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Intellectual Life Quotes

Browse 72 quotes about Intellectual Life.

Intellectual Life Quotes

“Having confronted the world with little except a battered typewriter and a certain resilience, he can now take posthumous credit for having got the three great questions of the 20th century essentially 'right.' Orwell was an early and consistent foe of European imperialism, and foresaw the end of colonial rule. He was one of the first to volunteer to bear arms against fascism and Nazism in Spain. And, while he was soldiering in Catalonia, he saw through the biggest and most seductive lie of them all—the false promise of a radiant future offered by the intellectual underlings of Stalinism.”

EuropeLiesFascismColonialism20th CenturyImperialismSpainNazismBritish EmpireStalinismGeorge OrwellIntellectual LifeCataloniaSpanish Civil War
Author:Christopher Hitchens
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“Nothing in my view is more reprehensible than those habits of mind in the intellectual that induce avoidance, that characteristic turning away from a difficult and principled position, which you know to be the right one, but which you decide not to take. You do not want to appear too political; you are afraid of seeming controversial; you want to keep a reputation for being balanced, objective, moderate; your hope is to be asked back, to consult, to be on a board or prestigious committee, and so to remain within the responsible mainstream; someday you hope to get an honorary degree, a big prize, perhaps even an ambassadorship. For an intellectual these habits of mind are corrupting par excellence. If anything can denature, neutralize, and finally kill a passionate intellectual life it is the internalization of such habits. Personally I have encountered them in one of the toughest of all contemporary issues, Palestine, where fear of speaking out about one of the greatest injustices in modern history has hobbled, blinkered, muzzled many who know the truth and are in a position to serve it. For despite the abuse and vilification that any outspoken supporter of Palestinian rights and self-determination earns for him or herself, the truth deserves to be spoken, represented by an unafraid and compassionate intellectual.”

CompassionIntellectualMainstreamPalestinePrestigeIntellectualismIntellectual LifeControvers
Author:Edward W. Said
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“Given the current pace of its corporatization, academia may well become the worst institution for indoctrinating and subjugating many brilliant minds that may otherwise have great potential for dissidence and creating a new worldview, which is much needed amid the global turmoil we are experiencing internationally.”

AcademiaCorporate CultureIntellectual LifeCorporate GreedAcademicsIntellectual FreedomIntellectual HonestyAcademic FreedomAcademic Industrial ComplexAcademic Politics
Author:Louis Yako
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“The man who is too isolated grows timid, abstracted, a little odd: He stumbles along amid realities like a sailor who has just come off his ship; he has lost the sense of the human lot; he seems to look on you as if you were a "proposition" to be inserted in a syllogism, or an example to be put down in a notebook.”

IsolationSocial LifeIntellectualismIntellectual LifeLoners
Book:The Intellectual Life: Its Spirit, Conditions, Methods
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“In his entire output, I can find only one piece of genuine unfairness: a thuggish attack on the poetry of WH Auden, whom he regarded as a dupe of the Communist Party. But even this was softened in some later essays. The truth is that he disliked Auden's homosexuality, and could not get over his prejudice. But much of the interest of Orwell lies in the fact that he was born prejudiced, so to speak, against Jews and the coloured peoples of the empire, and against the poor and uneducated, and against women and intellectuals—and managed, in a transparent and unique way, to educate himself out of this fog of bigotry (though he never did get over his aversion to 'pansies').”

EducationRacismPrejudiceBigotryHomosexualityImperialismHomophobiaGeorge OrwellIntellectual Life
Author:Christopher Hitchens
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“American culture has regressed because of contemporary society’s glorification of making a good living and spending free time in media activities rather than constantly devoting themselves to a learning and self-improvement. The combination of grooming youngsters to fit into a commercial workplace and Americans willingness to submit themselves to endless hours of watching television shows filled with murders, violence, sex, and replete with advertisements that promote the goods of commercial giants has eroded the American spirit and contributed to lack of an intellectually sophisticated populous.”

ViolenceTelevisionAmerican SocietyIntellectual LifeCulture CritiqueIntellectual GrowthMedia And Society
Book:Dead Toad Scrolls
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“There is a fundamental conflict between intellectual and political life... The essence of the intellectual life is the impulse to analyze everything indiscriminately, to understand the explanations for everything. The essence of political success is the contrary habit. Whatever one's internal understanding of the world, one must train oneself never to express those conclusions needlessly, for they may offend. Truth must be offered up by teaspoons, always with a purpose.”

TruthPolitical LifeIntellectual Life
Book:TREFETHEN'S INDEX CARDS: FORTY YEARS OF NOTES ABOUT PEOPLE, WORDS AND MATHEMATICS
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“When, thirty-five years ago, I tried to give a summary of the ideas and principles of that social philosophy that was once known under the name of liberalism, I did not indulge in the vain hope that my account would prevent the impending catastrophes to which the policies adopted by the European nations were manifestly leading. All I wanted to achieve was to offer to the small minority of thoughtful people an opportunity to learn something about the aims of classical liberalism and its achievements and thus to pave the way for a resurrection of the spirit of freedom after the coming debacle.”

IntellectualActivismLiberalismLibertarianismPolitical ActionIntellectual LifeClassical Liberalism
Book:Liberalism: The Classical Tradition
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“Curiosity, which may or may not eventuate in something useful, is probably the most outstanding characteristic of modern thinking ... Institutions of learning should be devoted to the cultivation of curiosity, and the less they are deflected by the consideration of immediacy of application, the more likely they are to contribute not only to human welfare, but to the equally important satisfaction of intellectual interest, which may indeed be said to have become the ruling passion of intellectual life in modern times.”

ThinkingShouldHumansMaySaidImportantPassionInterestModernIntellectualInstitutionsCuriositySatisfactionWelfareCharacteristicsConsiderationApplicationDevotedRulingOutstandingCultivationModern TimesImmediacyIntellectual LifeRuling Passion
Author:Abraham Flexner
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“It has been observed before that images, however beautiful, though faithfully copied from nature, and as accurately represented in words, do not of themselves characterize the poet. They become proofs of original genius only as far as they are modified by a predominant passion; or by associated thoughts or images awakened by that passion; or when they have the effect of reducing multitude to unity, or succession to an instant; or lastly, when a human and intellectual life is transferred to them from the poet's spirit.”

HumansHas BeensBeautifulLife IsSpiritPassionEffectsPoetGeniusIntellectualOriginalsUnityProofInstantMultitudesReducingAwakenedSuccessionIntellectual Life
Book:Biographia Literaria: Or, Biographical Sketches of My Literary Life and Opinions
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“Weakness of attitude becomes weakness of character; it becomes lack of power to act with courage proportionate to danger. All this must lead to the destruction of our intellectual life unless the danger summons up strong personalities able to fill the lukewarm and discouraged with new strength and resolution.”

CharacterAbleStrongAttitudeDangerPersonalityIntellectualWeaknessDestructionResolutionDiscouragedLukewarmIntellectual LifeStrong PersonStrong PersonalityWeakness Of Character
Author:Albert Einstein
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“Pragmatism , in trying to turn experimental physics into a prototype of all science and to model all spheres of intellectual life after the techniques of the laboratory, is the counterpart of modern industrialism, for which the factory is the prototype of human existence, and which models all branches of culture after production on the conveyor belt.”

TryingHumansTurnsCultureExistenceModernIntellectualModelsProductionsTechniquePhysicsBranchesSpheresFactoriesBeltsLaboratoryHuman ExistencePragmatismCounterpartsPrototypeIntellectual Life
Book:EPZ Eclipse of Reason
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“Few of us have been so exceptionally unfortunate as not to find, in our own age, some experienced friend who has helped us by precious counsel, never to be forgotten. We cannot render it in kind, but perhaps in the fulness of time it may become our noblest duty to aid another as we have ourselves been aided, and to transmit to him an invaluable treasure, the tradition of the intellectual life.”

KindMayHas BeensAgeDutyFriendsIntellectualTraditionForgottenAidsTreasureUnfortunateTransmitInvaluableIntellectual Life
Book:The Intellectual Life
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“I'm committed to the idea that one of the few things human beings have to offer is the richness of unconscious and conscious emotional responses to being alive. ... The kind of esteem that's given to brightness/smartness obliterates average people or slow learners from participating fully in human life, particularly technical and intellectual life. But you cannot exclude any human being from emotional participation.”

PeopleHumansKindIdeasGivenHuman BeingsAliveEmotionalOffersIntellectualConsciousResponseAverageCommittedEsteemHuman LifeUnconsciousParticipationRichnessBrightnessParticipatingLearnersSmartnessIntellectual LifeEmotional Response
Author:Ntozake Shange
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“The human race, in its intellectual life, is organized like the bees: the masculine soul is a worker, sexually atrophied, and essentially dedicated to impersonal and universal arts; the feminine is queen, infinite fertile, omnipresent in its brooding industry, but passive and abounding in intuitions without method and passions without justice.”

HumansArtSoulLife IsPassionJusticeRaceIndustryIntellectualUniversalInfiniteMethodWorkersIntuitionQueensHuman RaceOrganizedFeminineDedicatedHumankindBeesPassiveInsectsMasculineSexuallyFertileBroodingIntellectual Life
Book:Little essays drawn from the writings of George Santayana
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“Modern physics has taught us that the nature of any system cannot be discovered by dividing it into its component parts and studying each part by itself... We must keep our attention fixed on the whole and on the interconnection between the parts. The same is true of our intellectual life. It is impossible to make a clear cut between science, religion, and art. The whole is never equal simply to the sum of its various parts.”

ArtWholeAttentionStudyClearCuttingImpossibleModernTaughtEqualIntellectualVariousPhysicsFixedComponentsTaught UsDividingScience ReligionInterconnectionIntellectual LifeModern PhysicsReligion And Art
Author:Max Planck
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“I think serious research tends to be associated with higher academic quality, more prestige, more resources, and even, heaven help us, better teaching, to a greater extent than you might think. Folks who don't have an active intellectual life become, though the long years of just teaching, less intellectually alive and exciting.”

ThinkingYearsLongHelpingMightHeavenQualityGreaterAliveTeachingSeriousHigherIntellectualResearchResourcesExcitingFolksActiveAcademicPrestigeIntellectual Life
Author:Nicholas Lemann
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“Those, however, who saw that one cannot attain wisdom and perennial intellectual life, unless it be given through the gift of grace, and that the goodness of the Almighty God is so great that He hears those who invoke His name, and they gain salvation, became humble, acknowledging that they are ignorant, and directed their life as the life of one desiring eternal wisdom. And that is the life of the virtuous, who proceed in the desire for the other life, which is commended by the saints.”

DesireNamesGivenSawsGraceGoodnessEternalIntellectualGainsSalvationSaintHumbleIgnorantVirtuousAlmightyAlmighty GodInvokeIntellectual Life
Author:Nicholas of Cusa
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“Consistency in opinion is the slow poison of intellectual life, the destroyer of its vividness and energy.”

EnergyOpinionIntellectualPoisonConsistencyDestroyersIntellectual LifeVividness
Book:Fragmentary remains, literary and scientific, of Sir Humphry, Davy, bart., late president of the Royal society, etc: with a sketch of his life and selections from his correspondence
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“One of the unspoken themes that I'm grappling with in Day of Honey is the relationship between violence and cosmopolitanism. It's one thing to comprehend violence as an outgrowth of ignorance, poverty, and backwardness. It's another matter entirely to confront incredible atrocities in a country with a rich civic and intellectual life.”

CountryMatterPovertyRichViolenceOne ThingIgnoranceIntellectualIncrediblesThemeHoneyCivicsAtrocitiesUnspokenGrapplingIntellectual LifeCosmopolitanism
Author:Annia Ciezadlo
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“I think it is time for a new pride in the intellectual life, and a new impatience with people who take pride in ignorance, or somehow use "elite" to mean "person who has taken the time to know" and then are eager to dismiss, say, striving, or the notion that improving one's self out of difficult conditions is a noble thing.”

PeopleThinkingKnowsMeanPersonsSelfUseDifficultTakenConditionsIgnorancePrideIntellectualStriveNotionNobleElitesNow And ThenImprovingImpatienceIntellectual LifeMean Person
Author:George Saunders
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