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Human history begins with man's act of disobedience which is at the same time the beginning of his freedom and the development of his reason.

Erich Fromm

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Erich Fromm
Age: 79 †
Born: 1900
Born: March 23
Died: 1980
Died: March 18
Philosopher
Psychoanalyst
Psychologist
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
Frankfurt/Main
Time
Development
Liberty
Freedom
History
Reason
Human
Disobedience
Humans
Begins
Men
Beginning

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The fact is that the culture does not have only positive effects on our intellectual and moral functions but also negative effects.
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Chronic boredom compensated or uncompensated constitutes one of the major psychopathological phenomena in contemporary technotronic society, although it is only recently that it has found some recognition.
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I believe that if an individual is not on the path to transcending his society and seeing in what way it furthers or impedes the development of human potential, he cannot enter into intimate contact with his humanity.
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When blended with sexuality, the death instinct is transformed into more harmless impulses expressed in sadism or masochism.
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In the 19th century inhumanity meant cruelty in the 20th century it means schizoid self-alienation.
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The ordinary man with extraordinary power is the chief danger for mankind - not the fiend or the sadist.
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Having lost religious faith and the humanistic values bound up with it, he [man] concentrated on technical and material values and lost the capacity for deep emotional experiences, for the joy and sadness that accompany them.
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In times of change, learners inherit the earth
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The human passions transform man from a mere thing into a hero, into a being that in spite of tremendous handicaps tries to make sense of life.
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The mother-child relationship is paradoxical and, in a sense, tragic. It requires the most intense love on the mother's side, yet this very love must help the child grow away from the mother, and to become fully independent.
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[Carl Gustav] Jung was not right when he said that the unconscious message is always written clearly and so there is no need to seek to discover the distortions, because one must recognize that many dreams are more or less distortions.
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Independent of others and in concert with others, your main task in life is to do what you can best do and become what you can potentially be.
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The root of the word education is e-ducere, literally, to lead forth, or to bring out something which is potentially present.
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According to me [Sigmund ] Freud did not notice that the dream expresses the inner experiences in a symbolic form,resembling in that, poetry or other art forms.
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Our main way of relating ourselves to others is like things relate themselves to things on the market. We want to exchange our own personality - or as one says sometimes, our personality package - for something.
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What is for me socialism is exactly the opposite of a bureaucratically-managed culture.
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Thus, the ultimate choice for a man, inasmuch as he is driven to transcend himself, is to create or to destroy, to love or to hate.
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The most important influence on a child is the character of its parents, rather than this or that single event.
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To take the difficulties, setbacks and sorrows of life as a challenge to overcome makes us stronger, rather than unjust punishment which should not happen to us, requires faith and courage.
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Just as love for one individual which excludes the love for others is not love, love for one's country which is not part of one's love for humanity is not love, but idolatrous worship.
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