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An idea is a light turned on in a man's soul. Comic-strip artists are in the habit of representing it by means of a light bulb flashing on, above the head of a character who has suddenly grasped an idea. In simple, primitive terms, this is an appropriate symbol.

Ayn Rand

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Ayn Rand
Age: 77 †
Born: 1905
Born: February 2
Died: 1982
Died: March 6
Essayist
Journalist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Philosopher
Playwright
Science Fiction Writer
Screenwriter
St. Petersburg
Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum
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Turned
Symbol
Light
Terms
Primitive
Character
Habit
Symbols
Bulb
Soul
Head
Appropriate
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Ideas
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Mean
Simple
Comic
Bulbs
Men
Idea
Suddenly
Strip
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Artists

More quotes by Ayn Rand

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When you see that trading is done, not by consent, but by compulsion...th at in order to produce, you need to obtain permission from men who produce nothing-you may know that your society is doomed.
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Potentially, a government is the most dangerous threat to man's rights: it holds a legal monopoly on the use of physical force against legally disarmed victims.
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Do not set out to write with your eyes on the box office. It can't be done.
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Love is the expression of one's values, the greatest reward you can earn for the moral qualities you have achieved in your character and person, the emotional price paid by one man for the joy he receives from the virtues of another.
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I think. I am. I will.
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Productive work is the central purpose of a rational man's life, the central value that integrates and determines the hierarchy of all his other values. Reason is the source, the precondition of his productive work, pride is the result.
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Any alleged 'right' of one man, which necessitates the violation of the rights of another, is not and cannot be a right.
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Freedom, in a political context, means freedom from government coercion. It does not mean freedom from the landlord, from the employer, or freedom from the laws of nature which do not provide men with automatic prosperity. It means freedom from the coercive power of the state ' and nothing else
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The creator's concern is the conquest of nature. The parasite's concern is the conquest of men.
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I don't wish to be the symbol of anything. I'm only myself.
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People are not embracing collectivism because they have accepted bad economics. They are accepting bad economics because they have embraced collectivism.
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There are two sides to every issue: one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil.
Ayn Rand
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I want to be prepared to claim the greatest virtue of all - that I was a man who made money
Ayn Rand
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When I disagree with a rational man, I let reality be our final arbiter if I am right, he will learn if I am wrong, I will one of us will win, but both will profit.
Ayn Rand
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Don't worry. They're all against me. But I have one advantage: they don't know what they want. I do.
Ayn Rand
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To arrive at a contradiction is to confess an error in one's thinking to maintain a contradiction is to abdicate one's mind and to evict oneself from the realm of reality.
Ayn Rand
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Ferris: Are you going to be as impractical as that? Rearden: The evaluation of an action as practical, Dr. Ferris, depends on what it is that one wishes to practice. Ferris: Haven't you always placed your self-interest above all else? Rearden: That is what I am doing right now.
Ayn Rand
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For they have nothing to fight me with, save the brute force of their numbers. I have my mind.
Ayn Rand
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A BUSINESSMAN cannot force you to buy his product if he makes a mistake, He suffers the consequences if he fails, he takes the loss. A bureaucrat, forces you to obey his decisions, whether you agree with him or not... If he makes a mistake, you suffer the consequences If he fails, He passes the loss on to you, in the form of heavier taxes.
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She thought: at this moment, the glass stem between his fingers feels just like the one between mine. We have this much in common.
Ayn Rand