'Life is like a ten speed bicycle. Most of us have gears we never use.'

'Years ago, I tried to top everybody, but I don't anymore. I realized it was killing conversation. When you're always trying for a topper you aren't really listening.'

- Comedian Groucho Marx (1890-1977)

'In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.'

-Poet Robert Frost (1874-1963)

'There are no passengers on Spaceship Earth. We are all crew.'

- Philosopher Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980)

'No one is useless in this world who lightens the burdens of another.'

-Charles Dickens (1812-1870), in "Our Mutual Friend"

'The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.'

- Boxing champion Muhammad Ali (1942-2016)

'Unfortunately, many people do not consider fun an important item on their daily agenda. For me, that was always a high priority in whatever I was doing.'

-Chuck Yeager, the first pilot to break the sound barrier (1923-2020)

'Adults ask questions as a child does. When you stop wondering, you might as well put your rocker on the front porch and call it a day.'

- Comedian and late night host Johnny Carson (1925–2005)

'Others have seen what is and asked why. I have seen what could be and asked why not.'

- Pablo Picasso

'At every moment, we always have a choice, even if it feels as if we don’t. Sometimes that choice may simply be to think a more positive thought.'

- Singer Tina Turner (1993–2023)

'I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.'

-Inventor and businessman Thomas Edison (1847-1931)

'A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.'

- Jackie Robinson, the first Black MLB player (1919-1972)

'I can’t go back to yesterday–because I was a different person then.'

- "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" author Lewis Carroll (1832 - 1898)

'All the world is birthday cake, so take a piece, but not too much.'

- Musician George Harrison (1943–2001)

'There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words.'

- Writer Dorothy Parker (1893-1967)

'Early to bed, early to rise, work like hell, and advertise.'

- Ted Turner, on his secret to success (1938-2026)

‘The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby’ mapped a major transition

The hilarious 1963 story offered insight into how Americans were shifting away from elite interests to “low culture” by focusing on customized cars and their teen enthusiasts in Southern California. Wolfe pokes fun at the trend while also recognizing young people’s post-war desire for freedom, individualism and creativity.

A quote from Sally Ride

“Three Secrets to Success: Be willing to learn new things. Be able to assimilate new information quickly. Be able to get along with and work with other people.”

'Follow your enthusiasm. It's something I've always believed in. Find those parts of your life you enjoy the most. Do what you enjoy doing.'

- "Muppets" creator Jim Henson (1936-1990)

One hundred ways to improve your life without really trying

Whether it’s taking fruit to work (and to the bedroom!), being polite to rude strangers or taking up skinny-dipping, here’s a century of ways to make life better, with little effort involved …

Friedrich Nietzsche theorized that we will live our lives over and over again: the myth of eternal recurrence

Rather than a theory of physics, the idea is designed as a moral argument. While Nietzsche famously eschewed the Christian afterlife, he wanted to avoid the nihilism that results from no longer having such an ultimate horizon. In a mystical moment, the philosopher came to believe that the fleeting moments of our lives would be repeated, presenting a test: would you want to relive this moment? If not, he would argue, you're not living well.

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well

In today's society, SpongeBob's life as a single man, line cook, and town fool may not seem appealing. But SpongeBob is perhaps the happiest creature in Bikini Bottom, because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

Later in life, the clock in Grace Hopper's office ran counterclockwise

Acknowledging that most people have "an enormous tendency to resist change," Hopper's clock served as a reminder for the computer scientist that just because things have been done a certain way does not mean they should forever remain that way: "They love to say, 'We've always done it this way.' I try to fight that." (Some users may experience a paywall.)

'Practice, which some regard as a chore, should be approached as just about the most pleasant recreation ever devised.'

- Legendary athlete Mildred "Babe" Didrikson Zaharias (1911-1956)

SpongeBob exemplifies Aristotle's philosophy for living well because he understands that happiness doesn't come from external factors like money, recognition, or power.

'There are only four kinds of people in the world—those who have been caregivers, those who are caregivers, those who will be caregivers, and those who will need caregivers.'

- Former First Lady Rosalynn Carter (1927–2023)

Existentialist writer Jean-Paul Sartre coined the famous phrase 'Hell is—other people' in his play 'No Exit'

Matt Groening wrote the comic 'Life in Hell' before creating 'The Simpsons'

The strip began in 1977 as a self-published book featuring disturbing-looking rabbits navigating the indignities of life in Los Angeles, where Groening had recently moved. It was picked up by the Los Angeles Reader in 1980 and then syndicated by over 250 newspapers by 1986. Eventually, it caught the eye of James L Brooks, who was looking for a cartoonist to create sketches for "The Tracey Ullman Show" for Fox.

See the most iconic photos from four decades of LIFE magazine

How Amazon operates a 'flywheel' business model, a self-reinforcing cycle that drives continuous growth

After NASA's Voyager 1 captured Earth as a single pixel as it left the solar system in 1990, astronomer Carl Sagan used the image to reflect on humanity's fragility and the responsibility to protect 'the only world we've ever known.'

Browse a detailed visual analysis of over 200,000 similes—comparisons that often use 'like' or 'as'—from popular fiction to see how frequently writers the same idiomatic expressions.

Mid-century modern graphic designers, known for their bright colors and bold lines in advertising, also found success with children's books.

American short story writer Flannery O'Connor raised 40 peacocks, which became potent symbols for her fiction's elegant violence

Mark Twain spent decades feuding with the US Postal Service, convinced its costs and regulations were bureaucratic overreach.

Learn how your body is, scientifically, like a firework with its own slow, controlled burn.

In 1939, baseball star Lou Gehrig delivered his inspirational 'Luckiest Man' speech after retiring due to the health condition that now bears his name.

Explore chaos in this simulation of two double pendulums, where small differences in the release angles produce wildly different outcomes.

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

The first robot in literature may have been a 'mechanical man' in 1907's 'Ozma of Oz,' a book in L Frank Baum's 'Wizard of Oz' series.

Against his wishes, Albert Einstein's brain was removed before his cremation, and the pathologist responsible stored it for decades in mason jars within a beer cooler.

Discover the catastrophic consequences of a failure of the US electrical grid—something that is more likely than many Americans think.

Many legends about George Washington, including his supposed wooden teeth and the story of cutting down the cherry tree, lack evidence.

Use this calculator to find the dollar value of your mental load, from meal planning to coordinating after-school care for your children.

Apeirophobia is an overwhelming fear of living forever, perhaps stemming from the brain's inability to conceptualize an infinite life.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

See a ranking of the best (and worst) Federal Reserve Chairs since 1914 out of the 16 men and women who have held the office since.

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

See how Budweiser's famous Clydesdales spend their days at Warm Springs Ranch, where roughly 70 to 80 of the beer brand's giant horses can be found at any given time.

Graffiti dates back to at least ancient Pompeii, where citizens scrawled messages to one another on public walls

Prince's sexually explicit 1984 track 'Darling Nikki' attracted the ire of the Parents Music Resource Center, an advocacy group that inspired the Parental Advisory sticker, even though the song ends with a Christian message.