Deterministic Thinking Quotes

Man is a masterpiece of creation, if only because no amount of determinism can prevent him from believing that he acts as a free being.

Those who claim they are the prisoners of the laws of economics, only testify that they are prisoners of the idol.

A mind is so closely shaped by the body and destined to serve it that only one mind could possibly arise in it. No body, never mind.

I grew up in an environment that promoted a very fixed mindset. It was an era that worshipped IQ and thought that your IQ was the most important thing in determining your future. My sixth-grade teacher even seated us around the room in IQ order.

This is what writers mean when they say that the notion of cause involves the idea of necessity. If there be any meaning which confessedly belongs to the term necessity, it is unconditionalness. That which is necessary, that which must be, means that which will be, whatever supposition we may make in regard to all other things.

In the mind there is no absolute or free will; but the mind is determined to wish this or that by a cause, which has also been determined by another cause, and this last by another cause, and so on to infinity.

It reflects a prevailing myth that production technology is no more amenable to human judgment or social interests than the laws of thermodynamics, atomic structure or biological inheritance.

I am not an economic determinist. If I were, I would throw up my hands; I just would not bother. I think it's wrong to be an economic determinist. I think it's wrong to simply say, "Well, inevitably, if you're poor, you're going to get a lousy education; if you're lower-middle class, the cards are going to be stacked against you, and you'll probably never get anywhere".