Famous quotes containing the words basic, chromosome and/or number:
“When you realize how hard it is to know the truth about yourself, you understand that even the most exhaustive and well-meaning autobiography, determined to tell the truth, represents, at best, a guess. There have been times in my life when I felt incredibly happy. Life was full. I seemed productive. Then I thought,”Am I really happy or am I merely masking a deep depression with frantic activity?” If I don’t know such basic things about myself, who does?”
—Phyllis Rose (b. 1942)
“We become male automatically because of the Y chromosome and the little magic peanut, but if we are to become men we need the help of other men—we need our fathers to model for us and then to anoint us, we need our buddies to share the coming-of-age rituals with us and to let us join the team of men, and we need myths of heroes to inspire us and to show us the way.”
—Frank Pittman (20th century)
“I can’t quite define my aversion to asking questions of strangers. From snatches of family battles which I have heard drifting up from railway stations and street corners, I gather that there are a great many men who share my dislike for it, as well as an equal number of women who ... believe it to be the solution to most of this world’s problems.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)