practicality

is knowing to watch the cars, not the lights, because the lights ain't never killed nobody.

Advice to children crossing the street: damn the lights. Watch the cars. The lights ain't never killed nobody.

is a word a man uses when he wishes to be particularly unfair.

"I have noticed that when a man wishes to be particularly unfair that he calls it being practical." (OWH 11/20/92: 13)

is not always the most practical approach to things. The Greeks chose the ideal over the real in their geometry and demonstrated very well that far more could be achieved by consideration of abstract line and form than by a study of the real lines and forms of the world.

One might suppose that reality must be held to at all costs. However, though that may be the moral thing to do, it is not necessarily the most useful thing to do. The Greeks themselves chose the ideal over the real in their geometry and demonstrated very well that far more could be achieved by consideration of abstract line and form than by a study of the real lines and forms of the world; the greater understanding achieved through abstraction could be applied most usefully to the very reality that was ignored in the process of gaining knowledge.

is difficult --- No one regards what is before his feet; we all gaze at the stars.

No one regards what is before his feet; we all gaze at the stars.

is important --- good ideas need landing gear as well as wings.

Good ideas need landing gear as well as wings.

practicality, n.All

practicality