“In the twentieth century, the essence of man is not that he is a rational, or a political, or a sinful, or a thinking animal, but that he is an industrial animal. It is not his moral or intellectual or social or aesthetic … attributes which make man what he is. His essence resides in his capacity to contribute to, and to profit from, industrial society. The emergence of industiral society is the prime concern of sociology.”

— Ernest Gellner

Thought and Change (1964)

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Ernest Gellner 32

Czech anthropologist, philosopher and sociologist 1925–1995

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