contribution quotes

It often happens that a man of considerable eminence in his own profession, but without the smallest acquaintance with the fundamentals of economics, will make a suggestion which is precisely on a level with the proposition that the locomotive would be much more efficient if itsweight weretakenoffthe driving wheelsso that they could revolve more easily. The editor of an important magazineacceptswithjoy the contributionin whichhedevelopshisideas, and thepublic feebly thinks that there may be something in it, and is confirmed in this view by the fact that professional economists are as disinclined to publisha refutationof it asthe Astronomer Royal is to answer the theorists who declare that the world is flat.

- Edwin Cannan
  Wealth, ch.6.

Man's contribution to human history is nothing more than a drop of sperm.

-Jiang Qing or  Chiang Ch'ing
  In Newsweek, 20 Feb.

A good poem is a contribution to reality. The world is never the same once a good poem has been added to it.

- Dylan Marlais Thomas
  Quite Early One Morning,'On Poetry'.