Mind

"My goal is making machines that can think—by understanding how people think. One reason why we find this hard to do is because our old ideas about psychology are mostly wrong. Most words we use to describe our minds (like "consciousness," "learning," or "memory") are suitcase-like jumbles of different ideas. Those old ideas were formed long ago, before "computer science" appeared. It was not until the 1950s that we began to develop better ways to help think about complex processes."

"The ideas of the ruling class are, in every age, the ruling ideas. ... The class which is the dominant material force in society is at the same time its dominant intellectual force. The class which has the means of material production at its disposal has control over the means of mental production, so that in consequence the ideas of those who lack the means of mental production are, in general, subject to it."

"When people speak of ideas that revolutionize society, they do but express the fact that within the old society, the elements of a new one have been created, and that the dissolution of the old ideas keeps even pace with the dissolution of the old conditions of existence."

"There are no new ideas, just new ways of giving those ideas we cherish breath and power in our own living."

"It's impossible not to admire a person who devoted his life to his ideas."

"You can’t crush ideas by suppressing them. You can only crush them by ignoring them. By refusing to think, refusing to change. And that’s precisely what our society is doing!"

"It is of the nature of idea to be communicated: written, spoken, done. The idea is like grass. It craves light, likes crowds, thrives on crossbreeding, grows better for being stepped on."

"People don't understand this: Ideas are important, but they're not essential. What's essential and important is the execution of the idea. Everyone has had the experience of seeing a movie and saying, "Hey! That was my idea!" Well, it doesn't mean anything that you had that idea. There's no such thing as an original concept. What's original is the way you re-use ancient concepts."

"Plato was right: ideas rule the world, and, as men's minds will receive new ideas, laying aside the old and effete, the world will advance: mighty revolutions will spring from them; creeds and even powers will crumble before their onward march crushed by the irresistible force. It will be just as impossible to resist their influx, when the time comes, as to stay the progress of the tide. But all this will come gradually on, and before it comes we have a duty set before us; that of sweeping away as much as possible the dross left to us by our pious forefathers. New ideas have to be planted on clean places, for these ideas touch upon the most momentous subjects."

"The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist. Madmen in authority, who hear voices in the air, are distilling their frenzy from some academic scribbler of a few years back. I am sure that the power of vested interests is vastly exaggerated compared with the gradual encroachment of ideas. Not, indeed, immediately, but after a certain interval; for in the field of economic and political philosophy there are not many who are influenced by new theories after they are twenty-five or thirty years of age, so that the ideas which civil servants and politicians and even agitators apply to current events are not likely to be the newest. But, soon or late, it is ideas, not vested interests, which are dangerous for good or evil."

"The composition of this book has been for the author a long struggle of escape, and so must the reading of it be for most readers if the author's assault upon them is to be successful,—a struggle of escape from habitual modes of thought and expression. The ideas which are here expressed so laboriously are extremely simple and should be obvious. The difficulty lies, not in the new ideas, but in escaping from the old ones, which ramify, for those brought up as most of us have been, into every corner of our minds."

"A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on. Ideas have endurance without death."

"That fellow seems to me to possess but one idea, and that is a wrong one,"

"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me."

"A person with imprecise ideas can understand little and be of less help to others."

"If it's a good idea, go ahead and do it. It is much easier to apologize than it is to get permission."

"The real Antichrist is he who turns the wine of an original idea into the water of mediocrity."

"Religious ideas, supposedly private matters between man and god, are in practice always political ideas."

"Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas."

"Could Hamlet have been written by a committee, or the Mona Lisa painted by a club? Could the New Testament have been composed as a conference report? Creative ideas do not spring from groups. They spring from individuals. The divine spark leaps from the finger of God to the finger of Adam, whether it takes ultimate shape in a law of physics or a law of the land, a poem or a policy, a sonata or a mechanical computer."

"The phrase a Russian intellectual is probably most likely to use when talking about the early 1980s is bezvozdushnoye prostranstvo—“airless space.” The era was stuffy like the Russian izba, a log cabin, when its windows are caulked for the winter: it keeps out the cold, but also the fresh air. The windows will not be opened even a crack until well into spring, and as time goes on, smells of people, food, and clothing mix into one mind-numbing undifferentiated smell of gigantic proportions. Something similar had happened to the Russian mind over two generations of Soviet rule. At the time of the October Revolution, the Russian intellectual elite had been both a part of and a partner to the European conversation about God, power, and human life. After fifty years of purges, arrests, and, most damaging, unrelenting pressure on what had become an isolated thought universe, the Russian intellectual landscape was populated by barely articulated ghosts of once vibrant ideas. Even Communist ideology was a shadow of its former self, a set of ritually repeated words that had lost all meaning. Lenin had long ago dispensed with most of what Karl Marx had to say, enshrining a few of his selected ideas as überlaw."

"The key to every man is his thought…. He can only be reformed by showing him a new idea which commands his own."

"A new idea comes suddenly and in a rather intuitive way. But intuition is nothing but the outcome of earlier intellectual experience."

"A man to whom it has been given to bless the world with a great creative idea has no need for the praise of posterity. His very achievement has already conferred a higher boon upon him."

"It seems to me that in many ways, ideas have a life of their own. They appear to seize on people and make use of them."

"But arms – instrumentalities, as President Wilson called them – are not sufficient by themselves. We must add to them the power of ideas. People say we ought not to allow ourselves to be drawn into a theoretical antagonism between Nazidom and democracy; but the antagonism is here now. It is this very conflict of spiritual and moral ideas which gives the free countries a great part of their strength. You see these dictators on their pedestals, surrounded by the bayonets of their soldiers and the truncheons of their police. On all sides they are guarded by masses of armed men, cannons, aeroplanes, fortifications, and the like – they boast and vaunt themselves before the world, yet in their hearts there is unspoken fear. They are afraid of words and thoughts; words spoken abroad, thoughts stirring at home – all the more powerful because forbidden – terrify them. A little mouse of thought appears in the room, and even the mightiest potentates are thrown into panic. They make frantic efforts to bar our thoughts and words; they are afraid of the workings of the human mind. Cannons, airplanes, they can manufacture in large quantities; but how are they to quell the natural promptings of human nature, which after all these centuries of trial and progress has inherited a whole armoury of potent and indestructible knowledge?"

"Incredulity doesn't kill curiosity; it encourages it. Though distrustful of logical chains of ideas, I loved the polyphony of ideas. As long as you don't believe in them, the collision of two ideas — both false — can create a pleasing interval, a kind of diabolus in musica. I had no respect for some ideas people were willing to stake their lives on, but two or three ideas that I did not respect might still make a nice melody. Or have a good beat, and if it was jazz, all the better."

"... the best way to think about investments is to be in a room with no one else and just think. And if that doesn't work — nothing else is going to work. ... what you are looking for is some way to get one good idea a year ... and then ride it to its full potential. ... Wall Street makes its money on activity — you make your money on inactivity."

"It’s important not to overstate the benefits of ideas. Quite frankly, I know it’s kind of a romantic notion that you’re just going to have this one brilliant idea and then everything is going to be great. But the fact is that coming up with an idea is the least important part of creating something great. It has to be the right idea and have good taste, but the execution and delivery are what’s key."

"That neither our Thoughts, nor Passions, nor Ideas formed by the Imagination, exist without the Mind, is what every Body will allow. And it seems no less evident that the various Sensations or Ideas imprinted on the Sense... cannot exist otherwise than in a Mind perceiving them... For as to what is said of the absolute Existence of unthinking Things without any relation to their being perceived, that seems perfectly unintelligible. Their Esse is Percipi, nor is it possible they should have any Existence, out of the Minds or thinking Things which perceive them."

"You cannot force ideas. Successful ideas are the result of slow growth. Ideas do not reach perfection in a day, no matter how much study is put upon them. It is perseverance in the pursuit of studies that is really wanted."

"It is in this realm of ideas that humanity is not a free agent. . . . Once an idea becomes an ideal, humanity can freely reject or accept it, but ideas come from a higher source and are imposed... whether men want them or not. Upon the use made of these ideas (which are in the nature of divine emanations, embodying the divine plan for planetary progress) will depend the rapidity of humanity's progress, or its retardation for lack of understanding."

"Nothing is more dangerous than an idea, when you have only one idea."

"Unknown names, unknown places and unfamiliar words often come to the surface from the depths of consciousness. Scientists call this the subconscious, but they are unaware that communications from space accumulate... and when given an impulse, are transferred to the brain... one should pay heed to such flashes of consciousness... In everyday life one should learn to recognize these messages which always come at the right moment. People complain that they are deprived of lofty Guidance, but such a strong statement is unreasonable. We give much, and it is they who perceive little! Therefore, We remind people to pay more heed to words that spring forth suddenly in the conscious mind. Such words should not be dismissed, but should be carefully applied in life. Many other useful ideas come in a flash, like flying butterflies, but people only brush them aside. We never tire of disseminating useful information, and We advise you to treat it with care, for it will be of use in the Subtle World. Thus, one should develop the particular ability to catch the thoughts of space."

"Man has always been afraid of anything mysterious, forgetting that the key to the mystery is within himself. One must free oneself from all impeding conditions or circumstances, which are different for everyone. Progress depends upon free will that is directed toward good. The power of good compels even machines to act not for themselves, but for humanity. Thus, Our apparatuses function with Our collaboration. People may laugh, but ideas do rule the world. These words are entered into the Statutes of the Brotherhood."

"Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats."

"Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread."

"He who knows but does not speak is a fool."

"The fool is garrulous."

"As dogs return to their vomit,"

"Of what use is money in the hands of fools"

"Face a bear robbed of her cubs,"

"Don't approach a goat from the front, a horse from the back, or a fool from any side."

"At thirty, man suspects himself a fool; Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan."

"Be wise with speed; A fool at forty is a fool indeed."

"I have always been among those who believed that the greatest freedom of speech was the greatest safety, because if a man is a fool, the best thing to do is to encourage him to advertise the fact by speaking. It cannot be so easily discovered if you allow him to remain silent and look wise, but if you let him speak, the secret is out and the world knows that he is a fool."

"The best way in which to silence any friend of yours whom you know to be a fool is to induce him to hire a hall. Nothing chills pretense like exposure."

"The world is made up, for the most part, of fools and knaves, both irreconcilable foes to truth."

"The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right."

"Now and then there's a fool such as I am over you You taught me how to love And now you say that we are through I'm a fool, but I'll love you dear Until the day I die Now and then there's a fool such as I."