Jacques Barzun Quotes

The one thing that robots really find difficult to do is to look someone in the eye and have a sense of how they're feeling. We should be teaching that in schools.

I think there's a worry that an excessive use or an almost exclusive use of text and emails means that as a society we're losing some of the ability to build interpersonal communication that's necessary for living together and building a community.

I think if you work with different kinds of codes, attitudes, in the end you have a language. It's like within a person. You are not always the same.

I envy people who have the capacity to sit with another human being and find them endlessly interesting, I would rather watch TV. Of course this becomes eventually known to the other person.

Air and manners are more expressive than words.

I've never been interested in things that sparkle and shine; I'm more interested in people.

I would say I'm humanly engaged.

A story about my life should not be particularly interesting, but it is: it's just about me and some kids who didn't know how to talk to each other. It's personal but not autobiographical.

My biggest job really is to figure other people out. I need to understand what makes a person tick.

We are not won by arguments that we can analyse but by tone and temper, by the manner which is the man himself.

I find that communication as an actor and person is an important part of who I am. And I'm really drawn into the psychology of those dynamics.

I see people in terms of dialogue and I believe that people are their talk.

I love body language.

You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.

Our worst comes out when we behave like robots or professionals.

Having a human conversation is not something I've had any training in either as a comedian or as, you know, a human being.

We're losing social skills, the human interaction skills, how to read a person's mood, to read their body language, how to be patient until the moment is right to make or press a point. Too much exclusive use of electronic information dehumanises what is a very, very important part of community life and living together.

What differentiates us from animals is the fact that we can listen to other people's dreams, fears, joys, sorrows, desires and defeats - and they in turn can listen to ours.

In this respect I suppose I'm the total opposite of Garry. With his very emotive body language at the board he shows and displays all his emotions. I don't.

I am an observer, I like to watch people. I am into psychology and people - how they act and such.

Thence, I suppose, my natural disposition to make fresh acquaintances, and to break with them so readily, although always for a good reason, and never through mere fickleness.

What do you think is the world's most recognisable container of information? It's the human face. We are constantly reading each other and responding.

According as the man is, so must you humour him.

I think humans are just hard-wired to process people's faces and understand meaning and expression at such a more granular level than other types of communication.

I'm just incredibly interested in people.