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When blended with sexuality, the death instinct is transformed into more harmless impulses expressed in sadism or masochism.

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
Impulses
Expressed
Transformed
Sexuality
Impulse
Masochism
Instinct
Sadism
Death
Blended
Harmless

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The paradoxical and tragic situation of man is that his conscience is weakest when he needs it most.
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For [Sigmund ] Freud, the manifest dream, that is that which we remember after waking,is like a code message, that can be interpreted, provided the right key is avail-able, for example the method of free association.
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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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Man can be conditioned to behave in almost every desired way but only almost.
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Why should society feel responsible only for the education of children, and not for the education of all adults of every age?
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People think that to love is simple, but that to find the right object to love - or to be loved by - is difficult.
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The person who gives up his individual self and becomes an automaton, identical with millions of other automatons around him, need not feel alone and anxious any more. But the price he pays, however, is high it is the loss of his self.
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While we teach knowledge, we are losing that teaching which is the most important one for human development: the teaching which can only be given by the simple presence of a mature, loving person.
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Man is the only animal for whom his own existence is a problem which he has to solve.
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Education makes machines which act like men and produces men who act like machines.
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To live is to be born every minute. Death occurs when birth stops.
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When people can't handle God any more, they turn to religion.
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Education is helping the child realise his potentialities.
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The danger of the past was that men became slaves. The danger of the future is that men may become robots. True enough, robots do not rebel. But given man's nature, robots cannot live and remain sane, they become ''Golems',' they will destroy their world and themselves because they cannot stand any longer the boredom of a meaningless life.
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Love is a decision, it is a judgment, it is a promise. If love were only a feeling, there would be no basis for the promise to love each other forever. A feeling comes and it may go. How can I judge that it will stay forever, when my act does not involve judgment and decision.
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Giving is the highest expression of potency.
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Power on the one side, fear on the other, are always the buttresses on which irrational authority is built.
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The whole life of the individual is nothing but the process of giving birth to himself indeed, we should be fully born when we die.
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