The 31 best sentences of Noam Chomsky
A multidisciplinary thinker, committed and critical of the system. This is how you can define Noam Chomsky (United States, 1928) , a veteran psycholinguist and political activist who is one of the most applauded figures of contemporary thought.
- Here you can read the biography of Noam Chomsky
Chomsky, born in East Oak Lane, Pennsylvania, has directed his academic career in several lines. Perhaps the best known are his role as a researcher and psycholinguist, in addition to his staunch political activism as an advocate of anarcho-syndicalism.
As an academic, he formulated his theory of language development. As an activist, he published (and continues to publish) valuable works in which he analyzes the impact of US imperialism on international geopolitics, as well as being one of the most renowned discourse analysts.
Phrases by Noam Chomsky to understand his political thought
This versatility in the issues addressed by Chomsky has aroused admiration and distrust in equal parts . He is criticized for his permanent disagreement with US foreign policy. However, few question that Noam Chomsky is one of the most brilliant and neat thinkers of the XX and XXI century.
In this article we will know your best quotes and famous quotes.
1. Case after case, we see that conformity is the easy way, and the way to privilege and prestige; dissent, however, brings personal costs.
His political activism has brought him strong detractors.
2. The people honored in the Bible were the false prophets. Those whom we call the prophets were those who were imprisoned and sent to the desert.
A reflection by Noam Chomsky about one of the fundamental pillars on which the Catholic Church bases its doctrine.
3. If you assume that there is no hope, then you guarantee that there will be no hope. If you assume that there is an instinct for freedom, then there are opportunities to change things.
A phrase of Chomsky that remembers that of the great Eduardo Galeano.
4. People pay for their own subordination.
Accepting a precarious job or paying thousands of euros for a postgraduate degree are signs of living in a society of grateful slaves.
5. The basic idea that goes through modern history and modern liberalism is that the public must be marginalized. The general public is seen no more than as ignorant excluded people who interfere, like disoriented cattle.
Western democracy suffers from a true sense of handing over the power of decisions to the people.
6. When you have the opportunity to take a look at the file they keep on you at the FBI, it is when you discover that the intelligence agencies in general are extremely incompetent.
Apparently, Chomsky had access to his own secret report and what he saw seemed pretty ridiculous.
7. The intellectual tradition is one of servility toward power, and if I did not betray it I would be ashamed of myself.
Ethics in the academic world is usually not very present, and Chomsky says so.
8. Freedom without opportunities is a devilish gift and refusing to give those opportunities is criminal.
An indirect criticism of economic liberalism.
9. Who are the guardians of the story? The historians, of course. The educated classes, in general. Part of his job is to shape our vision of the past in a way that sustains the interests of the present power. If they do not do so, they will probably be marginalized in one way or another.
Another reflection about power relations in today's society.
10. We should not be looking for heroes, we should be looking for good ideas.
Ideas and creativity over individualism and personalism.
11. What financial capital basically wants is stable currency, not growth.
A thought that challenges the financial system.
12. Companies are simply as totalitarian as Bolshevism or fascism. They have the same intellectual roots of the early twentieth century. Therefore, like other forms of totalitarianism had to disappear, the same has to happen with private tyrannies. They have to be put under public control.
The private company and its vertical hierarchy have their days numbered, according to the reflection of the thinker and activist.
13. The principles are clear and explicit. The free market is good for the third world and its growing counterpart in our country. Mothers with dependent children can be strongly instructed about the need for self-sufficiency, but not for executives and dependent investors, please. For them, the welfare state must flourish.
Another famous quote by Chomsky that reviews the status quo in contemporary capitalism.
14. Sports play a societal role in the procreation of patriotic and chauvinist attitudes.They are destined to organize a community that is committed to their gladiators.
The hooligan phenomenon can be a powerful weapon of the neoliberal system.
15. If we do not believe in freedom of expression for the people we despise, we do not believe in it at all.
Does freedom of expression have limits?
16. Propaganda is to a democracy what coercion to a totalitarian state.
A parallel that can make us reflect on the supposed free society in which we live.
17. If you do not develop a constant and living democratic culture, capable of involving candidates, they will not do the things for which you voted for them. Pressing a button and then going home is not going to change things.
Another reflection on politics and democratic culture.
18. Rights are not granted, they are conquered.
Democracy was not delivered by the guarantors of the dictatorship.
19. Part of the reason why capitalism seems to succeed is that it has always had a lot of slave labor, half of the population. What women do-outside the workplace-does not count at all.
Feminism and social criticism, two key elements in the work of Noam Chomsky.
20. The critique of "democracy" among anarchists has often been the critique of parliamentary democracy, as it has arisen in societies with deeply repressive features.
Anarchism and its vision on public life.
21. You can not have a democracy that works without what sociologists call "secondary organizations", places where people can meet, plan, talk and develop ideas.
The meeting places for the people are fundamental to gestate changes on a large scale.
22. The purpose of the mass media ... is not so much to inform and report what happens, but rather to shape public opinion according to the agendas of the dominant corporate power.
The media and its disastrous influence on the opinions of the uninformed population.
23. Who are the guardians of history?
A rhetorical phrase that refers to the ruling classes.
24. The United States is unusual among industrial democracies in terms of the rigidity of the system of ideological control, indoctrination, we might say, exercised through the mass media.
Another thought that delves into the manipulation exercised by the mass media.
Famous quotes about education and learning
Since Chomsky developed much of his intellectual career as a psycholinguist and philosopher of education It is also interesting to echo several of his phrases and quotes that deal with this topic.
25. The purpose of education is to show people how to learn for themselves. The other concept of education is indoctrination.
A clear phrase that tells us what should be the way forward in education.
26. Education has a value in itself, regardless of the economic impact it produces in society.
A reflection against the excessive economism with which the educational system is organized at present.
27. Do we want to have a society of free, creative and independent individuals, capable of appreciating and learning from the cultural achievements of the past and contributing to them, or do we want people to increase GDP? It is not necessarily the same.
In the same line as the previous one.
28. If you do not know what you are looking for, if you do not have an idea of what is relevant, willing to question this idea, if you do not have that, exploring on the internet is only taking randomly unverifiable facts that do not mean anything .
Internet can be very useful, but we must have enough criteria to know where to navigate.
29. Internet is like any other technology, basically neutral, you can use it in constructive or harmful ways. The constructive forms are real, but very few.
Famous quote that, like the previous one, questions the use we give to the network of networks.
30. In the common problems of human life, science tells us very little, and scientists, as people, are certainly no guide. In fact, they are often the worst guide, as they often tend to concentrate, like a laser, on their own professional interests, and know very little about the world.
An essential difference between the scientist and the freethinker.
31. Science is an exploration of very difficult questions. Without underestimating the theory of evolution, that's a tremendous intellectual advance, but it does not tell you anything about whether or not there are what people believe when they talk about God. He does not even talk about that topic.
Religion is another of the subjects of study of the Jewish intellectual.
