Scientists do not believe in fundamental and absolute certainties. For the scientist, certainty is never an end, but a search; not the ordering of certainty, but its exploration. For the scientist, certainty represents the highest degree of probability.
Ashley MontaguIn Victorian times the purpose of life was to develop a personality once and for all and then stand on it.
Ashley MontaguYou certainly can't tell anything from the microscopic structure of the brain whether the person was an idiot or a genius.
Ashley MontaguHuman communication, 'as the saying goes, is a clash of symbols' it covers a multitude of signs. But it is more than media and messages, information and persuasion; it also meets a deeper need and serves a higher purpose. Whether clear or garbled, tumultuous or silent, deliberate or fatally inadvertent, communication is the ground of meeting and the foundation of community. It is, in short, the essential human connection.
Ashley MontaguToday, while the titular head of the family may still be the father, everyone knows that he is little more than chairman, at most, of the entertainment committee.
Ashley MontaguThe indifference, callousness and contempt that so many people exhibit toward animals is evil first because it results in great suffering in animals, and second because it results in an incalculably great impoverishment of the human spirit. All education should be directed toward the refinement of the individual's sensibilities in relation not only to one's fellow humans everywhere, but to all things whatsoever.
Ashley Montagu