Daniel Quinn Quotes

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Birth Children Community Culture Life Lying Mothers

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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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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There is no one right way to live.

Daniel Quinn

Way To Live, Way, Right Way

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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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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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[A]ny species that exempts itself from the rules of competition ends up destroying the community in order to support its own expansion.

Daniel Quinn

Order, Support, Community

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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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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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The world of the Takers is one vast prison, and except for a handful of Leavers scattered across the world, the entire human race is now inside that prison.

Daniel Quinn

Race, World, Prison

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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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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

Mastery, World, Devastation

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.80, 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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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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And every time the Takers stamp out a Leaver culture, a wisdom ultimately tested since the birth of mankind disappears from the world beyond recall.

Daniel Quinn

Culture, World, Birth

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.206, Bantam

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Increasing food production to feed an increased population results in yet another increase in population.

Daniel Quinn

Population, Increase, Results

Daniel Quinn (2009). “Ishmael: A Novel”, p.136, 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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