“We do not behave as if we believed that the affairs of our world were significant enough for the intervention of great men.”
Source: Growing Up Absurd (1956), p. 153.
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Paul Goodman 47
American novelist, playwright, poet and psychotherapist 1911–1972Related quotes

"Encouragement of Science" (Address at Science Talent Institute, 6 Mar 1950), Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, v.7, #1 (Jan 1951) p. 6-8
Context: We do not believe any group of men adequate enough or wise enough to operate without scrutiny or without criticism. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it, that the only way to detect it is to be free to enquire. We know that the wages of secrecy are corruption. We know that in secrecy error, undetected, will flourish and subvert.

Source: Speech in Gera (17 June 1934), quoted in The Times (26 September 1939), p. 9

The Social Value of the College-Bred http://www.des.emory.edu/mfp/jaCollegeBred.html
1910s, Memories and Studies (1911)

"A Coincidence," http://books.google.com/books?id=vmpHAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Although+we+talk+so+much+about+coincidence+we+do+not+really+believe+in+it+in+our+heart+of+hearts+we+think+better+of+the+universe+we+are+secretly+convinced+that+it+is+not+such+a+slipshod+haphazard+affair+that+everything+in+it+has+meaning%22&pg=PA215#v=onepage Going Up Stories and Sketches (1950)
A Voice from the Attic (1960)