Because we do not understand the brain very well we are constantly tempted to use the latest technology as a read more

Because we do not understand the brain very well we are constantly tempted to use the latest technology as a model for trying to understand it. In my childhood we were always assured that the brain was a telephone switchboard. ('What else could it be?') I was amused to see that Sherrington, the great British neuroscientist, thought that the brain worked like a telegraph system. Freud often compared the brain to hydraulic and electro-magnetic systems. Leibniz compared it to a mill, and I am told some of the ancient Greeks thought the brain functions like a catapult. At present, obviously, the metaphor is the digital computer.

The easier it is to do, the harder it is to change.

The easier it is to do, the harder it is to change.

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.

Everyone thinks of changing the world, but no one thinks of changing himself.

It has often been said that power corrupts. But it is perhaps equally important to realize that weakness, too, corrupts. read more

It has often been said that power corrupts. But it is perhaps equally important to realize that weakness, too, corrupts. Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many. Hatred, malice, rudeness, intolerance, and suspicion are the faults of weakness. The resentment of the weak does not spring from any injustice done to them but from their sense of inadequacy and impotence. We cannot win the weak by sharing our wealth with them. They feel our generosity as oppression.

The highest stage in moral culture at which we can arrive is when we recognize that we ought to control read more

The highest stage in moral culture at which we can arrive is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.

The more adaptability exists for a given kind of decision, the less risky it is to make plans for the read more

The more adaptability exists for a given kind of decision, the less risky it is to make plans for the future, and therefore the more likely it is that more people will make more plans in such areas.

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

Talk to a man about himself and he will listen for hours.

A man is never more his single separate self than when he sets out on a journey.

A man is never more his single separate self than when he sets out on a journey.

It may indeed prove to be far the most difficult and not the least important task for human reason rationally read more

It may indeed prove to be far the most difficult and not the least important task for human reason rationally to comprehend its own limitations. It is essential for the growth of reason that as individuals we should bow to forces and obey principles which we cannot hope fully to understand, yet on which the advance and even the preservation of civilization depend.