Quotes About Behavior

Yes,' growled Fell, 'for animals do not know what they do, but man has knowledge of his cruelty.

It follows that humans, people and knowledge are not only objectively significant: they are by far the most significant phenomena in nature – the only ones whose behaviour cannot be understood without understanding everything of fundamental importance.

Using our explanations, we 'see' right through the behaviour to the meaning. Parrots copy distinctive sounds; apes copy purposeful movements of a certain limited class. But humans do not especially copy any behaviour. They use conjecture, criticism and experiment to create good explanations of the meaning of things – other people's behaviour, their own, and that of the world in general. That

The reason why higher-level subjects can be studied at all is that under special circumstances the stupendously complex behaviour of vast numbers of particles resolves itself into a measure of simplicity and comprehensibility. This is called emergence: high-level simplicity 'emerges' from low-level complexity.

Logic wasn't the governing factor here. It rarely is in human affairs.

When we see ourselves and our world defined by stereotypical expectations, the very nature of our engagement alters. And our susceptibility to this transformation of behavior may diminish our capacity to appreciate important nuance in our surroundings. In a world where we're looking for 'familiar' or 'similar' through favorable lenses and seeing 'unfamiliar' as somehow lesser, we are at risk of being blind to the self-evident.

Would you rather have people be helpful or not? It turns out that having little nice things happen to them is a much better way of making them helpful than spending a huge amount of energy on improving their characters."5

Tolerance isn't just a discourse of power, it is also a discourse of conditionality; that is to say, you will be tolerated unless and until you behave in certain ways, at which point I will no longer tolerate you.

elle était terriblement jalouse. Elle savait que c'était absurde, mais elle n'arrivait pas à se maîtriser, à avoir un comportement rationnel.

La necesidad de estar solo se considera a veces como un comportamiento antisocial.

The presence of anger does not mean the absence of love—particularly in God. Love is God's character, not simply an emotion. What a small god we would have if divine character was dependent on our behavior. The Christian God is not like this. The Christian God is slow to anger and rich in mercy (see Exodus 34:6, echoed in Joel 2:13 and many other places in Scripture).

The Father's love reflects the Father's character, not the children's behavior. My behavior—whether responsible or irresponsible—is beside the point. Responsible behavior does not increase the Father's love, nor does irresponsible behavior decrease it.

Until we are willing to accept the unpleasant truths of our existence, we rationalize or deny responsibility for our behavior.

Those who surrender obey. But not all who obey surrender. It is quite easy to obey God for the wrong reasons. What God desires is submission of our heart and will, not simply compliance in our behavior.

The Father's love reflects the Father's character, not the children's behavior.

Act happy. We can sometimes act ourselves into a frame of mind. Manipulated into a smiling expression, people feel better; when they scowl, the whole world seems to scowl back. So put on a happy face. Talk as if you feel positive self-esteem, are optimistic, and are outgoing. Going through the motions can trigger the emotions.

If depression, loneliness, and social anxiety maintain themselves through a vicious circle of negative experiences, negative thinking, and self-defeating behavior, it should be possible to break the circle at any of several points—by changing the environment, by training the person to behave more constructively, or by reversing negative thinking. And it is. Several therapy methods help free people from depression's vicious circle.

Through social "contagion," groups magnify aggressive tendencies, much as they polarize other tendencies. Examples are youth gangs, soccer fans, rapacious soldiers, urban rioters, and what Scandinavians call "mobbing"— schoolchildren in groups repeatedly harassing or attacking an insecure, weak schoolmate (Lagerspetz & others, 1982). Mobbing is a group activity.

The gambling impulse even predates humanity: A variety of animals, from bees to primates, embrace risk for a chance at reward. A 2005 Duke University study found that macaque monkeys preferred to follow a "riskier" target, which gave them varying amounts of juice, over a "safe" one, which always gave the same—they just like gambling.

One of the reasons people steer clear of environmentalism is all the guilt associated with it. The creepy feeling that by doing what everyone else in one's society is doing - driving, washing the dishes, catching a flight - we are bringing about the end of the world.

Shy adults are paradoxically drawn to outgoing people, whose animated body language they find highly attractive.

I am well known by my friends to be a workaholic - to their often justifiable annoyance. I am therefore keenly aware that such behavior is at best slightly pathological, and certainly in no sense makes one a better person.

A fact-finding commission is a way of telling the public that the government is doing something it is not. But a large corporations will behave exactly the same way, if, say, there are revealed to be employing slaves or child laborers in their garment factories or dumping toxic waste.

When you ask someone to pass the salt, you are also giving them an order; by attaching the word "please", you are saying that it is not an order. But, in fact, it is.