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Noam Chomsky

Noam Chomsky Quotes

Linguist

Noam Chomsky, born on December 7, 1928, is a renowned linguist from the United States. His research in generative grammar and transformational grammar has had a profound impact on modern linguistics. Chomsky's academic achievements extend beyond linguistics, as he is also an active political commentator and philosopher, known for his unique perspective and profound insights.

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Famous Noam Chomsky Quotes

“Policies are designed to undermine working class organization and the reason is not only the unions fight for workers' rights, but they also have a democratizing effect. These are institutions in which people without power can get together, support one another, learn about the world, try out their ideas, initiate programs, and that is dangerous. That's like a referendum in Greece. It is dangerous to allow that.”

“There are a lot of people that form movements around particular commitments, like gay rights. It is important, but it does not link easily to, say, economic rights, and it often looks like it's opposed to them. The attempt to bring these together has yet to be done in a truly effective way, and I think it can be.”

People Thinking Way Looks Doe Important Done Together Form Rights Economic Movement Particular Gay Commitment Links Gay Rights

Author:Noam Chomsky

“A lot of people who voted for Trump, working class people, voted for Obama in 2008. They were seduced by the slogans "hope" and "change." They didn't get hope, they didn't get change, they were disillusioned. This time they voted for another candidate who is calling for hope and change and has promised to deliver all kinds of amazing things.”

People Kind Class Trump Calling All Kinds Candidates Working Class Slogans Amazing Things Disillusioned Hope And Change

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Adam Smith is an egalitarian, he believed in equality of outcome, not opportunity. He is an enlightenment figure, pre-capitalist. He says, suppose in England, one landowner got most of the land and other people would have nothing to live on. He says it wouldn't matter much, because the rich land owner, by virtue of his sympathy for other people would distribute resources among them, so that by an invisible hand, we would end up with a pretty egalitarian society. That is his conception of human nature.”

People Humans Ends Matter Hands Opportunity Virtue Rich Land Human Nature Figures Enlightenment Resources England Invisible Outcomes Owners Conception Adam Capitalist Invisible Hand

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Every night I get many letters, and after every talk I get many questions from people who say, "I want to change things. What can I do?" I never hear these questions from peasants in southern Colombia or Kurds in southeastern Turkey under miserable repression or anybody who is suffering. They don't ask what they can do; they tell you what they're doing.”

People Want Night Suffering Asks Can Do Letters Miserable Southern Every Night Turkeys Peasants Repression Colombia Kurds

Author:Noam Chomsky

“If you want to make changes in the world, you're going to have to be there day after day doing the boring, straightforward work of getting a couple of people interested and building a slightly bigger organization and carrying out the next move and suffering frustration and finally getting somewhere. That's how the world changes.”

People Ifs World Want Moving Suffering Next Building Couple Organization Bigger Boring Frustration Making Changes Straightforward Next Move

Author:Noam Chomsky

“There is a narrow class of uses of language where you intend to communicate. Communication refers to an effort to get people to understand what one means. And that, certainly, is one use of language and a social use of it. But I don't think it is the only social use of language. Nor are social uses the only uses of language.”

People Thinking Mean Use Language Social Effort Class Communication Communicate Use Of Language

Author:Noam Chomsky

“I think the use of language is a very important means by which this species, because of its biological nature, creates a kind of social space, to place itself in interactions with other people. It doesn't have much to do with communication in a narrow sense; that is, it doesn't involve transmission of information. There is much information transmitted but it is not the content of what is said that is transmitted.”

People Thinking Kind Mean Said Important Use Language Social Space Information Communication Species Interaction Transmission Use Of Language Interaction With Others

Author:Noam Chomsky

“To understand how people organize social systems, we have to discover the principles that we create to make some societies intelligible.”

People Social Principles Organize Social Systems

Author:Noam Chomsky

“There is no evolutionary pressure to create minds capable of forming sciences; it just happened. Evolutionary pressure has not led to higher rates of reproduction for people capable of solving scientific problems or creating new scientific ideas. So if, in fact, the science-forming capacities evolved for other reasons, it would not be too surprising if those particular structures that have developed proved to be rather special in their nature, reflecting the contingencies of their evolution or the working of physical law.”

People Ifs Mind Ideas Reason Facts Problem Law Happened Special Particular Evolution Higher Creating Capable Capacity Pressure Structure Rate Surprising Reflecting Reproduction Contingency

Author:Noam Chomsky

“I am a child of the Enlightenment. I think irrational belief is a dangerous phenomenon, and I try to consciously avoid irrational belief. On the other hand, I certainly recognize that it's a major phenomenon for people in general, and you can understand why it would be. It does, apparently, provide personal sustenance, but also bonds of association and solidarity and a means for expressing elements of one's personality that are often very valuable elements. To many people it does that. In my view, there's nothing wrong with that.”

“While I think in principle people should not have irrational beliefs, I should say that as a matter of fact, it is people who hold what I regard as completely irrational beliefs who are among the most effective moral actors in the world, in many respects. They're among the worst, but also among the best, even though the moral beliefs are ostensibly the same.”

People Thinking World Should Matter Facts Actors Belief Moral Principles Worst Regard Irrational Matter Of Fact Irrational Beliefs Moral Beliefs

Author:Noam Chomsky

“People will find some ways of identifying themselves, becoming associated with others, taking part in something. They're going to do it some way or other. If they don't have the options of participation in labor unions, political organizations that actually function, they'll find other ways. Religious fundamentalism is a classic example.”

People Ifs Way Political Religious Example Becoming Labor Organization Function Unions Classic Fundamentalism Participation Identifying Religious Fundamentalism Labor Union

Author:Noam Chomsky

“I don't see how one can "believe in organized religion." What does it mean to believe in an organization? One can join it, support it, oppose it, accept its doctrines or reject them. There are many kinds of organized religion. People associate themselves with some of them, or not, for all sorts of reasons, maybe belief in some of their doctrines.”

People Believe Kind Mean Doe Reason Belief Accepting Support Organization Doctrine Organized Rejects Associates Organized Religion It Support

Author:Noam Chomsky

“American imperialism has suffered a stunning defeat in Indochina. But the same forces are engaged In another war against a much less resilient enemy, the American people. Here, the prospects for success are much greater. The battleground is ideological, not military. At stake are the lessons to be drawn from the American war in Indochina; the outcome will determine the course and character of new imperial ventures.”

“Younger people who are being indoctrinated into the contemporary system of falsification - they really have to do some research to find out what is the truth. In the general population, people forget or don't care that much. And gradually what you hear drilled into your head everyday comes to be believed. People don't understand what you're talking about any more if you discuss the American war on South Vietnam.”

People Ifs War Care Forget Talking Research South Everyday Population Don't Care Contemporary Vietnam Falsification American War

Author:Noam Chomsky

“A colonial war is a very dirty kind of war. You're not fighting armed forces. You're fighting mostly unarmed people. And to fight that kind of war requires professional killers, which means mercenaries.”

People Kind Mean War Fighting Force Dirty Killers Armed Forces Unarmed

Author:Noam Chomsky

“The 50,000 Korean mercenaries we had in Vietnam were professional killers and just massacred people outright. And the American army did plenty of that too, but it couldn't take it after awhile. It's not the kind of job you can give to conscripts who are not trained to be murderers.”

People Giving Kind Jobs Army Plenty Vietnam Killers Murderer Korean American Army

Author:Noam Chomsky

“For thirty years, Isreal has been highjacking ships in international waters, killing people, taking hostages, bringing them to Israel, putting them in secret prisons, all with the help of the United States. That's serious piracy.”

People Years Has Beens States Helping Water United Secret United States Serious Prison Killing International Israel Ships Thirty Thirty Years Hostage Piracy

Author:Noam Chomsky

“If you go back a century in Europe, all over the place people were speaking different languages. There were dozens of languages in France and Italy, and they're all called French [and Italian], but they were not mutually comprehensible. They were different languages. And they have mostly disappeared in the last century or so. Some are being preserved, like Welsh, some are being revived, like Basque or Catelan to some extent. There are plenty of people in Europe who can't talk to their grandmother because they talk a different language.”

People Ifs Different Lasts Language Century Europe Plenty France Grandmother Italian Dozen Welsh Different Languages Basques

Author:Noam Chomsky

“In Europe there's kind of a reaction to the European Union, kind of a move towards some kind of regionalization. It's more advanced in some regions than others, like in Spain for example. Catelan was repressed under Franco. People spoke it, but not publicly. It's now the language of Catelonia. The Basque language is being revived, not just the language but the culture, the folk music and everything else. So you're getting more diverse societies, and it's happening in Britain as well.”

“There was a free election in Palestine, but it came out the wrong way. So instantly, the United States and Israel with Europe tagging along, moved to punish the Palestinian people, and punish them harshly, because they voted the wrong way in a free election. That's accepted here in the West as perfectly normal. That illustrates the deep hatred and contempt for democracy among western elites, so deep-seated they can't even perceive it when it's in front of their eyes. You punish people severely if they vote the wrong way in a free election.”

“I remember talking to, 40 years ago, one of the leading people in the government who was involved in arms control, pressing for arms control measures, détente, and so on. He's very high up, and we were talking about whether arms control could succeed. And only partially as a joke he said, "Well it might succeed if the high tech industry makes more profit from arms control than it can make from weapons-related research and production. If we get to that tipping point maybe arms control will work." He was partially joking but there's a truth that lies behind it.”

People Ifs Years Wells Said Government Might Remember Lying Behinds Talking Arms Industry Involved Succeed Weapons Jokes Research Years Ago Profit Productions Related Tipping Tipping Point

Author:Noam Chomsky

“When people denounced [former Iranian president Mahmoud] Ahmadinejad for rejecting and criminalizing homosexuality, it should be remembered that was true of the United States until very recently. Women's rights were unheard of. Civil rights proponents were horribly treated, not just in the South. It was awful there, but pretty bad here. Environmental issues did not exist. Opposition to aggression was virtually zero. In fact, so little, that to this day, even scholarship mentions the Vietnam War as beginning in 1965.”

“The Iraq War is the first war in history, in which there were huge demonstrations before the war was launched, not beginning five years later and then being broken up. All of these are changes, and the people who are writing in journals today lived through these changes.”

People Writing Years Firsts War Today Five Huge Broken Iraq Five Years Journal Demonstration Iraq War Broken Up Being Broken

Author:Noam Chomsky

“It's kind of interesting and sick that the intellectual culture called the 1960s, "time of troubles," a dangerous period in which a lot of harm was done to the society. And the reason is because we were civilized and that's dangerous. That increased the commitment to democracy, to rights and so on, and this left people much less obedient.”

People Kind Reason Done Culture Left Interesting Democracy Rights Trouble Dangerous Periods Intellectual Commitment Sick Harm Civilized 1960s Obedient Times Of Trouble

Author:Noam Chomsky

“In the 1960s, various parts of the population became energized and began to enter the public arena to call for the rights of women, students, young people, old people, farmers and workers. What are called "special interests" - meaning the whole population - they began to press to enter the public arena. And they said that puts too much pressure on the state and therefore we have to have more moderation in democracy and they should go back and be quiet and obedient.”

“Half of the [USA] population, roughly, thinks the world was created a couple thousand years ago. Two thirds of the country is expecting the second coming of Christ. They've also had to turn to nativists. The gun culture in the United States, which is out of control, is party fueled by people who think 'we've got to have our guns to protect ourselves.'”

“There are big, extremely irrational parts of the society, and they have now been mobilized politically by the Republican establishment, hoping that these people could be an electoral base to keep them in power.”

People Bigs Republican Establishment Irrational

Author:Noam Chomsky

“The United States is a very insular society. Most people know very little about the outside world and don't care that much. They're concerned with their own affairs.”

People Knows World Littles States Care United United States Concerned Affair Don't Care Outside World

Author:Noam Chomsky

“People don't have knowledge and understanding about the outside world, or about history [in the USA].”

People World Understanding Usa Outside World Knowledge And Understanding

Author:Noam Chomsky

“When something isn't constantly drummed-up by the media, [people] just don't know about it.”

People Knows Media

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Syria is bad enough, it's a pretty terrible atrocity. But there are much worse ones in the world. So for example, the worst atrocities in the past decade have been in the Congo, the Eastern Congo, where maybe 5 million people have been killed.”

People World Has Beens Enough Past Millions Worst Example Terrible Decades Syria Eastern Congo Atrocities

Author:Noam Chomsky

“The government of Rwanda, which is a US client, is intervening massively, and Uganda to an extent. It's almost an international war in Africa. Well, how many people know about this?”

People Knows Wells War Government International Clients Rwanda Intervening Uganda

Author:Noam Chomsky

“It is the worst atrocity underway [in Rwanda]. But it's barely in the media, and people just don't know about it. And that's quite generally true.”

People Knows Worst Media Atrocities Rwanda

Author:Noam Chomsky

“When people know we are ready to use nuclear weapons, they're going to back off if we do something aggressive. So basically, nuclear weapons are always being used.”

People Ifs Knows Use Used Ready Weapons Nuclear Aggressive Nuclear Weapons

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Bradley Manning should be regarded as a hero. He is doing what an honest, decent citizen should be doing: letting your population know what the government, the people who rule you are doing. They want to keep it secret of course.”

People Knows Want Should Government Courses Secret Honest Hero Citizens Population Decent Bradley Manning

Author:Noam Chomsky

“The rich and powerful countries are trying to wreck as much as possible. You know, go off the cliff as soon as you can. Extract every drop of hydrocarbons off the ground and destroy the environment. At the opposite extreme are countries like Bolivia and Ecuador, indigenous people around the world, and first nations in Canada and tribal people in India, campesinos in Colombia... They're trying to save the commons.”

“In England, enclosure programs kind of destroyed the commons. In the United States, it happened later. But, ah, now it's happening in the world. The last remnant of the commons is the environment, which the indigenous people are still trying to preserve and we sophisticated rich people are trying to destroy.”

“The people we call the prophets I think are the earliest dissident intellectuals, and they're treated like most dissident intellectuals - very badly. They're imprisoned, driven into the desert. King Ahab, the epitome of evil in the Bible, condemned Elijah as a "hater of Israel." This is the first self-hating Jew, the origin of the term. It goes right up to the present. That's the history of intellectuals.”

People Thinking Firsts Self Hate Evil Term Kings Jew Israel Driven Treated Desert Prophet Elijah Epitome Dissidents Ahab

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Honduras has become a murder capital of the world; there's horrible atrocities, infanticide, murder of women is way up, and people are fleeing in desperation. They come to the border, and we put them in trucks and send them back to Mexico to die. And here people are scared of illegal immigrants - that's what we're doing. It's pretty shocking.”

People World Way Dies Murder Scared Horrible Borders Immigrants Illegal Mexico Desperation Shocking Truck Atrocities Fleeing Illegal Immigrants Infanticide Honduras

Author:Noam Chomsky

“It's been a real success - one of the great business successes in the United States - to break down organization, to separate people too: it's part of consumerism. If you can drive people toward individual consumption, that's the highest goal in life. And furthermore, drive them into debt so they're trapped. You don't have to worry about a democracy function because people are trapped and they're alone.”

“Every single one cabinet appointment: education, environment, labor - every single one is selected to undermine any aspect of government that's of any help to people, and that doesn't benefit the super-rich. And it's absolutely systematic. The interesting question will be how long Donald Trump's constituency can fall for the con game.”

People Long Helping Fall Interesting Environment Labor

Author:Noam Chomsky

“There are people on the left who say, Look, we can't let these atrocities go on, so let's enter the war and get rid of Bashar Assad. The problem with that is you get into a nuclear war with Russia. And Syria gets wiped out along with everything else. So, it's fine to say, OK, let's stop the crimes, but how exactly?”

People War Problem Crime Syria Nuclear War

Author:Noam Chomsky

“President Barack Obama, to his credit, has given - issued personal pardons in deserving cases. But he should go far beyond. He should proceed to what is in fact an urgent necessity: to grant a general pardon to 11 million people who are living and working here, productive citizens in all but name, threatened with deportation by the incoming Donald Trump administration. This would be a horrible humanitarian tragedy, a moral outrage.”

People President Moral Tragedy Humanitarian Horrible Barack Productive Deserving President Barack Obama

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Millions of people are getting the vote, and we have to educate them to keep them from our throats. In other words, we have to train them in obedience and servility, so they're not going to think through the way the world works and come after our throats.”

People Thinking World Vote Train Obedience Educate Servility

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Going back to why people don't vote, I presume the main reason is because they understand without reading political science texts that it doesn't make any difference how they vote. It's not going to affect policy, so why bother?”

People Reason Political Reading Policy Vote Bother Political Science Why Bother

Author:Noam Chomsky

“There are simple things which would make sense. Take, say, weatherization, which would make a big cut in the unemployment rate. That's the kind of work that plenty of people are quick to do, and it would save individual households money, and it would make a significant reduction in the threats of climate change. But something is holding it back: the sociopathic character of market systems.”

People Kind Character Individual Simple Cutting Threat Rate Climate Change Significant Plenty Make Sense Simple Things

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Nothing is more inspiring to see how poor and suffering people, living under conditions incomparably worse than we endure, continue quietly and unpretentiously with courageous and committed struggle for justice and dignity.”

People Suffering Justice Poor Struggle Dignity Endure Committed Courageous

Author:Noam Chomsky

“Today, the danger of some sort of a nuclear catastrophe is greater than it was during the Cold War, and most people are blissfully unaware of this danger.”

People War Today Danger Cold Cold War Catastrophe

Author:Noam Chomsky

About the Author

Born: December 7, 1928
Known for: Linguist
Quotes: 1825

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