Daniel Quinn Quotes

There's nothing fundamentally wrong with people. Given a story to enact that puts them in accord with the world, they will live in accord with the world. But given a story to enact that puts them at odds with the world, as yours does, they will live at odds with the world. Given a story to enact in which they are the lords of the world, they will ACT like lords of the world. And, given a story to enact in which the world is a foe to be conquered, they will conquer it like a foe, and one day, inevitably, their foe will lie bleeding to death at their feet, as the world is now.

The world doesn't belong to us, we belong to it. Always have, always will. We belong to the world. We belong to the community of life on this planet--it doesn't belong to us. We got confused about that, now it's time to set the record straight

There is no one right way to live.

Blessed are those who do whatever they can wherever they are, for no one is devoid of resources or opportunities.

five severed fingers do not make a hand

What's normal is for things to work. What's not normal is for things to fail.

The obvious can sometimes be illuminating when perceived in an unhabitual way.

Everyone in your culture knows this. Man was born to turn the world into paradise, but tragically he was born flawed. And so his paradise has always been spoiled by stupidty, greed, destructiveness, and shortsightedness.

Children don't need learning. They need access to what they want to learn outside the home.

Yes,I'm afraid you're right. Trial and error isn't a bad way to learn how to build an aircraft,but it can be a disastrous way to learn how to build a civilization.

The sign stopped me-- or rather, this text stopped me. Words are my profession; I seized these and demanded that they explain themselves, that they cease to be ambiguous.

People will listen when they're ready to listen and not before. Don't waste time with people who want to argue. They'll keep you immobilized forever. Look for people who are already open to something new.

....he began to speak to me, not in the jocular way of visitors to the menagerie but rather as one speaks to the wind or to the waves crashing on a beach, uttering that which must be said but which must not be heard by anyone.

Animism is not a belief system, but a worldview: The world is a sacred place and we are part of it. The factuality of this statement is not the issue. To say that the world is a sacred place is to make a statement about values, not facts. It’s a statement about what you mean by ‘sacred,’ just as ‘Money can’t buy happiness’ is a statement about what you mean by ‘happiness.’ To put it all very simply, animism isn’t a belief system, it’s a value system.

You never actually know how you're going to handle a problem until you actually have it.

Diversity is a survival factor for the community itself. A community of a hundred million species can survive anything short of total global catastrophe. Within that hundred million will be thousands that could survive a global temperature drop of twenty degrees—which would be a lot more devastating than it sounds. Within that hundred million will be thousands that could survive a global temperature rise of twenty degrees. But a community of a hundred species or a thousand species has almost no survival value at all.

You shouldn't have to settle for rabbits if what you want is deer

I hope it will not be too long before the technologies that support our population explosion begin to be perceived as no less hazardous to the future of life on this planet than the endless production of radioactive wastes.

Man's destiny was to conquer and rule the world, and this is what he's done.. almost. He hasn't quite made it, and it looks as though this may be his undoing. The problem is that man's conquest of the world has itself devastated the world. And in spite of all the mastery we've attained, we don't have enough mastery to stop devastating the world.. or to repair the devastation we've already wrought.

There are times when having too much to say can be as dumbfounding as having too little.

That evening I went for a walk. To walk for the sake of walking is something I seldom do. Inside my apartment I'd felt inexplicably anxious. I needed to talk to someone. to be reassured or perhaps I needed to confess my sin: I was once again having impure thoughts about saving the world. Or it was neither of these - I was afraid I was dreaming.

It's the idea that people living close to nature tend to be noble. It's seeing all those sunsets that does it. You can't watch a sunset and then go off and set fire to your neighbor's tepee. Living close to nature is wonderful for your mental health.

May the forests be with you and with your children.

If the world was made for us, then it BELONGS to us and we can do what we damn well please with it.

The world is not going to survive very much longer as humanity's captive.

And in spite of all the mastery we've attained, we don't have enough mastery to stop devastating the world, or to repair the devastation we've already wrought.

I have amazing news for you. Man is not alone on this planet. He is part of a community, upon which he depends absolutely.

The world of the Takers is one vast prison, and except for a handful of Leavers scattered across the world, the entire human race is now inside that prison.

Don't wait. Where do you expect to get by waiting? Doing is what teaches you. Doing is what leads to inspiration. Doing is what generates ideas. Nothing else, and nothing less.

We've poured our poisons into the world as though it were a bottomless pit.. and we go on gobbling them up. It's hard to imagine how the world could survive another century of this abuse, but nobody's really doing anything about it. It's a problem our children will have to solve, or their children.