43 Human behavior Quotes

In a world where God does not exist, any reasonable person must see that the propensity toward selfishness should be the most venerated of all human traits. From this it stands to reason that any man, knowing the total expanse of his existence to be finite, who does not devote every moment of his life to acts of pure selfishness, must be seen as nothing more than a fool.

Why do people build houses to keep the climate out, then cut holes in the walls to let it in again? I shall never understand.

If you convey to a woman that something ought to be done, there is always a dreadful danger that she will suddenly do it.

Zoocentrism is the primary fallacy of human sociobiology, for this view of human behavior rests on the argument that if the actions of 'lower' animals with simple nervous systems arise as genetic products of natural selection, then human behavior should have a similar basis.

A man who's active and incisive can yet keep nail-care much in mind: why fight what's known to be decisive? custom is despot of mankind.

He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it - namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to obtain.

We become what we behold. We shape our tools and then our tools shape us (1964)

Lord, I wonder what fool it was that first invented kissing!

Curiosite n'est que vanite. Le plus souvent, on ne veut savoir que pour en parler. (152)

Les hommes se gouvernent plus par caprice que par raison.

For May wol have no slogardie a-night. The seson priketh every gentil herte, And maketh him out of his slepe to sterte.

I told him...that we ate when we were not hungry, and drank without the provocation of thirst.

Whether God is dead or not hardly matters, for we would use him no differently anyway.

The fact that men are naturally quarrelsome is presumed to be an argument against such institutions as the League. But it is precisely the fact of the natural pugnacity of man that makes such institutions necessary. If men were naturally and easily capable of being their own judges, always able to see the other's case, never got into panics, never lost their heads, never lost their tempers and called it patriotism - why, then we should not want a League. But neither should we want in that case most of our national apparatus of government either - parliaments, congresses, courts, police, ten commandments. These are all means by which we deal with the unruly element in human nature.

[after attending a John Maynard Keynes seminar, he] suddenly realized that Keynes and all the brilliant economics students in the room were interested in the behavior of commodities while I was interested in the behavior of people.

All my life, which has now lasted something under one hundred years, I have observed managers in action: in government, in universities, , and in industry, and I have puzzled over what made them tick. I am far form the end of that puzzle, for no man can ever fully understand another, even a close friend. But can we probe a bit toward the essence of the good, the great, managers.

Polly says her back hurts And she's just as bored as me She caught me off my guard Amazes me, the will of instinct.

people ruthless, people cruel see the damage that some people do full of hatred, full of pride it's enough to make you lose your mind

[He] smiled at once, his most winning and charming smile, and it worked as it always worked, suggesting as it did a sort of self-effacing humility, a believable protests of innocence, and a promise of friendship - whatever good thing the other person wish to read into it

He had discovered a great law of human action, without knowing it - namely, that in order to make a man or a boy covet a thing, it is only necessary to make the thing difficult to obtain.

It is wonderful, the power of a faith like that, that can make multitudes upon multitudes of the old and weak and the young and frail enter without hesitation or complaint upon such incredible journeys and endure the resultant miseries without repining. It is done in love, or it is done in fear; I do not know which it is. No matter what the impulse is, the act born of it is beyond imagination marvelous to our kind of people, the cold whites.

Of all the animals, man is the only one that is cruel. He is the only one that inflicts pain for the pleasure of doing it.

Adults must remember that they look like insane giants to children.

Eichmann is thirty-four or thirty-five years old, a very active, adventurous man. He felt that this act against Jews was necessary and was fully convinced of its necessity and correctness, as I was.

Two things in America are astonishing: the changeableness of most human behavior and the strange stability of certain principles. Men are constantly on the move, but the spirit of humanity seems almost unmoved.

A man's face as a rule says more, and more interesting things, than his mouth, for it is a compendium of everything his mouth will ever say, in that it is the monogram of all this man's thoughts and aspirations.

I seek through comprehensive anticipatory design science and its reductions to physical practices to reform the environment instead of trying to reform humans, being intent thereby to accomplish prototyped capabilities of doing more with less... (1947)

Madness is the exception in individuals but the rule in groups.

Men go to a fire for entertainment. When I see how eagerly men will run to a fire, whether in warm or in cold weather, by day or by night, dragging an engine at their heels, I'm astonished to perceive how good a purpose the level of excitement is made to serve.

When widows exclaim loudly against second marriages, I would always lay a wager that the man, if not the wedding day, is absolutely fixed on.

People have their reasons for giving rides, all of them different. Maybe they hitched a lot when they were younger and now they're settled and comfortable they want to put back what they took out. Like a circular thing. Maybe they have charitable natures. Or maybe they're just lonely and want a little conversation.

The watchdog's voice that bayed the whispering wind, And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind.

People are very fond of giving away what they need most themselves.

They wanted to have a good time, but they were like children playing in the street; they could see one after another of them being killed--run over, maimed, destroyed--but they continued to play anyhow.

Money is the sincerest of all flattery. Women love to be flattered. So do men.