Song
"Each epoch has its singer."
— Jack London, Oakland, California, 1901
"Anything but the void. And so we keep hoping to luck into a winning combination, to tap into a subtle harmony, trying like lock pickers to negotiate a compromise with the 'mystery tramp,' as Bob Dylan put it…."
— Dennis Overbye, Quantum Baseball,
New York Times, Oct. 26, 2004
"You said you'd never compromise
With the mystery tramp,
but now you realize
He's not selling any alibis
As you stare into
the vacuum of his eyes
And ask him do you want to
make a deal?"
— Bob Dylan, Like a Rolling Stone
"About a century ago scientists began to realize that beneath the too, too solid veneer of what had passed for reality for 2,000 years there was some pretty funny and fuzzy business going on….
Most of us, I suspect, would rather believe that the devil is running things than that no one is in charge, that our lives, our loves, World Series victories, hang on the whims of fate and chains of coincidences, on God throwing dice, as Einstein once referred to quantum randomness….
[But] we are people, with desires and memories and a sense of humor – not Ping Pong balls."
— Dennis Overbye, Quantum Baseball,
New York Times, Oct. 26, 2004
"You can be replaced by some Ping Pong balls and a dictionary."
— Anonymous source, March 29, 2001