One question · 6 of 40 answers to it
Originally asked
Vox, to writers and thinkers, 9 Questions, 2017
This exact prompt is one of Vox's nine recurring questions about intellectual habits.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
U.S. Representative from Georgia, 1987–2020; Chairman of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee 1963–1966
I wanted to know. I asked a lot of questions and she would say, "Read, read."…So she inspired me a great deal.
Recorded · Explorations in Black Leadership, University of Virginia
Founder, chairman and chief executive of Rakuten
My answer may have surprised some in attendance at the meeting: I don’t have a role model or sensei. Or to be more precise, I don’t have a single teacher.
Recorded · LinkedIn · 2022
Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town; chair of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission; Nobel Peace Prize, 1984
Ultimately, it’s a man who was teaching us English Literature in what we call matricula, the last 2 years of high school. He really was quite extraordinary.
Recorded · Academy of Achievement
United States international footballer, 2001–2015
the time that I got to spend with my teammates, the learning about life and about different people's beliefs and different people's opinions about things, those are the things that I'll…
Recorded · Fresh Air Archive · 2016
Attorney and politician; Director of the Office of Management and Budget, White House Chief of Staff, Director of the CIA and Secretary of Defense
one of the things that I learned — and I also pass this on to our students — which is that knowledge is power.
Recorded · Academy of Achievement · 2017
Playwright and screenwriter
they did what good teachers are meant to do, which is inspire you to love literature.
Recorded · The Arts Desk · 2009
Answers marked Recorded were said elsewhere and are quoted with the publication and date they came from. Those people have not joined — nobody here answers on anyone else's behalf.
Originally asked
Vox, to writers and thinkers, 9 Questions, 2017
Vox's fixed 9 Questions format asks this verbatim across respondents.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Professor of sociology and public affairs at Princeton University
I have the same academic disease that any academic will understand, that I get focused on the interesting because that’s appealing to me. Most of the time, most answers are boring.
Recorded · Conversations with Tyler
Economics columnist at the Financial Times
I probably want to be liked too much. This is one difference between me and Steve Levitt . Steve Levitt is also much smarter than me and much more successful than me.
Recorded · Conversations with Tyler
Journalist and author; host of CNN’s Fareed Zakaria GPS
Wasting time reading blogs, magazines, newspapers. They have their place but they can become an addiction.
Recorded · Vox · 2017
Originally asked
Vox, to writers and thinkers, 9 Questions, 2017
The exact question was part of every retrieved Vox 9 Questions installment.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Anglican Archbishop of Cape Town; chair of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission; Nobel Peace Prize, 1984
I used to be “Mister Disinvestment.” Now I would like to be Mister Investment and say, “Come! Come and be part of an exciting, exhilarating process. Come in!
Recorded · Academy of Achievement
Co-founder and chief executive of Nubank
In the first few months of Nubank, I asked everybody to be here by 8:00 a.m. every day. I saw it as a test of people's commitment, and I was pretty rigid about it.
Recorded · Sequoia Capital · 2018
Editor and memoirist
I can’t remember when I read, or was told, that he considered it a good thing to spend a short time every day thinking about death, thus getting used to its inevitability and coming to…
Recorded · The Guardian · 2014
Originally asked
The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A
The Guardian's Q&A repeatedly uses this prompt, sometimes dropping 'living' while retaining the same comparative judgment.
You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.
Spanish singer
Elvira, the lady that took care of me when my parents weren't able to be there. She dedicated her whole life to me and my brother and my sister. Now I take care of her.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2010
British TV and radio personality
All the NHS workers, care home staff and teachers who are the real superheroes of 2020.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2020
British costume designer
My friend [art director] Simon Costin who, in 35 years, I’ve never once seen in a bad mood.
Recorded · The Guardian · 2019
Recorded for public figures, from the source their answers were taken from. Browse by era too.
Every question the bank can deal, in the order it was written. See all 126.
Adrian Scarborough, Alex Jones, Alice Sheppard, Brett Story, Chaitanya Tamhane, Cressida Cowell, David Baddiel, David Oyelowo, DJ Koze, Don Rickles, Guy Garvey, Jacob Collier, Jacqui Smith, Jaime Winstone, Jeff Bezos, Joely Richardson, John Hume, Joshua Henkin, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Keith Black, Kelis Rogers, Kelly Hoppen, Keren Woodward, Liam Gallagher, Lizzy McAlpine, Lucy Ives, Luis von Ahn, Malorie Blackman, Mark Rylance, Mel Brooks, Rax King, Roger Allam, Roger Taylor, Sandy Tran, Shaun White, Sheridan Smith, Terry Crews, Tess Daly, Tom Kerridge, Tom Lubbock
You are dealt a few questions at a time and answer the ones you want to. What you write gets a permanent address and keeps it. Rewrite it whenever you like and say why — the new version goes up beside the old one rather than over it, so changing your mind reads as thinking rather than as a reversal.
You write before you read. Other members' answers to a question stay shut until you have answered it or passed on it, because reading first changes what you would have said. Passing is free and it is permanent.
Most of what is here so far was said somewhere else and recorded with its source — a named person, a publication and a date, on every line. Nothing has been deleted.