Our lifestyle is evolutionarily unstable--and is therefore in the process of eliminating itself in the perfectly ordinary way. Daniel Quinn More Quotes by Daniel Quinn More Quotes From Daniel Quinn But why? Why do you need prophets to tell you how you ought to live? Why do you need anyone to tell you how you ought to live Daniel Quinn prophetoughtneeds [I]n Africa I was a member of a family—of a sort of family that the people of your culture haven't known for thousands of years. If gorillas were capable of such an expression, they would tell you that their family is like a hand, of which they are the fingers. They are fully aware of being a family but are very little aware of being individuals. Here in the zoo there were other gorillas—but there was no family. Five severed fingers do not make a hand. Daniel Quinn expressionzooshands Many of the biggest and most far-reaching investments we make in our lives are investments that have little or nothing to do with money. Daniel Quinn investingmoneylittles Blessed are those who do whatever they can wherever they are, for no one is devoid of resources or opportunities. Daniel Quinn blessed-are-thoseblessedopportunity 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. Daniel Quinn issuesmeanworld With man gone, will there be hope for gorilla? Daniel Quinn gorillasgonemen Most beginning writers - and I was the same - are like chefs trying to cook great dishes that they've never tasted themselves. How can you make a great - or even an adequate - bouillabaisse if you've never had any? If you don't really understand why people read mysteries - or romances or literary novels or thrillers or whatever - then there's no way in the world you're going to write one that anyone wants to publish. This is the meaning of the well-known expression "Write what you know." Daniel Quinn expressionwritingpeople May the forests be with you and with your children. Daniel Quinn mayforestschildren During your lifetime, the people of our culture are going to figure out how to live sustainably on this planet--or they're not. Either way, it's certainly going to be extraordinary. If they figure out how to live sustainably here, then hum anity will be able to see something it can't see right now: a future that extends into the indefinite future. If they don't figure this out, then I'm afraid the human race is going to take its place among the species that we're driving into extinction here every day--as many as 200--every day Daniel Quinn raceculturepeople We need schools to force kids to learn things they have no use for. Daniel Quinn kidsschoolneeds If the world is saved, it will not be by old minds with new programs but by new minds with no programs at all. Why not new minds with new programs? Because where you find people working on programs, you don't find new minds, you find old ones. Programs and old minds go together like buggy whips and buggies. Daniel Quinn mindtogetherpeople 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. Daniel Quinn errorstrialscivilization ....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. Daniel Quinn windbeachway 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. Daniel Quinn prisonraceworld If you alone found out what the lie was, then you're probably right—it would make no great difference. But if you ALL found out what the lie was, it might conceivably make a very great difference indeed. Daniel Quinn differencesmightlying [T]he price you've paid is not the price of becoming human. It's not even the price of having the things you just mentioned. It's the price of enacting a story that casts mankind as the enemy of the world. Daniel Quinn storiesenemyworld If Mother Culture were to give an account of human history using these terms, it would go something like this: ' The Leavers were chapter one of human history -- a long and uneventful chapter. Their chapter of human history ended about ten thousand years ago with the birth of agriculture in the Near East. This event marked the beginning of chapter two, the chapter of the Takers. It's true there are still Leavers living in the world, but these are anachronisms, fossils -- people living in the past, people who just don't realize that their chapter of human history is over. ' Daniel Quinn mothertwopast five severed fingers do not make a hand Daniel Quinn ishmaelgorillashands Animists are not so much people with a religion as people with a fundamentally religious way of looking at things. Daniel Quinn religiouspeopleway Children don't need learning. They need access to what they want to learn outside the home. Daniel Quinn homechildrenneeds
