spectrum, humans have learned that what they can touch, smell, see, and hear is less than one-millionth of reality. Ninety-nine percent of all that is going to affect our tomorrows is being developed by humans using instruments and working in ranges of reality that are nonhumanly sensible.

R. Buckminster Fuller on Education (1979), p. 130, 1979

I seek through comprehensive anticipatory design science and its reductions to physical practices to reform the environment instead of trying to reform humans, being intent thereby to accomplish prototyped capabilities of doing more with less...

Earth, Inc. (1973) This is just part of a very long sentence that covers the whole first page, but in this part of the quote, the intention of the entire book is stated., 1973

I live on Earth at present, and I don't know what I am. I know that I am not a category. I am not a thing — a noun. I seem to be a verb, an evolutionary process — an integral function of the universe.

I Seem to Be a Verb (1970), 1970

The Things to do are: the things that need doing, that you see need to be done, and that no one else seems to see need to be done. Then you will conceive your own way of doing that which needs to be done — that no one else has told you to do or how to do it. This will bring out the real you that often gets buried inside a character that has acquired a superficial array of behaviors induced or imposed by others on the individual.

Letter to "Micheal" (16 February 1970), Micheal was a 10 year old boy who had inquired in a letter as to whether Fuller was a "doer" or a "thinker"., 1970

Thinking is a momentary dismissal of irrelevancies.

Utopia or Oblivion: The Prospects of Humanity (1969), 1969

The opposite of nature is impossible.

Public lecture at Columbia University (Spring 1965), quoted in "Buckminster Fuller: Thinking Out Loud" at PBS (12 December 2001), 1965

on first priority in design consideration is the full realization of individual potential in order to reach the second derivative — full realization for all individuals

No More Secondhand God (1963), 1963

God, to me, it seems is a verb, not a noun, proper or improper.

No More Secondhand God (1963), 1963

There is room enough indoors in New York City for the whole 1963 world's population to enter, with room enough inside for all hands to dance the twist in average nightclub proximity.

Prime Design (May 1960), later published in The Buckminster Fuller Reader (1970) edited by James Meller, 1963

Relativity is inherently convergent, though convergent toward a plurality of centers of abstract truths. Degrees of accuracy are only degrees of refinement and magnitude in no way affects the fundamental reliability, which refers, as directional or angular sense, toward centralized truths. Truth is a relationship.

"The Designers and the Politicians" (1962), later published in Ideas and Integrities : A Spontaneous Autobiographical Disclosure (1969), p. 233, and The Buckminster Fuller Reader (1970), p. 305, 1962

Technology paces industry, but there's a long lag in the process. Industry paces economics. It changes the tools, a great ecological change. And in that manner we come finally to everyday life. The politician is someone who deals in man's problems of adjustment. To ask a politician to lead us is to ask the tail of a dog to lead the dog.

"The Designers and the Politicians" (1962), later published in Beyond Left & Right : Radical Thought for Our Times (1968) by Richard Kostelanetz, p. 368, 1962

The highest of generalizations is the synergetic integration of truth and love.

1005.56, 1005

Truth is cosmically total: synergetic. Verities are generalized principles stated in semimetaphorical terms. Verities are differentiable. But love is omniembracing, omnicoherent, and omni-inclusive, with no exceptions. Love, like synergetics, is nondifferentiable, i.e., is integral.

1005.54, 1005