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Autonomy Quotes

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Autonomy Quotes

“Western notions of individual autonomy and rule of law simply do not apply in the desert. An attack on one tribesman is an attack on all, and in a landscape where a murderer can quickly and quietly slip away, it matters little whether the accused is guilty or innocent. His entire clan is held accountable for thar—retribution. The resulting skein of honor and revenge, so familiar in the modern Middle East, is eternal, seemingly without beginning and without end. When the first recourse of victims is to their cousins, and not to the police or to an independent judicial system, poverty and political instability are the usual outcomes.”

“Politics always puts forward Ideas: Nation, Empire, Union, Economy, etc. But none of these forms has value in itself; it has it only insofar as it involves concrete individuals. If a nation can assert itself proudly only to the detriment of its members, if a union can be created only to the detriment of those it is trying to unite, the nation or the union must be rejected. We repudiate all idealisms, mysticisms, etcetera which prefer a Form to man himself.”

“To prove the (rather scurrile) point, the writer acts both roles—that of the giving mother and the recipient child—on his own person. He gives to himself, out of himself, beautiful words and ideas, thus establishing an autarchy. That "magic gesture," acted on oneself, showing how the neurotic child in the writer allegedly wanted to be treated—kindly and lovingly—presents in the adult an unconscious tendentious alibi and is specific for the artist. Whereas the typical neurotic needs two people (himself and an object) for unconscious re-enactment of an infantile fantasy, the writer combines both roles into one.”

“Hegel’s claim that genuine agency is the collective historical product of earlier, only partially realized attempts at the actualization of such agency (attempts at an unavoidable normative self-regulation) goes well beyond Kant’s self-legislation model but is not fully intelligible without remembering that origin, and without working through what he (and Fichte) adopted from Kant and transformed. Kant’s view that being an agent involves not acting “according to laws” but “according to conceptions of law” still holds great, decisive force in his successors, as does his claim that a law’s authority and so its genuineness as law, can be explained only by some non arbitrary act of self-legislation or self authorization. This will turn out to be a thoroughly “socially mediated” account of human autonomy (as collective autonomy), but the reliance on the German idealist theme of Reason’s self-authorization will be quite prominent.”

“A free will not subject to immutable laws would be "ein Unding", a non-thing. If being autonomous were being under laws imposed in what would have to be arbitrary, lawless acts, then autonomy would be a non-reality. If this is right, then there is no need for a concept of autonomy - anyway paradoxical and therefore empty - according to which being autonomous is being under laws one has freely chosen. For then there is no apparent conflict of being free and being under laws, which autonomy so conceived would resolve.”

“Because she is the channel of life, woman as mythic mother lives at one remove from life. A woman who defines herself through her fertility has no other option. So a woman who feels she has been deprived of motherhood is trebly deprived—of children; of the value of herself as mother; and of her own self, as autonomous being.”

“Although our intrinsic nature and unconscious processes, which defy human cognition substantially influence us, every person possess a liberal dosage of personal autonomy to determine the ultimate essence of their existence. Nature’s endowments enable every person to declare their determined purpose, and deploy the human allotment of free will to pursue their driving passion. With courage, creativity, and effort every person seeks to realize their ultimate embodiment.”

“... In a ROWE* people don't have schedules. They show up when they want. They don't have to be in the office at certain time, or anytime. They just have to get their work done. How they do it ? When they do it ? Where they do it ? It's totally up to them. Meetings & this kind of environments are Optional. What happens ... ? Almost across the board ! - Productivity goes up - Worker Engagement goes up - Worker Satisfaction goes up - Turnovers goes down - Autonomy .. Mastery .. Purpose - these are the building blocks of new way of doing things." ______________________________________________________________ *ROWE: results-only work environment”

“in flow, the relationship between what a person had to do and what he could do was perfect. The challenge wasn't too easy. Nor was it too difficult. It was a notch or two beyond his current abilities, which stretched the body and mind in a way that made the effort itself the most delicious reward. That balance produced a degree of focus and satisfaction that easily surpassed other, more quotidian, experiences. In flow, people lived so deeply in the moment, and felt so utterly in control, that their sense of time, place, and even self melted away. They were autonomous, of course. But more than that, they were engaged.”

“It is mainly by resisting authority that the individual defines himself. This is why authorities--whether parental, priestly, political, or psychiatric--must be careful how and where they assert themselves; for while it is true that the more they assert themselves the more they govern, it is also true that the more they assert themselves the more opportunities they offer for being successfully denied.”

“Cognitive science has something of enormous importance to contribute to human freedom: the ability to learn what our unconscious conceptual systems are like and how our cognitive unconscious functions. If we do not realize that most of our thought is unconscious and that we think metaphorically, we will indeed be slaves to the cognitive unconscious. Paradoxically, the assumption that we have a radically autonomous rationality as traditionally conceived actually limits our rational autonomy. It condemns us to cognitive slavery - to an unaware and uncritical dependence on our unconscious metaphors. To maximize what conceptual freedom we can have, we must be able to see through and move beyond philosophies that deny the existence of an embodied cognitive unconscious that governs most of our mental lives.”

“Para ti, a vida tem de ser obrigatoriamente um cenário de mudança e distracção constante, caso contrário, o mundo é uma masmorra: tens de ser admirada, tens de ser cortejada, tens de ser bajulada… tens de ter música, tens de ter bailes, tens de ter companhia… caso contrário, definhas e morres. Será possível que não consigas arranjar maneira de te tornares independente de todas as iniciativas e de todas as vontades para além das que provêm de ti própria? Pega num dia, divide-o em partes, atribui a cada parte uma determinada tarefa; não deixes nem um quarto de hora, nem dez, nem cinco minutos que sejam por preencher, ocupa a totalidade do tempo; desempenha cada tarefa com método, com uma regularidade inflexível. O dia chegará ao fim quase sem dares por isso e não ficarás em dívida para com ninguém por te ter ajudado a livrares-te dum momento de ócio, não te verás obrigada a procurar companhia, a conversa, a simpatia, a tolerância de ninguém; viveste, em resumo, como qualquer criatura independente deve viver. (p.309)”

“There are Tantrics who deliberately break taboos and social norms and then there are other Tantrics who, by means of their practices and the way that they practice, that to society in general, it may have the appearance of breaking social norms but in fact that is just the manifestation of the progress of their practice.”

“You made me laugh at your jokes. You made me cry at your criticism. You made me shout at your lies. Then I noticed how in every case someone else was present, hearing you without laughter or tears or anger. I alone reacted. I see now; you never made me laugh or cry or rage. I chose to find humor. I chose to take offense. I chose to feel scorned. The truth is, you never had power over me.”

“Today there is a deep longing in our culture to reconnect to this spiritual world, for we are not whole without it. But our longing cannot be satisfied by embracing religious belief alone, no matter how emotional the embrace, for our longing is at root a hunger and thirst for the experience of interior realities. If, however, we are to forge a new relationship to the invisible world of spirit based on experience, what will distinguish it from the past is the modern necessity that it be based on our own autonomy as free individuals, able to think, decide, and act for ourselves.”

“Despite the many occasions when its characters feel frustrated before the weight of circumstances, and despite blaming their feeling of impotence on daiva, 'fate', moral autonomy shines through in the epic. Because they have some freedom to choose they can be praised when they follow dharma or blamed when they follow adharma. At the moment of making a decision they become conscious of their freedom, and it is this perception of autonomy that gives them the ability to lead authentic moral lives.”

“The petite bourgeoise and small property in general represent a precious zone of autonomy and freedom in state systems increasingly dominated by large public and private bureaucracies.”

“When God “saves” people in this life, by working through His Spirit to bring them to faith, and by leading them to follow Jesus in discipleship, prayer, holiness, hope and love, such people are designed – it isn’t too strong a word – to be a sign and foretaste of what God wants to do for the entire cosmos. What’s more, such people are not just to be a sign and foretaste of that ultimate “salvation”; they are to be part of the means by which God makes this happen in both the present and the future.”

“Movement away from defensive destructiveness and towards greater social responsibility is a characteristic of this [actualising] tendency. The political implication of this position is that we do not need to be controlled by authority. We, individually and collectively, not only have the right to self-determination and group determination but, given the necessary conditions, can be trusted to use our power responsibly.”

“I thought of Bobby, of the last look he had given me, and at that moment I understood one of the differences between man and cat: man knows he's going to die, so he can get ready and be willing, even eager, to go. A cat knows the end is near, but that's all. He can't accept death: he can't trust in it; cats are perhaps too metaphysical an entity to need to believe in the idea of a beyond; a cat is his own god and man his creation.”

“There are Tantrics who deliberately seek to do more active forms of renunciation, so transgression of social norms and breaking of taboo, and breaking of social taboos especially, is a form of renunciation.”

“Cheryl believed people were always being nudged toward something. Debbie believed the universe was mostly minding its own business.”