It seems self-evident that we should want people to be free, to be able to play an active part in making decisions about matters of concern to them, to the largest possible extent.

Students who acquire large debts putting themselves through school are unlikely to think about changing society. When you trap people in a system of debt, they can't afford the time to think.

The general population doesn't know what's happening, and it doesn't even know that it doesn't know.

That's the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don't work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital.

Jingoism, racism, fear, religious fundamentalism: these are the ways of appealing to people if you're trying to organize a mass base of support for policies that are really intended to crush them.

There's a good reason why nobody studies history, it just teaches you too much.

The world is a very puzzling place. If you're not willing to be puzzled, you just become a replica of someone else's mind.

Democratic societies can't force people. Therefore they have to control what they think.

Nobody should have any illusions. The United States has essentially a one-party system and the ruling party is the business party.

If you want to control a population... give them a God to worship.

A language is not just words. It's a culture, a tradition, a unification of a community, a whole history that creates what a community is. It's all embodied in a language.

Don't blow off another's candle for it won't make yours shine brighter.

Believing is not thinking something is true, Shireen. It is acting for the truth.

...not all encounters with the world affect the mind equally. Studies have demonstrated that if the brain appraises an event as "meaningful, " it will be more likely to be recalled in the future.

Trust is tough since it involves that quixotic mix of integrity, vulnerability, and intimacy. But trust anyway.

in all the years we spend together, I never once regretted the fact that I had chosen her and that she had chosen me as well.

One does not have to stand again the gale. One yields and becomes part of the wind.

If you think this is weird, just look at yourselves.

If man thinks about his physical or moral state he usually discovers that he is ill.

I’m not interested in being polite. It’s false.

There's no question that many factors contribute to voters' perceptions about debates and who wins and who loses.