Daniel Quinn Quotes

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Birth Children Community Culture Life Lying Mothers

If we continue...to consume the world until there's no more to consume, then there's going to come a day, sure as hell, when our children or their children or their children's children are going to look back on us - on you and me - and say to themselves, "My God, what kind of monsters were these people?"

Daniel Quinn

Children, Future, People

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The world doesn't belong to us, we belong to it. Always have, always will. We belong to the world. We belong to the community of life on this planet--it doesn't belong to us. We got confused about that, now it's time to set the record straight

Daniel Quinn

Confused, Community, Records

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If the world is saved, it will not be saved by old minds with new programs but by new minds with no programs at all.

Daniel Quinn

Change, Mind, World

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Beyond Civilization: Humanity's Next Great Adventure”, p.7, Broadway Books

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Once you learn to discern the voice of Mother Culture humming in the background, telling her story over and over again to the people of your culture, you’ll never stop being conscious of it. Wherever you go for the rest of your life, you’ll be tempted to say to the people around you, “how can you listen to this stuff and not recognize it for what it is?

Daniel Quinn

Life, Mother, Learning

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.37, Bantam

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You're captives of a civilizational system that more or less compels you to go on destroying the world in order to live. … You are captives—and you have made a captive of the world itself. That's what's at stake, isn't it?—your captivity and the captivity of the world.

Daniel Quinn

Order, Captivity, Goes On

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.25, Bantam

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Indigenous people believe that Man belongs to the World; civilized people believe that the World belongs to Man.

Daniel Quinn

Believe, Men, People

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But we're not humanity, we're just one culture - one culture out of hundreds of thousands that have lived their vision on this planet and sung their song. If it were humanity that needed changing, then we'd be out of luck. But it isn't humanity that needs changing, it's just...us.

Daniel Quinn

Song, Humanity, Luck

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The people who are horrified by the idea of children learning what they want to learn when they want to learn it have not accepted the very elementary psychological fact that people (all people, of every age) remember the things that are important to them - the things they need to know - and forget the rest.

Daniel Quinn

Children, Ideas, People

"Schooling: The Hidden Agenda". Daniel Quinn's Address at the Annual Conference of the North American Association for Environmental Education in Vancouver, Canada, www.ishmael.org. August 16, 1997.

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People will listen when they're ready to listen and not before. Don't waste time with people who want to argue. They'll keep you immobilized forever. Look for people who are already open to something new.

Daniel Quinn

Learning, Knowledge, People

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Beyond Civilization: Humanity's Next Great Adventure”, p.189, Broadway Books

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To you, Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism look very different, but to me they look the same. Many of you would say that something like Buddhism doesn't even belong on the list, since it doesn't link salvation to divine worship, but to me this is just a quibble. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, and Hinduism all perceive human beings as flawed, wounded creatures in need of salvation, and all rely fundamentally on revelations that spell out how salvation is to be attained, either by departing from this life or rising above it.

Daniel Quinn

Buddhism, Islam, Different

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Don't wait. Where do you expect to get by waiting? Doing is what teaches you. Doing is what leads to inspiration. Doing is what generates ideas. Nothing else, and nothing less.

Daniel Quinn

Inspiration, Ideas, Waiting

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Everyone in your culture knows this. Man was born to turn the world into paradise, but tragically he was born flawed. And so his paradise has always been spoiled by stupidty, greed, destructiveness, and shortsightedness.

Daniel Quinn

Life, Men, Greed

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.83, Bantam

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Animism is not a belief system, but a worldview: The world is a sacred place and we are part of it. The factuality of this statement is not the issue. To say that the world is a sacred place is to make a statement about values, not facts. It’s a statement about what you mean by ‘sacred,’ just as ‘Money can’t buy happiness’ is a statement about what you mean by ‘happiness.’ To put it all very simply, animism isn’t a belief system, it’s a value system.

Daniel Quinn

Mean, Issues, World

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There's nothing fundamentally wrong with people. Given a story to enact that puts them in accord with the world, they will live in accord with the world. But given a story to enact that puts them at odds with the world, as yours does, they will live at odds with the world. Given a story to enact in which they are the lords of the world, they will ACT like lords of the world. And, given a story to enact in which the world is a foe to be conquered, they will conquer it like a foe, and one day, inevitably, their foe will lie bleeding to death at their feet, as the world is now.

Daniel Quinn

Lying, Odds, Feet

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.84, Bantam

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There is no one right way to live.

Daniel Quinn

Way To Live, Way, Right Way

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What is crucial to your survival as a race is not the redistribution of power and wealth within the prison but rather the destruction of the prison itself.

Daniel Quinn

Race, Survival, Prison

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The world is not going to survive very much longer as humanity's captive.

Daniel Quinn

Humanity, World, Captives

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.26, Bantam

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Man's destiny was to conquer and rule the world, and this is what he's done.. almost. He hasn't quite made it, and it looks as though this may be his undoing. The problem is that man's conquest of the world has itself devastated the world. And in spite of all the mastery we've attained, we don't have enough mastery to stop devastating the world.. or to repair the devastation we've already wrought.

Daniel Quinn

Destiny, Men, People

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.80, Bantam

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The world must live. We are only one species among billions. The gods don't love us any more than they love spiders or bears or whales or water lilies.

Daniel Quinn

Whales, Water Lily, Spiders

Daniel Quinn (2010). “The Story of B”, p.324, Bantam

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Blessed are those who do whatever they can wherever they are, for no one is devoid of resources or opportunities.

Daniel Quinn

Blessed, Opportunity, Blessed Are Those

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Thinkers aren't limited by what they know, because they can always increase what they know. Rather they're limited by what puzzles them, because there's no way to become curious about something that doesn't puzzle you.

Daniel Quinn

Way, Curious, Increase

Daniel Quinn (2009). “My Ishmael”, p.65, Bantam

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The premise of the Taker story is 'the world belongs to man'. … The premise of the Leaver story is 'man belongs to the world'.

Daniel Quinn

Men, Stories, World

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.239, Bantam

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Do you see the slightest evidence anywhere in the universe that creation came to an end with the birth of man? Do you see the slightest evidence anywhere out there that man was the climax toward which creation had been straining from the beginning? ...Very far from it. The universe went on as before, the planet went on as before. Man's appearance caused no more stir than the appearance of jellyfish.

Daniel Quinn

Men, Birth, Appearance

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.58, Bantam

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TEACHER seeks pupil. Must have an earnest desire to save the world. Apply in person.

Daniel Quinn

Teacher, Desire, World

Daniel Quinn (2009). “My Ishmael”, p.3, Bantam

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From the animist point of view, humans belong in a sacred place because they themselves are sacred. Not sacred in a special way, not more sacred than anything else, but merely as sacred as anything else -- as sacred as bison or salmon or crows or crickets or bears or sunflowers.

Daniel Quinn

Views, Crow, Special

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Born: October 11, 1935
Occupation: Novelist
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