These modification quotes will inspire you. Modification is the action of modifying something.
A collection of motivating, happy, and encouraging modification quotes, modification sayings, and modification proverbs.
Best Modification Quotes
- “Our creation is the modification of relationship.” ~ Rabindranath Tagore
- “I tried a dozen different modifications that were rejected. But they all served as a path to the final design.” ~ Mikhail Kalashnikov
- “Modification of form is admitted to be a matter of time” ~ Alfred Russel Wallace
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“I know of nothing sublime which is not some modification of power.” ~ Edmund Burke
- “Heredity provides for the modification of its own machinery.” ~ James Mark Baldwin
- “God transforms, so to speak, this air into words, into various sounds. He makes you understand these various sounds through the modifications by which you are affected.” ~ Nicolas Malebranche
- “I mean, we’re really making a quantum change in our relationship to the plant world with genetic modification.” ~ Michael Pollan
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“Art is the distortion of an unendurable reality… Art is correction, modification of a situation; art is communication, connection… Art is social, self-sufficient, and total.” ~ Jean Tinguely
- “First, modify the patient’s diet and lifestyle and only then, if these do not effect a cure, treat with medicinals and acupuncture.” ~ Sun Simiao
- “I intend no modification of my oft-expressed wish that all men everywhere could be free.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
- “What is the meaning of the togetherness of the perceiving mind, in that peculiar modification of perceiving which makes it perceive not a star but a tree, and the tree itself, is a problem for philosophy” ~ Samuel Alexander
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“To deal with the true causes of war one must begin by recognizing as of prime relevancy to the solution of the problem the familiar fact that civilization is a partial, incomplete, and, to a great extent, superficial modification of barbarism.” ~ Elihu Root
- “Our morbidly obese federal government needs not just behavior modification but bariatric surgery.” ~ Mitch Daniels
- “He has willed – He wills incessantly – that the modifications of the mind and those of the body shall be reciprocal. This is the conjunction and the natural dependence of the two parts of which we are constituted.” ~ Nicolas Malebranche
- “Layering and changeability: this is the key, the combination that is worked into most of my buildings. Occupying one of these buildings is like sailing a yacht; you modify and manipulate its form and skin according to seasonal conditions and natural elements, and work with these to maximize the performance of the building.” ~ Glenn Murcutt
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“In classical oil painting, there seemed to be a radical turn to seeing things as the camera sees them, with that technological modification. I began to have a tremendous problem with all of this.” ~ Henry Flynt
- “I took the position from day one that it was the right decree, that the modifications I made to the decree were proper, that the correct outcome had been obtained, and that in due time all of that would become apparent. And it has become apparent.” ~ Harold H. Greene
- “A man has no religion who has not slowly and painfully gathered one together, adding to it, shaping it; and one’s religion is never complete and final, it seems, but must always be undergoing modification.” ~ D. H. Lawrence
- “Common sense is only a modification of talent. Genius is an exaltation of it. The difference is, therefore, in degree, not nature.” ~ Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton
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“When I’m shooting on location, you get ideas on the spot – new angles. You make not major changes but important modifications, that you can’t do on a set. I do that because you have to be economical.” ~ Satyajit Ray
- “There’s almost no food that isn’t genetically modified. Genetic modification is the basis of all evolution. Things change because our planet is subjected to a lot of radiation, which causes DNA damage, which gets repaired, but results in mutations, which create a ready mixture of plants that people can choose from to improve agriculture.” ~ Nina Fedoroff
- “The transfinite numbers are in a certain sense themselves new irrationalities and in fact in my opinion the best method of defining the finite irrational numbers is wholly disimilar to, and I might even say in priciple the same as, my method described above of introducing trasfinite numbers. One can say unconditionally: the transfinite numbers stand or fall with the finite irrational numbers; they are like each other in their innermost being; for the former like the latter are definite delimited forms or modifications of the actual infinite.” ~ Georg Cantor
- “(Propaganda) proceeds by psychological manipulations, character modifications, by creation of stereotypes useful when the time comes – The two great routes that this sub-propaganda takes are the conditioned reflex and the myth” ~ Jacques Ellul
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“I think that promoting insecurity in the form of plastic surgery is infinitely more harmful than an artistic expression related to body modification.” ~ Lady Gaga
- “Enlightenment is the complete awareness of life without mental modifications.” ~ Frederick Lenz
- “If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed.” ~ George Washington
- “If you want to build a recursively self-improving AI, have it go through a billion sequential self-modifications, become vastly smarter than you, and not die, you’ve got to work to a pretty precise standard.” ~ Eliezer Yudkowsky
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“The study of Buddhism is essentially the study of modification, how we modify the state of mind we’re in, how we modify the realm we’re in.” ~ Frederick Lenz
- “I advocate the modification of the ’67 borders to let about half of the Israeli stay in Palestine.” ~ Jimmy Carter
- “Although much remains obscure, and will long remain obscure, … I am convinced that Natural Selection has been the main but not exclusive means of modification.” ~ Charles Darwin
- “To avoid large and unsustainable budget deficits, the nation will ultimately have to choose among higher taxes, modifications to entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, less spending on everything else from education to defense, or some combination of the above.” ~ Ben Bernanke
- “We alter and customize the thing every century, every generation, every day – both in the courts and in our own homes. And marriage accepts our modifications gracefully. Marriage adapts, evolves and (in a manner that I find miraculous and kind of inspiring) somehow keeps chugging along.” ~ Elizabeth Gilbert
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“Any plan is bad which is incapable of modification.” ~ Publilius Syrus
- “Capitalism in the United States has undergone profound modification, not just under the New Deal but through a consensus that continued to grow after the New Deal. Government in the U.S. today is a senior partner in every business in the country.” ~ Norman Cousins
- “While in the course of ages the nucleus of social custom inscribed in law has been subjected to but slight and gradual modifications, the other portion has been largely developed in directions indicated by the interests of the dominant classes, and to the injury of the classes they oppress.” ~ Peter Kropotkin
- “I think one of the things we learned from the physicists and also the theoretical biologists is the idea that when you’re dealing with very complex systems you’re going to get a large variety of behavior which can be interpreted as hill climbing, but hill climbing with a lot of modifications, hill climbing with big jumps occasionally.” ~ Kenneth Arrow
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“It’s a mistake to suppose that capacities must evolve gradually. There are many known examples of sharp changes – slight genetic modification that yields substantial phenotypic effects, and much else.” ~ Noam Chomsky
- “These various habits of thought, or habitual expressions of life, are all phases of the single life sequence of the individual; therefore a habit formed in response to a given stimulus will necessarily affect the character of the response made to other stimuli. A modification of human nature at any one point is a modification of human nature as a whole.” ~ Thorstein Veblen
- “The smallest modification of tonality affects structure. Some things have to be rather large, but elegance is the presentation of things in their minimum dimensions.” ~ Frederick Sommer
- “LSD is really just a small chemical modification of a very old sacred drug of Mexico. LSD belongs, therefore, by its chemical structure and by its activity, in the group of the magic plants of Mesoamerica. It does not occur in nature as such, but it represents just a small chemical variation of natural material.” ~ Albert Hofmann
- “If in fact the Republicans make some modifications [of Obamacare], some of which I may have been seeking previously, but they wouldn’t cooperate because they didn’t wanna make the system work, and re-label it as Trumpcare, I’m fine with that.” ~ Barack Obama
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“It’s a whole lot more productive to be in problem-solving mode than it is to be in behavior modification mode.” ~ Ross W. Greene
- “A religious creed differs from a scientific theory in claiming to embody eternal and absolutely certain truth, whereas science is always tentative, expecting that modification in its present theories will sooner or later be found necessary, and aware that its method is one which is logically incapable of arriving at a complete and final demonstration.” ~ Bertrand Russell
- “The coup de grace which ends the patient’s life altogether is quite equivalent to the drastic modification in the institution of marriage that would be brought on by same-gender marriage.” ~ Dallin H. Oaks
- “Let’s not even talking about chain migration, immigration, which is another trick, but all of these things are designed to penetrate the heart exactly is it has yours so that there can be a modification in the law, a moderation of the law here for this instance, and over here for another instance, and there for another.” ~ Rush Limbaugh
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“It seems to me that, with but slight reserve and modification, we may apply to our departed friend his own pathetic and beautiful elegy upon another.” ~ Samuel Laman Blanchard
- “If our system continues without modification involving environmental and social concern, we will face an economic and social break down.” ~ Jacque Fresco
- “Although no definite reason for the accident has been established, modifications are being embodied to cover every possibility that imagination has suggested as a likely cause of the disaster. When these modifications are completed and have been satisfactorily flight tested, the Board sees no reason why passenger services should not be resumed.” ~ John Moore-Brabazon, 1st Baron Brabazon of Tara
- “The aim of spiritual formation is not behavior modification but the transformation of all those aspects of you and me where behavior comes from…Circumcision of the heart.” ~ Dallas Willard
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“The dogmatic and, therefore, invulnerable core in Islam is understandably simple: acknowledgement of faith, prayer, charity and fasting. Almost everything else is open to interpretation and modification in space and time.” ~ Tariq Ramadan
- “Focused intensity is required to win. I can’t stress enough that people who took control of their finances and worked their way out of debt got mad. They got sick and tired of being sick and tired! They said, “I’ve had it!” and went ballistic to change their lives. There is no intellectual exercise where you can academically work your way into wealth; you have to get fired up – There is no energy in logic; this is behavior and motivation modification, and it works.” ~ David Ramsey
- “Development requires modification and transformation of the environment… the planet’s capacity to support its people us being irreversibly reduced by the destruction and degradation of the biosphere and the need to understand the problem and take corrective action is becoming urgent.” ~ Malcolm Fraser
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“Last year I gave several lectures on “Intelligence and Musicality among Animals” … Today I am going to speak to you about “Intelligence and Musicality among Critics” … The subject is much the same, with some modifications, of course.” ~ Erik Satie
- “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would do that. I have here stated my purpose according to my official duty, and I intend no modification of my oft-expressed personal wish that all men, everywhere, could be free.” ~ Abraham Lincoln
- “…for the question is of will, and not, as the insanity of logic has assumed of power. It is not that the Deity cannot modify his laws, but that we insult him in imagining a possible necessity for modification. In their origin these laws were fashioned to embrace all contingencies which could lie in the future. With God all is Now.” ~ Edgar Allan Poe
- “Men of genius supply the substance of history, while the mass of men are but the critical filter, the limiting, slackening, passive force needed for the modification of ideas supplied by genius.” ~ Henri Frederic Amiel
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“All organs of an animal form a single system, the parts of which hang together, and act and re-act upon one another; and no modifications can appear in one part without bringing about corresponding modifications in all the rest.” ~ Georges Cuvier
- “A … difference between most system-building in the social sciences and systems of thought and classification of the natural sciences is to be seen in their evolution. In the natural sciences both theories and descriptive systems grow by adaptation to the increasing knowledge and experience of the scientists. In the social sciences, systems often issue fully formed from the mind of one man. Then they may be much discussed if they attract attention, but progressive adaptive modification as a result of the concerted efforts of great numbers of men is rare.” ~ Lawrence Joseph Henderson
- “The real cause of the great upheavals which precede changes of civilisations, such as the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of the Arabian Empire, is a profound modification in the ideas of the peoples …. The memorable events of history are the visible effects of the invisible changes of human thought …. The present epoch is one of these critical moments in which the thought of mankind is undergoing a process of transformation.” ~ Gustave Le Bon
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“Hebb place the Law of Effect at the synaptic level by proposing a correlation model of synaptic modification similar to that of Hayek (1952). This work was seminal in providing a basis for many subsequent theoretical studies . .” ~ Gerald Edelman
- “As I conceive this doctrine to be a gross misrepresentation of the character and moral government of God, and to affect many other articles in the scheme of Christianity, greatly disfiguring and depraving it; I shall show, … that it has no countenance whatever in reason, or the Scriptures; and, therefore, that the whole doctrine of atonement, with every modification of it, has been a departure from the primitive and genuine doctrine of Christianity.” ~ Joseph Priestley
- “Since the idea that modification of synaptic function can provide a basis for memory arose shortly after the first anatomical description of the synapse a number of models (Hebb 1949 . . Hayek 1952 . . Kendel 1981) have been proposed in which various cognitive activities are represented by combinations of the firing patterns of individual neurons.” ~ Gerald Edelman
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“Natural selection acts solely by accumulating slight successive favorable variations, it can produce no great or sudden modification; it can act only by very short steps.” ~ Charles Darwin
- “Grand telegraphic discovery today … Transmitted vocal sounds for the first time … With some further modification I hope we may be enabled to distinguish … the “timbre” of the sound. Should this be so, conversation viva voce by telegraph will be a fait accompli.” ~ Alexander Graham Bell
- “The modification of prejudice takes a long time, and occurs as the result of a thousand things that happen to the prejudiced person – things he sees and hears and reads, people he talks to, and places he visits. Any given reformer must be content to take a small and obscure place in a chain of cumulative pressures.” ~ Margaret Halsey
