Propensity Quotes - Page 4

• If we look into ourselves we discover propensities which declare that our intellects have arisen from a lower form; could our minds be made visible we should find them tailed.

  William Winwood Reade

  Mind, Atheism, Looks

  William Winwood Reade (1874). “The Martyrdom of Man”, p.394

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• The things that come to us easily, our propensities, are carried on a deep subconscious level into our next life. There are no coincidences.

  Raquel Cepeda

  Levels, Next, Coincidence

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• I consider nothing low but ignorance, vice, and meanness, characteristics generally found where the animal propensities predominate over the higher sentiments.

  William John Wills

  Ignorance, Animal, Vices

  William John Wills (1863). “A Successful Exploration Through the Interior of Australia: From Melbourne to the Gulf of Carpentaria”, p.45, London : R. Bentley

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• Genes are rarely about inevitability, especially when it comes to humans, the brain, or behavior. They're about vulnerability, propensities, tendencies.

  Robert M. Sapolsky

  Brain, Behavior, Genes

  Robert M. Sapolsky (2004). “Why Zebras Don't Get Ulcers: The Acclaimed Guide to Stress, Stress-Related Diseases, and Coping - Now Revised and Updated”, p.293, Macmillan

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• As to the origin of civil Societies or Governments; the Author of our Being, has given Man a Nature to be fitted for, and disposed to Society. It was not good for Man at first to be alone; his nature is social, having various Affections, Propensities and Passions, which respect Society, and cannot be indulged without a social Intercourse.

  Abraham J. Williams

  Passion, Men, Firsts

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• Abstemiousness in diet and control of the passions, will preserve the intellect and give mental and moral vigor, enabling men to bring all their propensities under the control of the higher powers, and to discern between right and wrong, the sacred and the common.

  Ellen G. White

  Passion, Men, Giving

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• If you are leaning over to starboard to balance the boat against the other guy's propensity to lean too far to port, both of you are about to get wet.

  Kenneth Kaye

  Guy, Balance, Boat

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• Forwards are the gnarled and scarred creatures who have a propensity for running into and bleeding all over each other.

  Peter FitzSimons

  Running, Bleeding, Rugby

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• If we betake ourselves to the statistical method, we do so confessing that we are unable to follow the details of each individual case, and expecting that the effects of widespread causes, though very different in each individual, will produce an average result on the whole nation, from a study of which we may estimate the character and propensities of an imaginary being called the Mean Man.

  James Clerk Maxwell

  Character, Mean, Science

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• There is an unusually high and consistent correlation between the stupidity of a given person and that person’s propensity to be impressed by the measurement of IQ.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Stupidity, Measurement, Given

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• Before my marriage, I didn’t think about all the obligations that were awaiting me. My experience has proved useful and I think that I have a natural propensity to feel compassion for people and their problems.

  Grace Kelly

  Thinking, Compassion, People

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• Religion is nothing more than a useless and sometimes dangerous, evolutionary accident. Religious behavior may be a misfiring, an unfortunate byproduct of an underlying psychological propensity which in other circumstances is, or once was, useful.

  Richard Dawkins

  Religious, Religion, Useless

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• You know, my boy, he said, it's impossible to love men such as they are. And yet we must. So try to do good to men by doing violence to your feelings, holding your nose, and shutting your eyes, especially shutting your eyes. Endure their villainy without anger, as much as possible; try to remember that you're a man too. For, if you're even a little above average intelligence, you'll have the propensity to judge people severely. Men are vile by nature and they'd rather love out of fear. Don't give in to such love: despise it always.

  Fyodor Dostoevsky

  Love, Eye, Boys

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• The propensity to intellectualize is itself both essential and dangerous. I think in our modern world we are much more aware of its essential character than of its dangers, and that is why I think of it as being an expression of transcendence.

  Talal Asad

  Character, Thinking, Expression

  "Do Muslims Belong in the West? An Interview with Talal Asad". Interview with Hasan Azad, www.eutopiainstitute.org. February 13, 2015.

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• The national media don't know me. They know the caricature that was created of me by journalists who were frankly jealous of my access. And it was a very negative caricature. There's this propensity for blaming a woman. It comes down to implicit bias. There are so many studies that show this.

  Paula Broadwell

  Jealous, Media, Negative

  Source: www.vanityfair.com

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• After all, advocates, including advocates for States, are like managers of pugilistic and election contestants in that they have a propensity for claiming everything.

  Felix Frankfurter

  Election, States, Contestants

  "First Iowa Hydro-Electric Cooperative v. Federal Power Commission (FPC), 328 U.S. 152". U.S. Supreme Court case, supreme.justia.com. April 29, 1946.

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• It is surely one of the strangest of our propensities to mark out those we love best for the worst usage; yet we do, all of us. We can take any freedom with a friend; we stand on no ceremony with a friend.

  Samuel Laman Blanchard

  Love Is, Usage, Mark

  "Sketches from Life, Vol. 1-2". Book by Laman Blanchard, Wiley & Putnam, "That Good Wine Needs No Bush", 1846.

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• REACH, n. The radius of action of the human hand. The area within which it is possible (and customary) to gratify directly the propensity to provide.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Hands, Action, Humans

  Ambrose Bierce (2016). “The Devil's Dictionary: The Devil World”, p.176, 谷月社

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• The vigor of a mass movement stems from the propensity of its followers for united action and self-sacrifice. When we ascribe the success of a movement to its faith, doctrine, propaganda, leadership, ruthlessness and so on, we are but referring to instruments of unification and to means used to inculcate a readiness for self-sacrifice. It is perhaps impossible to understand the nature of a mass movement unless it is recognized that their chief preoccupation is to foster, perfect and perpetuate a facility for united action and self-sacrifice.

  Eric Hoffer

  Mean, Sacrifice, Self

  Eric Hoffer (1980). “The True Believer”

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• Self-denial is indulgence of a propensity to forego.

  Ambrose Bierce

  Self, Denial, Indulgence

  Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Illustrated)”, p.1223, Delphi Classics

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• A fearful instance of the ill consequences attending upon irascibility - alive, with the qualifications of the dead - dead, with the propensities of the living - an anomaly on the face of the earth - being very calm, yet breathless.

  Edgar Allan Poe

  Anomalies, Alive, Earth

  Edgar Allan Poe (2016). “The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe”, p.799, Xist Publishing

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• The propensity to play is situated in very ancient regions of the brain. Rats that have had their neocortex removed still engage in normal play.

  Jaak Panksepp

  Play, Brain, Rats

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• Some philosophers have been of opinion that our immortal part acquires during this life certain habits of action or of sentiment, which become forever indissoluble, continuing after death in a future state of existence ... I would apply this ingenious idea to the generation, or production of the embryon, or new animal, which partakes so much of the form and propensities of the parent.

  Erasmus Darwin

  Science, Animal, Ideas

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• In fact, Darwin's own grandfather anticipated the central tenet of Lamarckism by some seven years: "All animals undergo perpetual transformations; which are in part produced by their own exertions... and many of these acquired forms or propensities are transmitted to their posterity."

  Erasmus Darwin

  Animal, Years, Grandfather

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• You possess the (pro.pen.si.ty), propensity to become one of the great success stories.

  Jon Jones

  Inspirational, Stories, Great Success

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