An inability to communicate has little to do with international friction-as is seen in the special ferocity of wars fought between people who speak the same language.

Food to a large extent is what holds a society together, and eating is closely linked to deep spiritual experiences.

A complex society is not necessarily more advanced than a simple one; it has just adapted to conditions in a more complicated way.

Gestures and facial expressions do indeed communicate, as anyone can prove by turning off the sound on a television set and asking watchers to characterize the speakers from the picture alone.

The environment does not determine man's culture; it merely sets the outer limits and at the same time offers opportunities.

Despite the theories traditionally taught in high-school social studies, the truth is: the more primitive the society, the more leisured its way of life.

An invention or new combination can be successful only if all if the elements necessary for the recombination are present in the culture.

No child is capable of speech until he has heard other human beings speak, and even two infants reared together cannot develop a language from scratch.

People who speak the same language can hate one another as easily as can people who speak unrelated languages.

In place of science, the Eskimo has only magic to bridge the gap between what he can understand and what is not known. Without magic, his life would be one long panic.

Language does not stand still. Surprisingly, despite this knowledge, most speakers are fearful of change.

The quality of our lives lives, depends on the quality of our thoughts.

It took a pair of ghosts to open my eyes.

I should like to bring a case to trial: Prosperity versus Beauty, Cash registers teetering in a balance against the comfort of the soul.

Men can be a great deal of work for very little reward.

We can see that the complexity we witness inside the African-American community today has always been there. Black people were just as noble and just as ignoble as anybody else.

By bringing the past into the present, we create a future just like the past. By letting the past go, we make room for miracles.

I have an enormous fondness for delicious food. It's very comforting

I think that the discovery of antimatter was perhaps the biggest jump of all the big jumps in physics in our century.

When I begin to eliminate from the list all those professions which are impossible from a financial point of view and then those which I feel disinclined to-it leaves nothing

Can one desire too much of a good thing?