Quotes About Society

Fundamental to the Scottish notion of history is the idea of progress. The Scots argued that societies, like individuals, grow and improve over time. They acquire new skills, new attitudes, and a new understanding of what individuals can do and what they should be free to do. The Scots would teach the world that one of the crucial ways we measure progress is by how far we have come from what we were before. The present judges the past, not the other way around.

Diogenes's goal, he said, was "to deface the coinage," meaning strip away the false conventions on which society was built and expose the raw reality underneath.

The law is a means to an end—and what that end is depends on human desires and needs.

The law is a means to an end—and what that end is depends on human desires and needs. But somewhere, some basic principles have to stick.

The natural effort of every individual to better his own condition . . . is so powerful a principle, that it is alone, and without any assistance, not only capable of carrying on the society to wealth and prosperity, but of surmounting a hundred impertinent obstructions with which the folly of human laws too often incumbers its operations.

Proper government is not a restraint on our natural liberty, as Hobbes and others thought. It is a net increase, since it provides a framework of security in which we can enjoy our civil liberties in ways not possible in the state of nature. It "is the one great reason of men putting themselves into Society, and quitting the State of Nature.

the duty of the sovereign to respect that liberty: and when he doesn't, when "he that in a State of Society would take away the Freedom that belongs to those of that Society," and pretends to be our master rather than our servant, then it is he, not us, who is the real rebel against society.

Spartan citizens were not allowed to use money, practice a trade, make a statue, or write a poem.

German critics like Paul de Lagarde said that the individual produced entirely by society's manners lacked depth; Nietzsche called him an emotional cripple.

with lawlessness freedom is inconsistent

In civilized society [a person] stands at all times in need of the cooperation and assistance of great multitudes," Smith wrote, "while his whole life is scarce sufficient to gain the friendship of a few persons.

If co-operation, is thus the lifeblood of science and technology, it is similarly vital to society as a whole.

We ought to change the legend on our money from "In God We Trust" to "In Money We Trust." Because, as a nation, we've got far more faith in money these days than we do in God.

In Holland vergeleek men hoeren met paarden.

Heus, kuisheid is alleen iets voor de laagste klasse. [...] Ik ben nog nooit aan een hof geweest waar ze met de kuisheid erg nauw waren.

Civilizations do not then "fall"—they are merely replaced by another culture, which is the product of the new population.

Herein lies the key to understanding the rise and fall of all civilizations. In any given territory, the people making up the society in that territory create a culture which is unique to themselves.

Amerind civilization, for all practical purposes, disappeared. The Amerind civilization in North America "fell" because the population of North America changed.

The Yogi and the Commissar

Without alienation, there can be no politics.

Nobody dast blame this man. For a salesman, there is no rock bottom to the life. He don't put a bolt to a nut, he don't tell you the law or give you medicine. He's a man way out there in the blue, riding on a smile and a shoeshine. And when they start not smiling back -- that's an earthquake. And then you get yourself a couple of spots on your hat, and you're finished. Nobody dast blame this man. A salesman is got to dream, boy. It comes with the territory.

In the dark jaws, where all things tumble, where societies crumble and old men stumble, love is the air we breathe, the earth we walk on, the economy we function in. It's not a passion or a fixation or a desire or a guilt. Love should have been a conduct, a process of life, an axiom, a grandeur we evolve...Its connective nature, its transferal powers, make utter sense.

Human kinship systems vary enormously but not limitlessly. There are always rules prohibiting sex (and hence marriage) with certain kinds of kin.

But music is, at the very minimum, inflammatory, exclusionary, divisive, encouraging of snobbery and solipsism.