“I don't think there is any truth. There are only points of view.”
Allen Ginsberg (1926–1997) American poet
A collection of quotes on the topic of view, point, other, use.
“I don't think there is any truth. There are only points of view.”
Allen Ginsberg (1926–1997) American poet
Robert Downey Jr. (1965) American actor
Quoted in David Carr, "Been Up, Been Down. Now? Super." http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/movies/20carr.html?_r=4&pagewanted=2&8dpc&oref=slogin&, New York Times (2008-04-20)
Marie Curie (1867–1934) French-Polish physicist and chemist
Lecture at Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, New York (14 May 1921)
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (1945) Brazilian politician, 35th president of Brazil
"Brazil to break Aids drug patent" http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6626073.stm, BBC News, 4 May 2007
Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist
Source: Quotes 1990s, 1995-1999, The Common Good (1998)
Thomas Sankara (1949–1987) President of Upper Volta
Source: Women's Liberation and the African Freedom Struggle
Alexis Karpouzos (1967)
Source: https://www.goodreads.com/author/quotes/14108295.alexis_karpouzos?page=2
Henri de Saint-Simon (1760–1825) French early socialist theorist
Le philosophe se place au sommet de la pensée; de là il envisage ce qu'a été le monde et ce qu'il doit devenir. Il n'est pas seulement observateur, il est acteur; il est acteur du premier genre dans le monde moral, car ce sont ses opinions sur, car ce sont ses opinions sur ce que le monde doit devenir qui règlent la société humaine.
Science de l'homme: Physiologie religieuse (1858), p. 437
Edward Bernays (1891–1995) American public relations consultant, marketing pioneer
Source: Crystallizing Public Opinion (1923), p. 212
Lady Gaga (1986) American singer, songwriter, and actress
SHOWstudio Interview. In Camera with Lady Gaga 30 May 2010. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmcxdZQCnT4&feature=PlayList&p=6DB0E6483F09B62E&playnext_from=PL&playnext=1.
Henri Fayol (1841–1925) Developer of Fayolism
Source: Industrial and General Administration, 1916, p. 68 ; as cited in: Albert Lepawsky (1949), Administration, p. 6-7
Georges Lemaître (1894–1966) Belgian scientist and priest
AIKMAN, Duncan, New York Times Magazine, February 19, 1933, p. 3 http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9A02E7DA1539E033A2575AC1A9649C946294D6CF&nytmobile=0&legacy=true
Jack Welch (1935) American executive: General Electric CEO
Source: Jack: Straight from the Gut (2001), Ch. 24.
Loreena McKennitt (1957) Canadian musician and composer
Notes from McKennitt's journals in the CD booklet for The Mask and Mirror '
Context: May, 1993 - Stratford... have been reading through the poetry of 15th century Spain, and I find myself drawn to one by the mystic writer and visionary St. John of the Cross; the untitled work is an exquisite, richly metaphoric love poem between himself and his god. It could pass as a love poem between any two at any time... His approach seems more akin to early Islamic or Judaic works in its more direct route to communication to his god... I have gone over three different translations of the poem, and am struck by how much a translation can alter our interpretation. I am reminded that most holy scriptures come to us in translation, resulting in a diversity of views.
Noam Chomsky (1928) american linguist, philosopher and activist
Quotes 1990s, 1990-1994, Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media, 1992
Context: If you believe in freedom of speech, you believe in freedom of speech for views you don't like. Goebbels was in favor of freedom of speech for views he liked. So was Stalin. If you're in favor of freedom of speech, that means you're in favor of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise.
Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution
Source: The Military Programme of the Proletarian Revolution
“A point of view can be a dangerous luxury when substituted for insight and
understanding.”
Marshall McLuhan book The Gutenberg Galaxy
Source: The Gutenberg Galaxy: The Making of Typographic Man
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
Source: All Art is Propaganda: Critical Essays
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
"Benefit Of Clergy: Some Notes On Salvador Dalí," Dickens, Dali & Others: Studies in Popular Culture (1944) http://orwell.ru/library/reviews/dali/english/e_dali
Bill Evans (1929–1980) American jazz pianist
http://jazztimes.com/articles/20128-miles-davis-and-bill-evans-miles-and-bill-in-black-white.
Elliot Rodger (1991–2014) American spree killer
My Twisted World (2014), Thoughts at 19, Longing
John Rawls book A Theory of Justice
Source: A Theory of Justice (1971; 1975; 1999), Chapter VI, Section 59, pg. 388
Sebastian Bach (1968) Canadian singer
http://www.roadrunnerrecords.com/blabbermouth.net/news.aspx?mode=Article&newsitemID=60702 Blabbermouth.net (October 21, 2006)
James Burke (science historian) (1936) British broadcaster, science historian, author, and television producer
Connections (1979), 10 - Yesterday, Tomorrow and You
Terence McKenna (1946–2000) American ethnobotanist
True Hallucinations http://www.matrixmasters.com/takecharge/consciousness/mckenna2.html (1993)
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
On Mark Twain and Anatole France, in "Mark Twain - The Licensed Jester" in Tribune (26 November 1943); reprinted in The Collected Essays, Journalism and Letters of George Orwell (1968)
Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist
The ABC of Relativity (1925), p. 166
1920s
Variant: "Most people would rather die than think; many do."
Ted Bundy (1946–1989) American serial killer
1984 interview with Detective Robert Keppel (regarding the Green River Killer)
Erwin Chargaff (1905–2002) Ukrinian-born biochemist who emigrated to the United States
Heraclitean Fire: Sketches from a Life Before Nature, Paul & Co Pub Consortium, June, 1978.
Shahrukh Khan (1965) Indian actor, producer and television personality
From interview with Komal Nahta
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
From a review of Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf, New English Weekly (21 March 1940)
Humberto Maturana (1928) Chilean biologist and philosopher
Source: Biology of Cognition (1970), p. 9.
Takeda Shingen (1521–1573) Japanese daimyo of the Sengoku period
William Scott Wilson, Gregory Lee. Ideals of the Samurai: Writings of Japanese Warriors, 1982. p 92
Gary Yourofsky (1970) animal rights activist
Part of the speech to the students of the Georgia Institute of Technology (Summer 2010)
Michael J. Sandel (1953) American political philosopher
1. America's Search for a Public Philosophy
Public Philosophy (2005)
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (1892–1973) British philologist and author, creator of classic fantasy works
No. 247: To Colonel Worskett (20 September 1963)
The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien (1981)
Andrea Dworkin (1946–2005) Feminist writer
Interview in New Statesman & Society (21 April 1995), discussing her books Intercourse and Right Wing Women.
Roger Penrose (1931) English mathematical physicist, recreational mathematician and philosopher
Interview in "Secrets of the Old One" in Berkeley Groks (16 March 2005) http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/%7Efrank/BerkeleyGroks_Penrose.htm. <br class="br">Context: Some years ago, I wrote a book called The Emperor's New Mind and that book was describing a point of view I had about consciousness and why it was not something that comes about from complicated calculations. So we are not exactly computers. There's something else going on and the question of what this something else was would depend on some detailed physics and so I needed chapters in that book, which describes the physics as it is understood today. Well anyway, this book was written and various people commented to me and they said perhaps I could use this book for a course Physics for Poets or whatever it is if it didn't have all that contentious stuff about the mind in that. So I thought, well, that doesn't sound too hard, all I'll do is get out the scissor out and snip out all the bits, which have something to do with the mind. The trouble is that if I did that — and I actually didn't do it — the whole book fell to pieces really because the whole driving force behind the book was this quest to find out what could it be that constitutes consciousness in the physical world as we know it or as we hope to know it in future
Manly P. Hall (1901–1990) Canadian writer and mystic
Source: The Secret Teachings of All Ages (1928), Chapter: Fishes, Insects, Animals, Reptiles and Birds
George Boole (1815–1864) English mathematician, philosopher and logician
Source: 1840s, The Mathematical Analysis of Logic, 1847, p. i: Lead paragraph of the Preface; cited in: R. H. Hutton, " Professor Boole http://books.google.com/books?id=pfMEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA157," (1866), p. 157 <br class="br">Context: In presenting this Work to public notice, I deem it not irrelevant to observe, that speculations similar to those which it records have, at different periods, occupied my thoughts. In the spring of the present year my attention was directed to the question then moved between Sir W. Hamilton and Professor De Morgan; and I was induced by the interest which it inspired, to resume the almost-forgotten thread of former inquiries. It appeared to me that, although Logic might be viewed with reference to the idea of quantity, it had also another and a deeper system of relations. If it was lawful to regard it from without, as connecting itself through the medium of Number with the intuitions of Space and Time, it was lawful also to regard it from within, as based upon facts of another order which have their abode in the constitution of the Mind. The results of this view, and of the inquiries which it suggested, are embodied in the following Treatise.
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
In private this was sometimes cynically admitted. The attitude of the Indian millionaires was similar. Gandhi called upon them to repent, and naturally they preferred him to the Socialists and Communists who, given the chance, would actually have taken their money away. How reliable such calculations are in the long run is doubtful; as Gandhi himself says, "in the end deceivers deceive only themselves"; but at any rate the gentleness with which he was nearly always handled was due partly to the feeling that he was useful.
Reflections on Gandhi (1949)
George Orwell (1903–1950) English author and journalist
Original preface to Animal Farm; as published in George Orwell: Some Materials for a Bibliography (1953) by Ian R. Willison
Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910) Russian writer
What is Art? (1897)
Context: No longer able to believe in the Church religion, whose falsehood they had detected, and incapable of accepting true Christian teaching, which denounced their whole manner of life, these rich and powerful people, stranded without any religious conception of life, involuntarily returned to that pagan view of things which places life's meaning in personal enjoyment. And then among the upper classes what is called the "Renaissance of science and art" took place, which was really not only a denial of every religion, but also an assertion that religion was unnecessary.
“History is almost always written by the victors and conquerors and gives their view.”
Jawaharlal Nehru book The Discovery of India
The Discovery of India (1946), pp. 287-8.
“Fascism was an emergency makeshift. To view it as something more would be a fatal error.”
Ludwig von Mises book Liberalism
Source: Liberalism (1927), Ch. 1 : The Foundations of Liberal Policy § 10 : The Argument of Fascism
Context: Repression by brute force is always a confession of the inability to make use of the better weapons of the intellect — better because they alone give promise of final success. This is the fundamental error from which Fascism suffers and which will ultimately cause its downfall. The victory of Fascism in a number of countries is only an episode in the long series of struggles over the problem of property. The next episode will be the victory of Communism. The ultimate outcome of the struggle, however, will not be decided by arms, but by ideas. It is ideas that group men into fighting factions, that press the weapons into their hands, and that determine against whom and for whom the weapons shall be used. It is they alone, and not arms, that, in the last analysis, turn the scales.
So much for the domestic policy of Fascism. That its foreign policy, based as it is on the avowed principle of force in international relations, cannot fail to give rise to an endless series of wars that must destroy all of modern civilization requires no further discussion. To maintain and further raise our present level of economic development, peace among nations must be assured. But they cannot live together in peace if the basic tenet of the ideology by which they are governed is the belief that one's own nation can secure its place in the community of nations by force alone.
It cannot be denied that Fascism and similar movements aiming at the establishment of dictatorships are full of the best intentions and that their intervention has, for the moment, saved European civilization. The merit that Fascism has thereby won for itself will live on eternally in history. But though its policy has brought salvation for the moment, it is not of the kind which could promise continued success. Fascism was an emergency makeshift. To view it as something more would be a fatal error.
Barbra Streisand (1942) American singer, actress, writer, film producer, and director
Playboy interview (1977), as quoted in No Glass Slipper : Surviving and Conquering Painful Life Experiences (2006), p. 32
Context: To have ego means to believe in your own strength. And to also be open to other people's views. It is to be open, not closed. So, yes, my ego is big, but it's also very small in some areas. My ego is responsible for my doing what I do — bad or good.
Trevor Noah (1984) South African comedian
On how his upbringing informs his comedy in “Life’s Work: An Interview with Trevor Noah” https://hbr.org/2018/09/lifes-work-an-interview-with-trevor-noah in Harvard Business Review (September-October, 2018) <br class="br">Personal life
Joaquin Phoenix (1974) American actor, music video director, producer, musician, and social activist
"Joaquin Phoenix's Oscars speech in full: 'We feel entitled to artificially inseminate a cow and steal her baby'" https://www.theguardian.com/film/2020/feb/10/joaquin-phoenixs-oscars-speech-in-full, The Guardian (February 10, 2020).
Nikita Khrushchev (1894–1971) First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Remark made at Kremlin New Year's Eve reception, December 31, 1956. Quoted in Khrushchev by Edward Crankshaw. ISBN 9781448205059
David Benatar (1966) South African philosopher
Source: The Human Predicament: A Candid Guide to Life's Biggest Questions (2017), Introduction, p. 14
Jiri Lev (1979)
Source: The Australian Architects Offering Pro-Bono Design Services to Bushfire Survivors https://hivelife.com/architects-assist/.
Unknown author
Harper Lee book To Kill a Mockingbird
Variant: You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view - until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.
Source: To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
John O'Donohue (1956–2008) Irish writer, priest and philosopher
Source: Anam Cara: A Book of Celtic Wisdom
Carol Gilligan (1936) American feminist, ethicist, and psychologist
Source: In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women's Development
Vladimir Lenin (1870–1924) Russian politician, led the October Revolution
.
1900s
Context: Everyone is free to write and say whatever he likes, without any restrictions. But every voluntary association (including the party) is also free to expel members who use the name of the party to advocate anti-party views. Freedom of speech and the press must be complete. But then freedom of association must be complete too. I am bound to accord you, in the name of free speech, the full right to shout, lie and write to your heart’s content. But you are bound to grant me, in the name of freedom of association, the right to enter into, or withdraw from, association with people advocating this or that view. The party is a voluntary association, which would inevitably break up, first ideologically and then physically, if it did not cleanse itself of people advocating anti-party views.
Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865) 16th President of the United States
Address Delivered in Candidacy for the State Legislature (9 March 1832)
1830s
Context: Upon the subject of education, not presuming to dictate any plan or system respecting it, I can only say that I view it as the most important subject which we as a people can be engaged in. That every man may receive at least a moderate education, and thereby be enabled to read the histories of his own and other countries, by which he may duly appreciate the value of our free institutions, appears to be an object of vital importance, even on this account alone, to say nothing of the advantages and satisfaction to be derived from all being able to read the Scriptures, and other works both of a religious and moral nature, for themselves.
“The man who views the world at 50 the same as he did at 20 has wasted 30 years of his life.”
Muhammad Ali (1942–2016) African American boxer, philanthropist and activist
Interview in Playboy magazine (November 1975)
“Let us accept truth, even when it surprises us and alters our views.”
George Sand (1804–1876) French novelist and memoirist; pseudonym of Lucile Aurore Dupin
Source: Letters Of George Sand
Cornel West (1953) African-American philosopher and political/civil rights activist
Source: Breaking Bread: Insurgent Black Intellectual Life
“The radical invents the views. When he has worn them out the conservative adopts them.”
Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist
Mark Twain's Notebook (1935)
Mark Twain book The Innocents Abroad
Vol. II, Conclusion http://books.google.com/books?id=f4EwNleAjJAC&q=%22Travel+is+fatal+to+prejudice+bigotry+and+narrow-mindedness+and+many+of+our+people+need+it+sorely+on+these+accounts+Broad+wholesome+charitable+views+of+men+and+things+cannot+be+acquired+by+vegetating+in+one+little+corner+of+the+earth+all+one's+lifetime%22&pg=PA333#v=onepage <br class="br">Source: The Innocents Abroad (1869) <br class="br">Context: Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one's lifetime.
Robinson Jeffers (1887–1962) American poet
"Carmel Point"
Context: Now the spoiler has come: does it care?
Not faintly. It has all time. It knows the people are a tide
That swells and in time will ebb, and all
Their works dissolve. Meanwhile the image of the pristine beauty
Lives in the very grain of the granite,
Safe as the endless ocean that climbs our cliff. — As for us:
We must uncenter our minds from ourselves;
We must unhumanize our views a little, and become confident
As the rock and ocean that we were made from.
“You get a wonderful view from the point of no return.”
Terry Pratchett book Making Money
Source: Making Money
“do not view mountains from the scale of human thought”
Dogen (1200–1253) Japanese Zen buddhist teacher
“Mathematics rightly viewed possesses not only truth but supreme beauty.”
Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist
1900s, "The Study of Mathematics" (November 1907)
Context: Mathematics, rightly viewed, possesses not only truth, but supreme beauty – a beauty cold and austere, like that of sculpture, without appeal to any part of our weaker nature, without the gorgeous trappings of painting or music, yet sublimely pure, and capable of a stern perfection such as only the greatest art can show. The true spirit of delight, the exaltation, the sense of being more than Man, which is the touchstone of highest excellence, is to be found in mathematics as surely as in poetry. What is best in mathematics deserves not merely to be learnt as a task, but to be assimilated as a part of daily thought, and brought again and again before the mind with ever-renewed encouragement.
Ben Carson book Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story
Source: Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story
Source: Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story (1990), p. 232