George Lakoff Quotes

Most people enjoy other people. Most people are human beings first. And affiliated with political parties second.

All people are endowed with the faculty of compassion, and for this reason can develop the humanitarian spirit.

I've always been antagonistic to any naïve application of the selfish gene theory to politics. Some people have attempted to suggest that it means we are selfish or we should be selfish.

Throughout my many years of service to the people of North Carolina, I have always tried to treat people from all viewpoints with respect.

People are no damned good.

For too long, we have focused on our differences - in our politics and backgrounds, in our race and beliefs - rather than cherishing the unity and pride that binds us together.

I have differences with every single human being I know, but that difference shouldn’t define our relationship.

if we stop talking at one another, and start talking with one another, we can get a lot done.

Man is endowed by nature with organic relations to his fellow men; and natural impulse prompts him to consider the needs of others even when they compete with his own.

Here is a neuron that fires when I reach and grab something, but it also fires when I watch Joe reaching and grabbing something. ... It's as though this neuron is adopting the other person's point of view.

As in a Russian doll, however, the outer layers always contain an inner core. Instead of evolution having replaced simpler forms of empathy with more advanced ones, the latter are merely elaborations on the former and remain dependent on them. This also means that empathy comes naturally to us. It is not something we only learn later in life, or that is culturally constructed.

I always ask myself one question: what is human? What does it mean to be human? Maybe people will consider my new films brutal again. But this violence is just a reflection of what they really are, of what is in each one of us to certain degree.

I believe poor people are good people, except the ones that are mean . . .

Many species reciprocate, but only humans gossip, and much of what we gossip about is the vale of other people as partners for reciprocal relationships.

My plays are always involved with society, but I'm writing about people, too, and it's clear over the years that audiences understand them and care about them. The political landscape changes, the issues change, but the people are still there. People don't really change that much.

Much of the insensibility and hardness of the world is due to the lack of imagination which prevents a realization of the experiences of other people.

People always say there is competition in nature, but I think that because we are human, it's not only competition. Because we are human we have something other than competition - sharing, helping others, or being oneself. Competition is really kind of ugly.

There are lots of guys out there who write a better prose line than I do and who have a better understanding of what people are really like and what humanity is supposed to mean - hell, I know that.

It's one of the ironies of human nature that the most sensitive people are generally insensitive to the feelings of others.

Toni Morrison seems to have a lot of faith in people - that's what I mean by gentle power.

Getting along well with other people is still the world's most needed skill. With it...there is no limit to what person can do. We need people, we need the cooperation of others. There is very little we can do alone

Us as a people, we can't do it on our own. We have to understand that we're not each other's enemy. We have to stop discriminating against each other due to class and due to race and due to location or financial position.

To say that a person feels listened to means a lot more than just their ideas get heard. It's a sign of respect. It makes people feel valued.

The mystery in how little we know of other people is no greater than the mystery of how much, Laurel thought.

The sympathy of most people consists of a mixture of good-humour, curiosity, and self-importance.