Quotes about behavior
A collection of quotes on the topic of behavior.
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„We do not consider patriotism desirable if it contradicts civilized behavior.“
— Friedrich Dürrenmatt, Romulus the Great
Romulus the Great, act I (1956)
„It is an open question whether any behavior based on fear of eternal punishment can be regarded as ethical or should be regarded as merely cowardly.“
— Margaret Mead American anthropologist 1901 - 1978
Attributed in American Quotations (1992) by Gorton Carruth and Eugene H. Ehrlich, p. 149
1990s
„Atheism may be, in some cases, just verbal behavior masking personal feelings that may be very different, perhaps even deeply religious.“
— Raymond Moody American psychologist 1944
Reflection on Life After Life (1977)
„I think if we study the primates, we notice that a lot of these things that we value in ourselves, such as human morality, have a connection with primate behavior.“
— Jane Goodall British primatologist, ethologist, and anthropologist 1934
Frans de Waal, in a NOVA interview, " The Bonobo in All of Us" PBS (1 January 2007) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/nature/bonobo-all-us.html; quotes from this interview were for some time misplaced on this page, which probably generated similar misattributions elsewhere, and the misplacement was not discovered until after this quotation had been selected for Quote of the Day, as a quote of Goodall. Corrections were subsequently made here, during the day the quote was posted as QOTD.
Misattributed
Context: I think if we study the primates, we notice that a lot of these things that we value in ourselves, such as human morality, have a connection with primate behavior. This completely changes the perspective, if you start thinking that actually we tap into our biological resources to become moral beings. That gives a completely different view of ourselves than this nasty selfish-gene type view that has been promoted for the last 25 years.
„In addition to recognizing that deviance is created by the responses of people to particular kinds of behavior, by the labeling of that behavior as deviant, we must also keep in mind that the rules created and maintained by such labeling are not universally agreed to. Instead, they are the object of conflict and disagreement, part of the political process of society.“
— Howard S. Becker American sociologist 1928
Source: Outsiders: Studies in the Sociology of Deviance (1963), p. 18.
„If we can stop, listen, and think about what others are seeing in us, we have a great opportunity. We can compare the self that we want to be with the self that we are presenting to the rest of the world. We can then begin to make the real changes that are needed to close the gap between our stated values and our actual behavior.“
— Marshall Goldsmith American author of leadership and management literature 1949
Source: What Got You Here Won't Get You There, 2008, p. 125 (in 2010 edition)
„The behavior of the Taliban as well as their extremist attitudes do not correspond in any way with a tolerant Islam. We have always been opposed to extremist tendencies of Islam and we still are. We have not stopped insisting on defending an Islam of tolerance which would be profitable to every Muslim, in Afghanistan and in the whole world, and we will always defend it.“
— Ahmad Shah Massoud Afghan military leader 1953 - 2001
Meeting with European legislators http://www.afghanistannewscenter.com/news/2000/june/jun23i2000.html (11 June 2000).
„Law is an order of human behavior. An “order” is a system of rules. Law is not, as it is sometimes said, a rule. It is a set of rules having the kind of unity we understand by a system. It is impossible to grasp the nature of law if we limit our attention to the single isolated rule.“
— Hans Kelsen Austrian lawyer 1881 - 1973
General Theory of Law and State (1949), I. The Concept of Law, A. Law and Justice, a. Human Behavior as the Objects of Rules
„Justice is primarily a possible, but not a necessary, quality of a social order regulating the mutual relations of men. Only secondarily it is a virtue of man, since a man is just, if his behavior conforms to the norms of a social order supposed to be just. But what does it really mean to say that a social order is just? It means that this order regulates the behavior of men in a way satisfactory to all men, that is to say, so that all men find their happiness in it. The longing for justice is men's eternal longing for happiness. It is happiness that men cannot find alone, as an isolated individual, and hence seeks in society. Justice is social happiness. It is happiness guaranteed by a social order.“
— Hans Kelsen Austrian lawyer 1881 - 1973
"What Is Justice?" (1952), published in What is Justice? (1957)
„I'm not a poster boy for good behavior and recovery in Hollywood, I'm just a guy who knows he has a lot to be grateful for.“
— Robert Downey Jr. American actor 1965
Quoted in Dotson Rader, "I rose from the ashes" http://www.parade.com/articles/editions/2008/edition_04-20-2008/1Robert_Downey_Jr, Parade Magazine (2008-04-20)
„Human behavior is predictable, but, as in physical science, accurate prediction hinges on the correctness of underlying theoretical assumptions. There is, in fact, no prediction without theory; all managerial decisions and actions rest on assumptions about behavior. If we adopt the posture of the ostrich with respect to our assumptions under the mistaken idea that we are thus “being ‘practical,” or that “management is an art,” our progress with respect to the human side of enterprise will indeed be slow. Only as we examine and test our theoretical assumptions can we hope to make them more adequate, to remove inconsistencies, and thus to improve our ability to predict.“
— Douglas McGregor American professor 1906 - 1964
Source: The Human Side of Enterprise (1960), p. 11 (2006; 13)
„The State’s behavior is violence, and it calls its violence “law”; that of the individual, “crime.”“
— Max Stirner, book The Ego and Its Own
The state calls its own violence law, but that of the individual, crime.
As quoted in The Great Quotations (1960) by George Seldes, p. 664
The Ego and Its Own (1845)
„There was no difference between the behavior of a god and the operations of pure chance.“
— Thomas Pynchon, book Gravity's Rainbow
Gravity's Rainbow (1973)
„The behavior of an individual is determined not by his racial affiliation, but by the character of his ancestry and his cultural environment.“
— Franz Boas German-American anthropologist 1858 - 1942
Source: Race and Democratic Society (1945), Chapter 2.
„“Human beings fear difference,” Lilith had told him once. “Oankali crave difference. Humans persecute their different ones, yet they need them to give themselves definition and status. Oankali seek difference and collect it. They need it to keep themselves from stagnation and overspecialization. If you don’t understand this, you will. You’ll probably find both tendencies surfacing in your own behavior.” And she had put her hand on his hair. “When you feel a conflict, try to go the Oankali way. Embrace difference.”“
— Octavia E. Butler, book Adulthood Rites
Part II “Phoenix” chapter 4 (p. 329).
Adulthood Rites (1988)