#authority

In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual. ↗

— Galileo Galilei

#humble #individual #questions #reasoning #science

Think for yourself and question authority. ↗

— Timothy Leary

#question #think #yourself

He who is firmly seated in authority soon learns to think security, and not progress, the highest lesson in statecraft. ↗

— James Russell Lowell

#firmly #highest #learns #lesson #progress

Do you wish to speak in Provençal, French, or Latin? They are all I can manage, I'm afraid." "Any will do," the rabbi replied in Provençal. "Splendid. Latin it is," said Pope Clement. ↗

— Iain Pears

#communication #conceit #languages #mockery #papal-authority

Too often, our concept of pastors and church leaders reinforces rather than obliterates the sad state of family life in our current context. ↗

— Russell Moore

#family #pastors #family

The catchword I use with my classes is: The authority of the writer always overcomes the skepticism of the reader. ↗

— Nikki Giovanni

#authority #classes #i #overcomes #reader

This, not incidentally, is another perfect setting for deindividuation: on one side, the functionary behind a wall of security glass following a script laid out with the intention that it should be applied no matter what the specific human story may be, told to remain emotionally disinvested as far as possible so as to avoid preferential treatment of one person over another - and needing to follow that advice to avoid being swamped by empathy for fellow human beings in distress. The functionary becomes a mixture of Zimbardo's prison guards and the experimenter himself, under siege from without while at the same time following an inflexible rubric set down by those higher up the hierarchical chain, people whose job description makes them responsible, but who in turn see themselves as serving the general public as a non-specific entity and believe or have been told that only strict adherence to a system can produce impartial fairness. Fairness is supposed to be vested in the code: no human can or should make the system fairer by exercising judgement. In other words, the whole thing creates a collective responsibility culminating in a blameless loop. Everyone assumes that it's not their place to take direct personal responsibility for what happens; that level of vested individual power is part of the previous almost feudal version of responsibility. The deindividuation is actually to a certain extent the desired outcome, though its negative consequences are not. ↗

— Nick Harkaway

#bureaucracy #government #individual #life #power

When a man has a gift in speaking the truth, brute aggression is no longer his security blanket for approval. He, on the contrary, spends most of his energy trying to tone it down because his very nature is already offensive enough. ↗

— Criss Jami

#approval #authority #blanket #brute-force #brutes

Any fool can make a rule, and any fool will mind it. ↗

— Henry David Thoreau

#conformity #fool #foolishness #law #rule

Power is a poison well known for thousands of years. If only no one were ever to acquire material power over others! But to the human being who has faith in some force that holds dominion over all of us, and who is therefore conscious of his own limitations, power is not necessarily fatal. For those, however, who are unaware of any higher sphere, it is a deadly poison. For them there is no antidote. ↗

— Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

#power #experience