Norman O. Brown Quotes

The world has always gone through periods of madness so as to advance a bit on the road to reason.

If I hadn't been an actress, I was thinking seriously about going into psychology. It's just really what I'm interested in: the human psyche and how we process information.

While the overall goal of any society must be to educate all its members, at this stage in human history the greatest need is to educate women and girls. For over twenty years, studies have consistently documented that, of all possible investments, educating women and girls pays the highest overall dividends in terms of social development, the eradication of poverty and the advancement of community.

It has taken us centuries of thought and mockery to shake the medieval system. -- With this in view I have taken as impulses, instincts, or needs certain driving forces in the human species as we know it at present, and argued for such social and economic changes as will give them new, free, and varied expression. To take even this first step towards a happy society is a herculean task. After it has been accomplished, generations to come will see what the creature [us] will do next. We none of us know; and we should be thoroughly on our guard against all those who pretend that they do

Sexuality is the key to the problem of the psychoneuroses and of the neuroses in general. No one who disdains the key will ever be able to unlock the door.

Religion (is) a universal obsessional neurosis.

When I'm saying hysteria, I'm referring to Freud, because all the women were coming to him with symptoms and seeking help, and he just called it hysteria.

Sigmund Freud was the apostle of disbelief. He was the one who made psychoanalysis a part of our culture, and in so doing he kicked out a flying buttress that had been essential for holding up our cathedral of faith.

A technical survey that systematize, digest, and appraise the mid century state of psychology.

Psychoanalysis is the confession without absolution.

The psychoanalysis of neurotics has taught us to recognize the intimate connection between wetting the bed and the character trait of ambition.

I read Freud's Introductory Lectures in Psychoanalysis in basically one sitting. I decided to enroll in medical school. It was almost like a conversion experience.

Freud said that we are born as a tabula rasa. This is a model that simply is too superficial and inadequate.

I've never gone into analysis. But Freud opened a door, I know.

Governments never learn. Only people learn.

Human history in essence is the history of ideas.

We all know from a study of history the progress of the working people from the stage of barbarism to that of slavery, serfdom and later individual freedom... .

The history of the world demonstrates that man becomes what we call civilized by increasing his wants.

History is a record of the gradual negation of man’s original bestiality by the evolution of his humanity.

I'm somebody who's super into psychology and analysis and the human psyche and the human experience.

Don't talk to me about Freud. I'll go up the wall!

I have studied Freud and that kind of thing. I just never thought I would need it.

Religion is comparable to a childhood neurosis.

Psychoanalysis is a science conducted by lunatics for lunatics. They are generally concerned with proving that people are irresponsible; and they certainly succeed in proving that some people are

In so doing, the idea forces itself upon him that religion is comparable to a childhood neurosis, and he is optimistic enough to suppose that mankind will surmount this neurotic phase, just as so many children grow out of their similar neurosis.