Noam Chomsky Quotes

Sometimes, I believe I actually see the wheels in my brain turning.

Everything I think is in pictures.

By using your intelligence, you can sometimes make your problems twice as complicated.

Yes and no are soon said, but give much to think over.

For imagination sets the goal picture which our automatic mechanism works on. We act, or fail to act, not because of will, as is so commonly believed, but because of imagination.

People seem to have trouble with the imagination. They can't believe that you can just pull things out of your brain like that.

Every decision you make in life, not just on the sporting field - a lot of time and energy goes into it. You think things through before you make decisions and you always think the decision you make at the time is going to be the right one.

Man does not speak because he thinks; he thinks because he speaks. Or rather, speaking is no different than thinking: to speak is to think.

The final upshot of thinking is the exercise of volition, and of this thought no longer forms a part; but belief is only a stadium of mental action, an effect upon our nature due to thought, which will influence future thinking.

I very rarely think in words at all. A thought comes, and I may try to express it in words afterwards.

My mind sort of works like a search engine. You ask me something, and I start seeing pictures.

The soul never thinks without a picture.

Language for me narrates the pictures in my mind.

All action results from thought, so it is thoughts that matter.

I wonder how many decisions we make every day. I believe it's probably hundreds. We decide whether or not to get out of bed, what we'll eat, what we'll do, what we'll think about, what we'll say... and on and on.

I don't think there is such a thing as an idea without words, because your language is your thought.

I only think in live action.

WHAT a person thinks is determined by HOW a person thinks.

Thinking isn't something you think about. It comes naturally. Thinking involves many things. It involves being an observer. It involves analyzing things, taking in what's around you in the world and finding how to make it inspire your work or turn it into a lesson to teach your children; it's paying attention to details. That's what thinking is: processing.

The thought is not something that observes an inner event, but, rather it is this inner event itself. We do not reflect on something, but, rather, something thinks itself in us.

You only have control over three things in your life-the thoughts you think, the images you visualise, & the actions you take.

It doesn't matter how smart you are unless you stop and think.

Thought is a process of exaggeration. The refusal to exaggerate is not infrequently an alibi for the disinclination to think or praise.

If I can't picture it, I can't understand it.

You think, you don't just speak. The lines come off the thoughts.