Irrational Quotes - Page 15

• Advancing bourgeois society liquidates memory, time, recollection as irrational leftovers of the past.

  Theodor Adorno

  Memories, Past, Leftovers

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• Even the most humane and compassionate of the monotheisms and polytheisms are complicit in this quiet and irrational authoritarianism: they proclaim us, in Fulke Greville's unforgettable line, "Created sick Commanded to be well." And there are totalitarian insinuations to back this up if its appeal should fail.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Sick, Lines, Quiet

  Christopher Hitchens (2009). “Letters to a Young Contrarian”, p.57, Basic Books

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• I would think that you are more fluent with the rational. It has its appeal. But the irrational permits a greater exercise of ... shall we say, power.

  Alan Lightman

  Exercise, Thinking, Permit

  Alan Lightman (2012). “Mr g: A Novel About the Creation”, p.25, Vintage

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• Reason ... contradicts the established order of men and things on behalf of existing societal forces that reveal the irrational character of this order for "rational" is a mode of thought and action which is geared to reduce ignorance, destruction, brutality, and oppression.

  Herbert Marcuse

  Ignorance, Character, Men

  Herbert Marcuse (2012). “One-Dimensional Man: Studies in the Ideology of Advanced Industrial Society”, p.142, Beacon Press

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• We must therefore turn to history for enlightenment; here we find that none of the proclaimed anarchist groups correspond to the libertarian position, that even the best of them have unrealistic and socialistic elements in their doctrines. Furthermore, we find that all of the current anarchists are irrational collectivists, and therefore at opposite poles from our position. We must therefore conclude that we are not anarchists, and that those who call us anarchists are not on firm etymological ground, and are being completely unhistorical.

  Murray Rothbard

  Opposites, Enlightenment, Groups

  "Are Libertarians 'Anarchists'?". Faith and Freedom, unpublished, mid-1950s.

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• If you want to - if you want to engage in conspiracy theories that the White House and the vice president intended no one to ever know - like "The New York Times" - we would have been kept in the dark forever. I just think that's completely irrational.

  Kate O'Beirne

  New York, Dark, Thinking

  "Hardball" with Chris Matthews, www.nbcnews.com. February 17, 2006.

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• Flesh-eating by humans is unnecessary, irrational, anatomically unsound, unhealthy, unhygienic, uneconomic, unaesthetic, unkind and unethical. May I elaborate?

  Helen and Scott Nearing

  Vegetarianism, Flesh Eating, May

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• I knew all the time I was going to get through the war. It was completely irrational, a silly idea, but I was not going to lie down and get myself killed. I was going to get out of it.

  Abraham Pais

  War, Lying, Silly

  "To Save a Life: Stories of Holocaust Rescue" edited by Ellen Land-Weber, Part I, Holland, Ch. 1, (p. 50), 2000.

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• When we approach history, we are dealing with a conglomeration of irrational continua. Those who deal with history by nonrational processes are the ones who make history, the actors in it.

  Carroll Quigley

  Actors, Process, Deals

  Carroll Quigley (1979). “The evolution of civilizations: an introduction to historical analysis”, Liberty Fund Inc.

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• This proletarianization of the lower salaried bourgeoisie is accompanied by an excess in the opposite direction: the irrationally high pay of top managers and bankers, a level of remuneration that is economically irrational since, as investigations in the US have demonstrated, it tends to be inversely proportional to the company's success.

  Slavoj Žižek

  Opposites, Bankers, Bourgeoisie

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• I'm trapped in a fun-house mirror reflection of a historical society where everyone was crazy by default, driven mad by irrational laws and meaningless customs.

  Charles Stross

  Fun, Crazy, Reflection

  Charles Stross (2006). “Glasshouse”, p.88, Penguin

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• Hellenic science is a victory of rationalism, which appears greater, not smaller, when one is made to realize that it had been won in spite of the irrational beliefs of the Greek people; all in all, it was a triumph of reason in the face of unreason. Some knowledge of Greek superstitions is needed not only for a proper appreciation of that triumph but also for the justification of occasional failures, such as the many Platonic aberrations.

  George Sarton

  Appreciation, People, Greek

  George Sarton (2012). “Ancient Science Through the Golden Age of Greece”, p.9, Courier Corporation

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• I think this fear of insanity is comparable to the fear people once had of falling off the edge of the world. Or the fear of heretics...What's happening is that each year our old flat earth of conventional reason becomes less and less adequate to handle the experiences we have and this is creating wide-spread feelings of topsy-turviness. As a result we're getting more and more people in irrational areas of thought...occultism, mysticism, drug changes and the like...because they feel an inadequacy in classical reason to handle what they know are real experiences.

  Robert M. Pirsig

  Real, Fall, Thinking

  "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance". Book by Robert M. Pirsig, 1974.

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• The core of the Marxist critique of capitalism is that although the individual capitalist is rational (as liberals assume), the capitalist system itself is irrational.

  Robert Gilpin

  Assuming, Individual, Marxist

  Robert Gilpin (2016). “The Political Economy of International Relations”, p.37, Princeton University Press

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• If the spiritual values of human existence at its highest term of development and achievement do not endure, amidst all the changes and chances of this mortal universe, there seems to be no stable or coherent meaning in existence. Then the universe is irrational--indeed it is no universe at all.

  Joseph Alexander Leighton

  Spiritual, Achievement, Development

  Joseph Alexander Leighton (1922). “Man and the Cosmos - An introduction to Metaphysics.”

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• The great snare of thought is uncritical acceptance of irrational assumptions.

  Will Durant

  Acceptance, Assumption, Snares

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• Remember that failure is part of the process of successful running. Performance is a roller coaster; to think otherwise is irrational and will cause you much stress and discouragement. Lighten up on yourself. Ups and downs can be expected. The performance of most serious runners fluctuates by the week. You win some, you lose some; some days you're hot, some days you're not. Don't fight with yourself when failure, the teacher, pays an unexpected visit. Open up to learning from it.

  Jerry Lynch

  Running, Teacher, Stress

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• What matters is that they are curious about life, energy, truth, and themselves and that they haven't sold out to the establishment powers that tell us what to think, what to wear, how to behave, what to believe in and what goes beyond the line of rational and irrational thought.

  Frederick Lenz

  Believe, Buddhism, Thinking

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• It began with one act of madness, and it ended with another. John Brown heard history's clock strike in the night and tried to hurry dawn along with gunfire; now John Wilkes Booth heard the clock strike, and he tried with gunfire to restore the darkness. Each man stood outside the human community, directed by voices the sane do not hear, and each kept history from going logically... The line from Harper's Ferry to Ford's Theater is a red thread binding the immense disorder of the Civil War into an irrational sort of coherence.

  Bruce Catton

  War, Night, Men

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• The claim is also sometimes made that science is as arbitrary or irrational as all other claims to knowledge, or that reason itself is an illusion. As Ethan Allen said Those who invalidate reason ought seriously to consider whether they argue against reason with or without reason; if with reason, then they establish the principle that they are labouring to dethrone. If they argue without reason, which they must do, in order to be consistent with themselves, they are out of reach of rational conviction, nor do they deserve a rational argument.

  Carl Sagan

  Science, Order, Principles

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• Randian heroes come off as metaphors for Jews because they are beset by irrational forces that try to bar them from the professions and use their virtues against them to bring about their destruction.

  Florence King

  Hero, Atheism, Trying

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• I dont agree with those who think that the conflict is simply between two religions, namely Christianity and Islam... To me, the key conflict is between irrational blind faith and rational, logical minds.

  Taslima Nasrin

  Thinking, Keys, Two

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• In the search for meaning we must not forget that the gods (or God, for that matter) are a concept of the human mind; they are the creatures of man, not vice versa. They are needed and invented to give meaning and purpose to the struggle that is life on Earth, to explain strange and irregular phenomena of nature, haphazard events and, above all, irrational human conduct. They exist to bear the burden of all things that cannot be comprehended except by supernatural intervention or design.

  Barbara Tuchman

  Struggle, Men, Giving

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• Our enemies may be irrational, even outright insane, driven by nationalism, religion, ethnicity or ideology. They do not fear the United States for its diplomatic skills or the number of automobiles and software programs it produces. They respect only the firepower of our tanks, planes and helicopter gunships.

  Ronald Reagan

  Skills, Numbers, Ethnicity

  Ronald Reagan (1998). “A Shining City: The Legacy of Ronald Reagan”

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• All great art contains an element of the irrational.

  Edith Sitwell

  Art, Elements, Great Art

  Edith Sitwell (Dame), Elizabeth Salter, Allanah Harper (1976). “Edith Sitwell: fire of the mind : an anthology”, Michael Joseph

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