Marxist Theory Quotes

Intellectuals ... advertise their superiority to political practice but are absolutely in its thrall ... It is no accident that Marxist theory and practice use the intellectuals as tools and keep them in brutal subservience. ~ Allan Bloom

In the little hall leading to it was a rack holding various Socialist or radical newspapers, tracts, and pamphlets in very small print and on very bad paper. The subjects treated were technical Marxist theories. ~ Agnes Smedley

Liberalism makes this mistake in regard to private property and Marxism makes it in regard to socialized property ... The Marxist illusion is partly derived from a romantic conception of human nature ... It assumes that the socialization of property will eliminate human egotism ... The development of a managerial class in Russia, combing economic with political power, is an historic refutation of the Marxist theory. ~ Reinhold Niebuhr

If Marxist theory dictates that the personal is always political, the rebuttal of both 'The Americans' and 'House of Cards' is that the political is always personal: the sum total of our collective needs and desires, vows and betrayals. ~ Steve Erickson

Charity could chatter dorm-room Marxist theory with the best of them, but a single look from cool, silver-haired Lady Beddington was enough to make her tremble from head to toe. ~ Elizabeth Jane Howard

I'm very interested in Marxist theory. I disagree with it, but I keep thinking about it, because some Marxist theory does seem to work. ~ Robert Anton Wilson

In a time in which Communist regimes have been rightfully discredited and yet alternatives to neoliberal capitalist societies are unwisely dismissed, I defend the fundamental claim of Marxist theory: there must be countervailing forces that defend people's needs against the brutality of profit driven capitalism. ~ Cornel West

It is necessary to master Marxist theory and apply it, master it for the sole purpose of applying it. If you can apply the Marxist-Leninist viewpoint in elucidating one or two practical problems, you should be commended and credited with some achievement. The more problems you elucidate and the more comprehensively and profoundly you do so, the greater will be your achievement. ~ Mao Zedong

Every great artist raises art to a science, and every great scientist raises science to an art, hence we have Michelangelo's David and Einstein's Theory of Relativity. ~ Robert Breault

Incredibly, whenever I have proposed the theory that half of government workers could be cut, current and former federal employees I know have all agreed. ~ Ronald Kessler

The dominance panacea is so out of proportion that entire schools of training are based on the premise that if you can just exert adequate dominance over the dog, everything else will fall into place. Not only does it mean that incredible amounts of abuse are going to be perpetrated against any given dog, probably exacerbating problems like unreliable recalls and biting, but the real issues, like well-executed conditioning and the provision of an adequate environment, are going to go unaddressed, resulting in a still-untrained dog, perpetuating the pointless dominance program. None of this is to say that dogs aren't one of those species whose social life appears to lend itself to beloved hierarchy constructs. But, they also see well at night, and no one is proposing retinal surgery to address their non-compliance or biting behavior. Pack theory is simply not the most elegant model for explaining or, especially, for treating problems like disobedience, misbehavior or aggression. People who use aversives to train with a dominance model in mind would get a better result with less wear and tear on the dog by using aversives with a more thorough understanding of learning theory, or, better yet, forgoing aversives altogether and going with the other tools in the learning theory tool box. The dominance concept is simply unnecessary. ~ Jean Donaldson

When a theater goes dark for the night, a stagehand leaves a lighted lamp on stage. No one knows why any more, but some old timers say it is to keep the ghosts away. Others say it lights the stage for the ghosts to play. Whichever theory one adheres to, most people agree: a great theater is haunted. ~ Emily Mann

I do feel that literature should be demystified. What I object to is what is happening in our era: literature is only something you get at school as an assignment. No one reads for fun, or to be subversive or to get turned on to something. It's just like doing math at school. I mean, how often do we sit down and do trigonometry for fun, to relax. I've thought about this, the domination of the literary arts by theory over the past 25 years -- which I detest -- and it's as if you have to be a critic to mediate between the author and the reader and that's utter crap. Literature can be great in all ways, but it's just entertainment like rock'n'roll or a film. It is entertainment. If it doesn't capture you on that level, as entertainment, movement of plot, then it doesn't work. Nothing else will come out of it. The beauty of the language, the characterisation, the structure, all that's irrelevant if you're not getting the reader on that level -- moving a story. If that's friendly to readers, I cop to it. ~ T. Coraghessan Boyle

The highway looked different to him now, as they drove on. In theory it was the same stretch of tarmac, bounded by the same traffic paraphernalia and flimsy metal fences, but it had been transformed by their own intent. It was no longer a straight line to an airport, it was a mysterious hinterland of shadowy detours and hidey-holes. Proof, once again, that reality was not objective, but always waiting to be reshaped and redefined by one's attitude. Of course, everybody on earth had the power to reshape reality. It was one of the things Peter and Beatrice talked about a lot. The challenge of getting people to grasp that life was only as grim and confining as you perceived it to be. The challenge of getting people to see that the immutable facts of existence were not so immutable after all. The challenge of finding a simpler word for immutable than immutable. ~ Michel Faber

I was an English major, so I love discussing possibilities and alternate theories. ~ William Mapother

Pythagoras (550 BCE), with his theory of numbers, had been a source of inspiration for those who sought harmony in the Universe. His aim was to show in his philosophy that there was a high, structural, divine order to the Universe. This was a natural habitat for the souls. Mathematics was the tool to investigate this order. ~ Altay Birand

one of the twins went for a long trip in a spaceship at nearly the speed of light. When he returned, he would be much younger than the one who stayed on earth. This is known as the twins paradox, but it is a paradox only if one has the idea of absolute time at the back of one's mind. In the theory of relativity there is no unique absolute time, but instead each individual has his own personal measure of time that depends on where he is and how he is moving. ~ Stephen Hawking

The UU Professor of Anthropics had developed the Special and Inevitable Anthropic Principle, which was that the entire reason for the existence of the universe was the eventual evolution of the UU Professor of Anthropics. But this was only a formal statement of the theory which absolutely everyone, with only some minor details of a "Fill in name here" nature, secretly believes to be true. ~ Terry Pratchett

The theory of ramification is one of pure colligation, for it takes no account of magnitude or position; geometrical lines are used, but these have no more real bearing on the matter than those employed in genealogical tables have in explaining the laws of procreation. ~ James Joseph Sylvester

The ideology of liberal humanism found expression in the earliest reviews of Hardy's writing and remained a dominant force until the explosion of literary theory in the 1980s. It is a broad and still influential category. It endorses the moral value of the individual, and the strength of the human spirit. It prefers the integrity of an organic rural society to the anonymity and materialism of an urbanised and technological world. Applied to fiction, this ideology involves the naturalisation of the novel's world and its values, and the recognition of fictional character as presenting a unified subject. ~ Geoffrey Harvey

Just as an age was ready to receive the Copernican theory of the universe, so is our own age ready for the ideas of reincarnation and karma to be brought into the general consciousness of humanity. And what is destined to happen in the course of evolution will happen no matter what powers rise up against it. ~ Rudolf Steiner

Human experience, which is constantly contradicting theory, is the great test of truth. A system, built upon the discoveries of a great many minds, is always of more strength, than what is produced by the mere workings of any one mind, which, of itself, can do very little. There is not so poor a book in the world that would not be a prodigious effort were it wrought out entirely by a single mind, without the aid of prior investigators. ~ Samuel Johnson

Admit only your victories until you have hooked their interest, then you draw them closer and admit the sort of failings that reflect well on a fellow, sentimental failings: that was the theory of courtship the young master had formulated... ~ Claire Robertson

The truth is, Jung has brought back one member of the old duality, unreason, with a new name; it is no synthesis at all, but only the latest maneuver in the war against rationality that has been conducted with rising hysteria by literary intellectuals and humanists against the laws of a culture they have reason to distrust and disobey. The Jungian theory proposes to every disaffected humanist his "personal myth," as a sanctuary against the modern world. Against the vulgar democracy of intelligence, Jungian theory proposes an aristocracy of feeling. From this proposal derives Jung's persistent influence on modern critical and aesthetic style. ~ Philip Rieff

Neither in theory nor in practice does one farmer in a hundred realize how important it is to cultivate, cultivate, and cultivate. ~ Albert Howard

He then expounded a remarkable theory, which had occurred to him while he was playing the clarinet during one of the power cuts that the French electricity board arranges at regular intervals. Electricity, he said, is a matter of science and logic. Classical music is a matter of art and logic. Vous voyez? Already one sees a common factor. And when you listen to the disciplined and logical progression of some of Mozart's work, the conclusion is inescapable: Mozart would have made a formidable electrician. ~ Peter Mayle

The existence of matter and energy in the universe did not require the violation of energy conservation at the assumed creation. In fact, the data strongly support the hypothesis that no such miracle occurred. If we regard such a miracle as predicted by the creator hypothesis, then the prediction is not confirmed. ~ Victor J. Stenger

My latest theory is that it's - well, I describe it as, like, being in an apartment with kind of thin walls. And in the apartment next door, they've got a radio tuned constantly on - tuned to a really cool radio station. It's on all the time. And you can just hear it coming through the wall all the time. ~ Nick Lowe

I swear the older I get, the more I value bad examples over good ones. It's a good thing too, because most people are egotistical, neurotic, self-absorbed peons, insistent on wearing near-sighted glasses in a far-sighted world. And it's this exact sort of myopic ignorance that has led to my groundbreaking new theory. I call it Mim's Theorem of Monkey See Monkey Don't, and what it boils down to is this: it is my belief that there are some people whose sole purpose of existence is to show the rest of how not to act. ~ David Arnold

A lot of my theories were not applicable as a closer ~ Curt Schilling

Have a theory that she is in love with the dream of someone and not an actual person. ~ Erin Morgenstern

It's packed in there already and we're fifteen minutes early. My theory, proven once again," Kristen said, climbing the stairs.
"What theory would that be?"
"Everyone adores a tragedy. ~ Leah Clifford

The word 'proof' should strictly only be used when we are dealing with deductive inferences.... Popper claimed that scientists only need to use deductive inferences.... So if a scientist is only interested in demonstrating that a given theory is false, she may be able to accomplish her goal without the use of inductive inferences.... When a scientist collects experimental data, her aim might be to show that a particular theory...is false. She will have to resort to inductive reasoning.... So Popper's attempt to show that science can get by without induction does not succeed. ~ Samir Okasha

My best film is always my next film. I couldn't make Chungking Express now, because of the way I live and drink I've forgotten how I did it. I don't believe in film school or film theory. Just try and get in there and make the bloody film, do good work and be with people you love. ~ Christopher Doyle

We got some that were plain and some cinnamon. I liked the cinnamon better. Violet said that it was important to start with the plain, so that the cinnamon seemed more like a change. She said she had a theory that everything was better if you delayed it. She had this whole thing about self-control, okay, and the importance of self-control. ~ M T Anderson

The treatment of the indeterminacy principle as absolute and final can then be criticized as constituting an arbitrary restriction on scientific theories, since it does not follow from the quantum theory as such, but rather from the assumption of the unlimited validity of certain of its features, an assumption that can in no way ever be subjected to experimental proof. ~ David Bohm

The expressions of those moving about a picture gallery show ill-concealed disappointment that they only find pictures there. ~ Walter Benjamin

When the basic status of a theory is clear, and all that needs to be cleared are details, you can collaborate. But if the main structure of a hypothesis isn't established, and you want to change the paradigm - like it was the case in the 1960s - it's better to work alone. ~ Peter Higgs

The voices of actual communities are alive in a way no theory could every be even if, for now, it takes the form of tiny acts of resistance. Who doesn't cheat on taxes, avoid cops, or skip class? These acts themselves may not be revolutionary, but they begin to unravel the control from above. Anarchist approaches must be relevant to everyday experiences and flexible enough to address struggles in different situations and contexts. If we can achieve this, then we may thrive in the world after the dinosaurs. We might even be fortunate enough to be in one of the communities that have a hand in toppling them. ~ Curious George Brigade

Shepherd Book: What are we up to, sweetheart?
River: Fixing your Bible.
Book: I, um ... What?
River: Bible's broken. Contradictions, false logistics - doesn't make sense.
Shepherd Book: No, no. You-you-you can't ...
River: So we'll integrate non-progressional evolution theory with God's creation of Eden. Eleven inherent metaphoric parallels already there. Eleven. Important number. Prime number. One goes into the house of eleven eleven times, but always comes out one. Noah's ark is a problem.
Shepherd Book: Really?
River: We'll have to call it early quantum state phenomenon. Only way to fit 5000 species of mammal on the same boat.
Shepherd Book: River, you don't fix the Bible.
River: It's broken. It doesn't make sense.
Book: It's not about making sense. It's about believing in something, and letting that belief be real enough to change your life. It's about faith. You don't fix faith, River. It fixes you. ~ Ben Edlund

The weapon of criticism cannot, of course, replace criticism of the weapon, material force must be overthrown by material force; but theory also becomes a material force as soon as it has gripped the masses. Theory is capable of gripping the masses as soon as it demonstrates ad hominem, and it demonstrates ad hominem as soon as it becomes radical. To be radical is to grasp the root of the matter. But, for man, the root is man himself. ~ Karl Marx

Gun Control: The theory that a woman found dead in an alley, raped and strangled with her panty hose, is somehow morally superior to a woman explaining to police how her attacker got that fatal bullet wound. God may have made men and women, but Colt made them equal. Anon totalitarian regimes and genocides can't happen without gun control Ordinary citizens don't need guns, as their having guns doesn't serve the State. ~ Heinrich Himmler

In social cognitive theory, perceived self-efficacy results from diverse sources of information conveyed vicariously and through social evaluation, as well as through direct experience ~ Albert Bandura

The problem of the origin of the laws of physics is an acute one for physicists. Einstein's suggestion that they may turn out necessarily to possess the form that they do has little support. It is sometimes said that a truly unified theory of physics might be so tightly constrained logically that its mathematical formulation is unique. But this claim is readily refuted. It is easy to construct artificial universe models, albeit impoverished ones bearing only a superficial resemblance to the real thing, which are nevertheless mathematically and logically self-consistent. ~ Paul Davies

I'm struck by the difficulty I had in formulating it. When I think back now, I ask myself what else it was that I was talking about in Madness and Civilization or The Birth of the Clinic, but power? Yet I'm perfectly aware that I scarcely ever used the word and never had such a field of analyses at my disposal. I can say that this was an incapacity linked undoubtedly with the political situation in which we found ourselves. It is hard to see where, either on the Right or the Left, this problem of power could then have been posed. On the Right, it was posed only in terms of constitution, sovereignty, and so on, that is, in juridical terms; on the Marxist side, it was posed only in terms of the state apparatus. The way power was exercised - concretely, and in detail - with its specificity, its techniques and tactics, was something no one attempted to ascertain; they contented themselves with denouncing it in a polemical and global fashion as it existed among the "other," in the adversary camp. Where Soviet socialist power was in question, its opponents called it totalitarianism; power in Western capitalism was denounced by the Marxists as class domination; but the mechanics of power in themselves were never analyzed. ~ Michel Foucault

Even if it were true that evolution, or the teaching of evolution, encouraged immorality that would not imply that the theory of evolution was false. ~ Richard Dawkins

Think of Zen as the bow and Zazen as the arrow. The bow is the guiding theory behind the practice, while Zazen is the arrow which puts that practice into action. The better you understand the bow and the better you control the arrow, the better you'll be at hitting your target. ~ Bino Schree

Even though their arguments did not invoke religion, I think we all know what's behind these arguments. They're trying to protect religious beliefs from contradiction by science. They used to do it by prohibiting teachers from teaching evolution at all; then they wanted to teach intelligent design as an alternative theory; now they want the supposed "weaknesses" in evolution pointed out. But it's all the same program - it's all an attempt to let religious ideas determine what is taught in science courses. ~ Steven Weinberg

Some experts suggest you announce that you have a gun and state your intent to use it. The theory assumes the home intruder would rather avoid armed conflict and flee the scene. I subscribe to the "surprise them with a bullet" technique. ~ Anson Scott

When I was younger I thought going through something rough would be fun, or uplifting somehow. That sounds odd, but it was how everyone portrayed terrible things. You go through this horrid experience, and suddenly you're a better person. I wanted that; everyone wants to be a better person.
Now, though, after all of this, I realized that wasn't true. Not all the time, at least. Suffering didn't make a person stronger. It didn't make character, or mold someone into a better part of themselves.
It could - don't get me wrong, it could. It could make someone see the light, see the world through a clearer vision. It could change everything. It could make people good and courteous, make them spend their lives trying to save others'. Their past could lead them to something brighter in the future, creating the theory that everything happened for a reason. It could make them grateful for their life instead of hateful, scornful, wishing they were never born.
But it wasn't like that for me; I didn't get better. For me, all pain ever did was hurt. ~ Lauren Evers

[deconstruction and other French theories] was the gift of the French. They gave Americans a language they did not need. It was like the Statue of Liberty. Nobody needs French theory. ~ Jean Baudrillard

The methods from which the different non-anarchist parties expect, or say they do, the greatest good of one and all can be reduced to two, the authoritarian and the so-called liberal. The former entrusts to a few the management of social life and leads to the exploitation and oppression of the masses by the few. The latter relies on free individual enterprise and proclaims, if not the abolition, at least the reduction of governmental functions to an absolute minimum; but because it respects private property and is entirely based on the principle of each for himself and therefore of competition between men, the liberty it espouses is for the strong and for the property owners to oppress and exploit the weak, those who have nothing; and far from producing harmony, tends to increase even more the gap between rich and poor and it too leads to exploitation and domination, in other words, to authority. This second method, that is liberalism, is in theory a kind of anarchy without socialism, and therefore is simply a lie, for freedom is not possible without equality, and real anarchy cannot exist without solidarity, without socialism. The criticism liberals direct at government consists only of wanting to deprive it of some of its functions and to call on the capitalists to fight it out among themselves, but it cannot attack the repressive functions which are of its essence: for without the gendarme the property owner could not exist, indeed the government's powers of repression mus ~ Errico Malatesta

Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you (Matthew 6:33). The principle that Jesus expressed in these words is the basic law that underlies all answer to prayer. Many people know this in theory but are confused about putting it into practice. They think, "I will ignore this problem and think about God instead." Here there is a subtle mistake; because they are really thinking of their problem as existing in one place, of God as existing in another, and of themselves as going in thought from the first place to the second place. This, of course, is by implication to reaffirm the existence of the problem in its own place, and such a belief will not heal. What we have to do is to seek the Kingdom in the very place where the trouble seems to be. We have to know that in Truth and reality it is not there, because God is there. When we succeed in doing this, the difficulty disappears. ~ Emmet Fox

Everything must be taken into account. If the fact will not fit the theory
let the theory go. ~ Agatha Christie

Mitt Romney's primary season embrace of the social and economic agenda of the more rabid elements of his party doomed him, especially the shrill immigration rhetoric and the harshly insensitive theory that no additional sacrifice or contribution should be sought from those at the top. ~ Eliot Spitzer