Quotessence
Home / Quotes / Quote by Gregory Bateson

Quote by Gregory Bateson

“No organism can afford to be conscious of matters with which it could deal at unconscious levels. Broadly, we can afford to sink those sorts of knowledge which continue to be true regardless of changes in the environment, but we must maintain in an accessible place all those controls of behavior which must be modified for every instance. The economics of the system, in fact, pushes organisms toward sinking into the unconscious those generalities of relationship which remain permanently true and toward keeping within the conscious the pragmatic of particular instances.”

Quote by Gregory Bateson

Create image

Author

Gregory Bateson
Gregory Bateson

Gregory Bateson was a prominent anthropologist whose research spanned across various fields such as culture, semiotics, systems theory, and cognitive science. His work has had a profound impact on interdisciplinary studies that followed. more

You May Also Like

“If a man achieves or suffers change in premises which are deeply embedded in his mind, he will surely find that the results of that change will ramify throughout his whole universe.”

IfsMenMindWholeSufferingUniverseResultsAchievePremisesEmbedded
Book:Steps to an Ecology of Mind: Collected Essays in Anthropology, Psychiatry, Evolution, and Epistemology
Create image

“What we mean by information - the elementary unit of information - is a difference which makes a difference, and it is able to make a difference because the neural pathways along which it travels and is continually transformed are themselves provided with energy. The pathways are ready to be triggered. We may even say that the question is already implicit in them.”

MayMeanAbleEnergyDifferencesInformationReadyMaking A DifferenceTransformedUnitsPathwaysImplicit
Author:Gregory Bateson
Create image

“Science, like art, religion, commerce, warfare, and even sleep, is based on presuppositions. It differs, however, from most other branches of human activity in that not only are the pathways of scientific thought determined by the presuppositions of the scientists but their goals are the testing and revision of old presuppositions and the creation of new.”

HumansArtGoalSleepCreationActivityScientistDeterminedBranchesCommerceWarfareTestingPathwaysHuman ActivityRevision
Author:Gregory Bateson
Create image

“If you are receptive and humble, mathematics will lead you by the hand. Again and again, when I have been at a loss how to proceed, I have just had to wait until I have felt the mathematics led me by the hand. It has led me along an unexpected path, a path where new vistas open up, a path leading to new territory, where one can set up a base of operations, from which one can survey the surroundings and plan future progress.”

IfsHas BeensHandsFeltWaitingLossPathProgressPlansMathematicsHumbleOperationsUnexpectedTerritoryAgain And AgainSurroundingsSurveysReceptiveVistasNew TerritoryFuture Progress
Author:Paul Dirac
Create image

“I know of nothing more terrible than the poor creatures who have learned too much. Instead of the sound powerful judgement which would probably have grown up if they had learned nothing, their thoughts creep timidly and hypnotically after words, principles and formulae, constantly by the same paths. What they have acquired is a spider's web of thoughts too weak to furnish sure supports, but complicated enough to provide confusion.”

IfsKnowsEnoughSoundPoorPowerfulPrinciplesSupportPathToo MuchTerribleCreaturesWeakComplicatedConfusionJudgementSpidersCreeps
Book:Popular Scientific Lectures
Create image