Following up on commencement speeches (A bit late, I know), but I ran into Kurt Vonnegut’s speech to Agnes Scott College in 1999. Agnes is a women’s college, so obviously the speech is directed towards women. Excellent quotes though:
A computer teaches a child what a computer can become.
An educated human being teaches a child what a child can become.
Some of you may know that I am a Humanist, not a Christian. But I say of Jesus, as all Humanists do, ”If what he said was good and so much of it is absolutely beautiful, what can it matter if he was God or not?”
If Christ hadn’t delivered the Sermon on the Mount, with its message of mercy and pity, I wouldn’t want to be a human being.
I would just as soon be a rattlesnake.
Now this part here illustrated the genius of Vonnegut. At the beginning of the speech, he brings up this excellent quote about what we can all hope to contribute to this world:
”A woman’s reach should exceed her grasp, or what’s a heaven for?”
And of course the original ”A man’s reach should exceed his grasp, or what’s a heaven for?”
Then later on, he talks about children and becoming teachers to teach children:
A child’s reach should exceed its grasp, or what’s a heaven for?
His beliefs about Christianity and Jesus Christ are something I strongly believe in myself. His philosophy on revenge is something that we should all adhere to, but we all know that’s a tough one to pull off.
Remind me to write an entry about how I’ve gone from Atheism to Agnosticism sometime.
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“gone from Atheism to Agnosticism”
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i’ve considered myself an agnostic for some time now. let me know if you’d like to check out agnosticism.. good stuff. its not a religion.. i call it an “understanding”. “not knowing”