Implicit in the activist conception of government is the assumption that you can take the good things in a complex system for granted, and just improve the things that are not so good. What is lacking in this conception is any sense that a society, an institution, or even a single human being, is an intricate system of fragile inter-relationships, whose complexities are little understood and easily destabilized.
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Perhaps even these things, one day, will be pleasing to remember. - Aenid.
Perhaps even these things, one day, will be pleasing to remember. - Aenid.
Considering the enormous range of human knowledge, from intimate personal knowledge of specific individuals to the complexities of organizations and read more
Considering the enormous range of human knowledge, from intimate personal knowledge of specific individuals to the complexities of organizations and the subtleties of feelings, it is remarkable that one speck in this firmament should be the sole determinant of whether someone is considered knowledgeable or ignorant in general. Yet it is a fact of life that an unlettered person is considered ignorant, however much he may know about nature and man, and a Ph.D. is never considered ignorant, however barren his mind might be outside his narrow specialty and however little he grasps about human feeling or social complexities.
Good means not merely not to do wrong, but rather not to desire to do wrong.
Good means not merely not to do wrong, but rather not to desire to do wrong.
Commitment becomes hysterical when those who have nothing to give advocate generosity, and those who have nothing to give up read more
Commitment becomes hysterical when those who have nothing to give advocate generosity, and those who have nothing to give up preach renunciation.
A man is but what he knows.
A man is but what he knows.
A line runs from the meditations of the heart to the words of the mouth. The meditations are not clear read more
A line runs from the meditations of the heart to the words of the mouth. The meditations are not clear to us until the mouth utters its words. If what the mouth utters is unclear or foolish or mendacious, it must be that the meditations are the same. But the line runs both ways. The words of the mouth will become the meditations of the heart, and the habit of loose talk loosens the fastenings of our understanding.
No one is truly literate who cannot read his own heart.
No one is truly literate who cannot read his own heart.
A wonderful discovery--psychoanalysis. Makes quite simple people feel they're complex.
A wonderful discovery--psychoanalysis. Makes quite simple people feel they're complex.
It is impossible to describe any human action if one does not refer to the meaning the actor sees in read more
It is impossible to describe any human action if one does not refer to the meaning the actor sees in the stimulus as well as in the end his response is aiming at.
