Edward Thorndike Quotes

• Colors fade, temples crumble, empires fall, but wise words endure.

  Edward Thorndike

  Wise, Wisdom, Fall

  89 Copy quote

• He who learns and runs away, lives to learn another day.

  Edward Thorndike

  Running, Military, Another Day

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• Psychology is the science of the intellects, characters and behavior of animals including man.

  Edward Thorndike

  Character, Science, Animal

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• Human education is concerned with certain changes in the intellects, characters and behavior of men, its problems being roughly included under these four topics: Aims, materials, means and methods.

  Edward Thorndike

  Education, Character, Mean

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• All that exists, exists in some amount and can be measured.

  Edward Thorndike

  Science, Existence, Amount

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• To the intelligent man with an interest in human nature it must often appear strange that so much of the energy of the scientific world has been spent on the study of the body and so little on the study of the mind.

  Edward Thorndike

  Nature, Men, Intelligent

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.312, Routledge

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• Human beings are accustomed to think of intellect as the power of having and controlling ideas and of ability to learn as synonymous with ability to have ideas. But learning by having ideas is really one of the rare and isolated events in nature.

  Edward Thorndike

  Nature, Thinking, Ideas

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• Psychology helps to measure the probability that an aim is attainable.

  Edward Thorndike

  Psychology, Helping, Aim

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• The function of intellect is to provide a means of modifying our reactions to the circumstances of life, so that we may secure pleasure, the symptom of welfare.

  Edward Thorndike

  Mean, May, Welfare

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.325, Routledge

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• Nowhere more truly than in his mental capacities is man a part of nature.

  Edward Thorndike

  Nature, Men, Capacity

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1962). “Psychology and the Science of Education: Selected Writings”

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• Whatever exists at all exists in some amount. To know it thoroughly involves knowing its quantity as well as its quality.

  Edward Thorndike

  Knowing, Quality, Wells

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1962). “Psychology and the Science of Education: Selected Writings”

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• Just as the science and art of agriculture depend upon chemistry and botany, so the art of education depends upon physiology and psychology.

  Edward Thorndike

  Art, Agriculture, Psychology

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• It will of course, be understood that directly or indirectly, soon or late, every advance in the sciences of human nature will contribute to our success in controlling human nature and changing it to the advantage of the common wheel.

  Edward Thorndike

  Nature, Wheels, Common

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• So the animal finally performs in that situation only the fitting act.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Fitting, Situation

  "The Evolution of the Human Intellect".

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• The intellectual evolution of the race consists in an increase in the number, delicacy, complexity, permanence and speed of formation of such associations.

  Edward Thorndike

  Race, Numbers, Intellectual

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1924). “The Evolution of the Human Intellect”

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• The real difference between a man's scientific judgments about himself and the judgment of others about him is he has added sources of knowledge.

  Edward Thorndike

  Real, Men, Differences

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.36, Routledge

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• For origin and development of human faculty we must look to these processes of association in lower animals.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Looks, Development

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1898). “Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals”

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• The dog, on the other hand, has few or no ideas because his brain acts in coarse fashion and because there are few connections with each single process.

  Edward Thorndike

  Dog, Fashion, Hands

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.322, Routledge

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• Human folk are as a matter of fact eager to find intelligence in animals.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Matter, Facts

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1898). “Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals”

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• When, instead of merely associating some act with some situation in the animal way, we think the situation out, we have a set of particular feelings of its elements.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Thinking, Feelings

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.320, Routledge

  11 Copy quote

• Amongst the minds of animals that of man leads, not as a demigod from another planet, but as a king from the same race.

  Edward Thorndike

  Kings, Animal, Men

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1924). “The Evolution of the Human Intellect”

  32 Copy quote

• Dogs get lost hundreds of times and no one ever notices it or sends an account of it to a scientific magazine.

  Edward Thorndike

  Dog, Magazines, Lost

  Edward Lee Thorndike (1898). “Animal Intelligence: An Experimental Study of the Associative Processes in Animals”

  9 Copy quote

• From the lowest animals of which we can affirm intelligence up to man this type of intellect is found.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Men, Type

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• On the whole, the psychological work of the last quarter of the nineteenth century emphasized the study of consciousness to the neglect of the total life of intellect and character

  Edward Thorndike

  Character, Lasts, Study

  Edward Thorndike (2017). “Animal Intelligence: Experimental Studies”, p.25, Routledge

  7 Copy quote

• The un-conscious distortion of the facts is almost harmless compared to the unconscious neglect of an animal's mental life until it verges on the unusual and marvelous.

  Edward Thorndike

  Animal, Facts, Mental Health

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