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Twain never said that. There's a similar quote in his _Autobiography_ but it doesn't really say the same thing. > We are so high that we do not have to explai

Twain never said that. There's a similar quote in his _Autobiography_ but it doesn't really say the same thing. > We are so high that we do not have to explain anything to anybody, either in this world or in the next. Annihilation has no terrors for me, because I have already tried it before I was born–a hundred million years–and I have suffered more in an hour, in this life, than I remember to have suffered in the whole hundred million years put together. Look at his Autobiography for more context.

wslh 3y ago
This is a good Internet archeology challenge. I quickly tried on Google [books] and ChatGPT. ChatGPT says that oldest misattribution it finds is from Richard Dawkins' book "The God Delusion" [1]. I retried on Google Books using quotes around a sentence and it finds [2] and [3]. I don't have access to these so I cannot check, if some can we could clarify part of the mistery. Project Gutenberg on Mark Twain [4]? DDG find the oldest attributed to Mark Twain in 2004 [5]. Trying [1] https://www.docdroid.net/XGv3aLm/the-god-delusion-pdf https://www.docdroid.net/XGv3aLm/the-god-delusion-pdf [2] https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/Mark_Twain_on_Religion/oIqMKvyxsGcC?hl=en https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/Mark_Twain_on_Religi... (Mark Twain 1906/2007 based on page results) [3] https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/The_Five_Boons_of_Life/ARHGDAEACAAJ?hl=en https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/The_Five_Boons_of_Li... (1902) (checked in Kindle search and it is not there, Google failed!). [4] https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/53 https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/53 trying site:gutenberg.org "I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born" doesn't give any result. [5] https://sorcerers.net/community/threads/high-level-abilities.23918/ https://sorcerers.net/community/threads/high-level-abilities...
Ntrails 3y ago
I am not convinced that is a significantly different meaning? The true quote certainly has more depth and nuance around the hardship of living. But GP feels like a tolerable para-phrase to me

wslh 3y ago

This is a good Internet archeology challenge. I quickly tried on Google [books] and ChatGPT. ChatGPT says that oldest misattribution it finds is from Richard Dawkins' book "The God Delusion" [1]. I retried on Google Books using quotes around a sentence and it finds [2] and [3]. I don't have access to these so I cannot check, if some can we could clarify part of the mistery. Project Gutenberg on Mark Twain [4]? DDG find the oldest attributed to Mark Twain in 2004 [5]. Trying [1] https://www.docdroid.net/XGv3aLm/the-god-delusion-pdf https://www.docdroid.net/XGv3aLm/the-god-delusion-pdf [2] https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/Mark_Twain_on_Religion/oIqMKvyxsGcC?hl=en https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/Mark_Twain_on_Religi... (Mark Twain 1906/2007 based on page results) [3] https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/The_Five_Boons_of_Life/ARHGDAEACAAJ?hl=en https://www.google.com.ar/books/edition/The_Five_Boons_of_Li... (1902) (checked in Kindle search and it is not there, Google failed!). [4] https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/53 https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/53 trying site:gutenberg.org "I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born" doesn't give any result. [5] https://sorcerers.net/community/threads/high-level-abilities.23918/ https://sorcerers.net/community/threads/high-level-abilities...

Ntrails 3y ago

I am not convinced that is a significantly different meaning? The true quote certainly has more depth and nuance around the hardship of living. But GP feels like a tolerable para-phrase to me