quote: Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.
— Eleanor Roosevelt
All ideas must surely come not only from people, but from the Person as an embodied individual, to quote Jeremy Weate, the Anglo-Nigerian philosopher I so admire,
quote: Each of these responses [reason, ethics and spirituality] comes from the body - not thought of as a purely physical entity, but rather in the sense of embodied being. This is a vital point that has been lost in western philosophy for the most part post-Descartes. Spirituality is of the body, as is reason.
At a more basic and self-evident level, a large portion of events are also man made.
Discussing people seems the best place to begin, and the best place to finish, as everything can only lead back to a. people or b. people's responses to natural events.
Posts: 1332 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:All ideas must surely come not only from people, but from the Person as an embodied individual
Yeah, but then again, so what? You can discuss the idea without knowing anything about the person. And incidentally, 'the Person as an embodied individual' is meaningless.
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
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I agree with your general point, and I'm interested to learn more about Weate.
(Hey! Case in point! )
However, I would dispute your characterization of the Roosevelt quote. One way of seeing it is to insert 'only' before 'ideas,' 'events,' and 'people.'
I had always imagined she meant the petty gossip of folks interested in people to the exclusion of ideas and events. A pause in the grocery check-out line provides examples.
Posts: 431 | Registered: Oct 2003
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I agree. The quotation (not quote, btw) refers to what one occupies ones mind with. Sadly, it's like a joke, though. If you have to explain it, it loses its power.
Pel, one thing that ER's statement has going for it is brevity.
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quote:I had always imagined she meant the petty gossip of folks interested in people to the exclusion of ideas and events. A pause in the grocery check-out line provides examples.
It's sort of like how "invite" now means "invitation". It used to bother me, but it no longer does. I wonder when the oldest usage of "quote" meaning "quotation" dates from.
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quote: Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.
— Eleanor Roosevelt
Actually, I think that's a great quote. I agree with her entirely. It's simply petty to try and interpret it as meaning something other than it obviously does. Discussing people is gossip. Discussing events is watercooler crap. Discussing ideas is all that really matters.
To the extent that you discuss people and their ideas, that's discussing ideas. It's clearly not what she meant by discussing people.
How much of a chip does one have to have to turn an intelligent quote like this into the pap you've interpreted it as?
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How much of a chip does one have to have to iterate a point already made by a previous poster, adding only a healthy froth of venom?
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I've always read the quote as tiered exclusions, to a certain extent.
It's not "only" ideas, or "only" events, etc. Small minds discuss only people, sure (celebrities, coworkers lives, other gossip). Average minds discuss people and events (Bush and the Iraq war, Ken Lay and the Enron collapse). Great minds discuss ideas, people, and events, not limiting their discussion topics at all, and embracing even the highest ideals (Terry Shiavo, the situation with stopping her life support, *and* the greater concept of what constitutes human life).
It always struck me as a quote that damns provincial thinking and promotes expanding one's horizons to include all topics.
But that might just be my reading of it.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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Here is the world's stupidest quote, in my opinion:
What luck for rulers that men do not think. --Adolf Hitler
Strangely, I found it on my english teacher's bulletin board -- and not as an example of a stupid quote. I don't know quite how she missed its stupidity.
Sorry to change the subject -- everyone can go back to what they were saying. Posts: 464 | Registered: Jul 2004
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I think the Hitler quote is a good one, not because I particularly like it, but because I think it's a good warning.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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Taken as a whole, with the Hitler attribution, it is a good quotation -- it is a good warning. "See how evil despots think."
Taken as a quote, it is supremely stupid. In other words, if you were in the room when Hitler said it, would you consider him smart or stupid?
a. Stupid, for revealing that his notion of being a ruler relies on his subjects not thinking.
b. Stupid (i.e., wrong), when judged by history -- for, albeit slowly, the people of the world DID think and did act, and the consequences to Hitler's rule were devastating.
I know the above is simplistic from the standpoint of historiography, but I am just making a point about the quotation.
Posts: 431 | Registered: Oct 2003
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quote:Taken as a quote, it is supremely stupid. In other words, if you were in the room when Hitler said it, would you consider him smart or stupid?
Smart. It, especially when taken together with the rest of his life, shows that he understood very well some aspects of human nature and was able to use that knowledge.
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What makes a quote stupid? Is it the words that are being quoted, or the fact that someone took the time to quote them?
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I don't know that you could say that the opposition to Hitler came because the people of the world were thinking.
Prior to Pearl HArbor, American sentiment was extremely divided, and the majority were for kepeping out of the war. It wasn't a rational recognition of the potential danger that motivated the U.S., but rather the emotional reaction to a direct attack. This reaction was guided, in no small part, by the government and a huge helping of propoganda.
Similar can be said for England. Churchill worked very hard to get the English into the war and to maintain their spirit by doing so. His speeches were not appeals to reason, but rather extremely emotionally stirring.
The Russians made a non-agression pact with Hitler and only came in when he violated it.
Hitler made many mistakes, but I don't think underestimating the ability or rather desire and tendency of ruled populace to think was one of them.
---
edit: I also like the Eleanor Roosevelt quotation. Smart lady.
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quote:Discussing people is gossip. Discussing events is watercooler crap. Discussing ideas is all that really matters.
Discussing people builds and delineates identity and community. Discussing events is coping with and developing adaptations for the changing world. Discussing ideas is discovering why the first two are important.
If the first two are completely irrelevant, you aren't doing the third one very well.
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quote:b. Stupid (i.e., wrong), when judged by history -- for, albeit slowly, the people of the world DID think and did act, and the consequences to Hitler's rule were devastating.
This makes it an even better quote.
When people *didn't* think, he managed to manipulate them into committing all manner of atrocities. When people *did* think (other world leaders), he was resisted and deposed to the good of all.
In the first case, he was lucky - "what luck for rulers that people don't think". When people do think, that luck goes away.
Also, he didn't say that "Rulers always succeed because people never think" - It wasn't an absolute, he just said it is lucky for rulers that they do not think. The way I take that is that rulers benefit from an unthinking populace, which is true. And seeing that the quote came from a man who greatly manipulated an unthinking populace, it stands as a good warning and an admonishment against not thinking.
All in all, it's a good quote. It's short and easily memorable, it serves as a warning, it makes people think, and it has a strong element of truth.
Posts: 3960 | Registered: Jul 2001
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quote: Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people.
— Eleanor Roosevelt
Actually, I think that's a great quote. I agree with her entirely. It's simply petty to try and interpret it as meaning something other than it obviously does. Discussing people is gossip. Discussing events is watercooler crap. Discussing ideas is all that really matters.
To the extent that you discuss people and their ideas, that's discussing ideas. It's clearly not what she meant by discussing people.
How much of a chip does one have to have to turn an intelligent quote like this into the pap you've interpreted it as?
Come now Lisa it isnt really fair of you to just jump on this thread and steal Ms Roosevelts hard earned title.
Just playing, I think I agree with your assesment of the situation.
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While we're on the subject, another somewhat related quote (at least in time period) "Bureaucracy is the price we pay for impartiality." ~Josef Stalin
Also, I think both of the afforementioned quotes are quite good for reasons already summed up in the thread.
Posts: 1038 | Registered: Feb 2006
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"And incidentally, 'the Person as an embodied individual' is meaningless."
You may think so KoM (I can see why as I shall explain), but the distinction is important as a rejection of certain Religious viewpoints which reject the idea the the person as an embodied individual can have worth.
"I agree with your general point, and I'm interested to learn more about Weate."
Generaly true, luckier still that they so seldom act when they do think. Hitler was not overthrown from within his own country, only a few people thought to do it, fewer still acted and those that did failed.
"Discussing people is gossip."
If that is the case, then all historians, novelists, poets and philosophers have been nothing but "gossips."
"To the extent that you discuss people and their ideas, that's discussing ideas."
Exactly, but there is no room in the false scenario she set up to discuss both.
Posts: 1332 | Registered: Apr 2005
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"What luck for rulers that men do not think"...
Yes, it is TRUE, is some cases -- or a lot of cases -- the thing that makes it stupid is that Hitler said it.
As if he wasn't responsible for what happened. As if it was just LUCK that all the Nazis followed him and committed unspeakable atrocities. It wasn't LUCK, Hitler, it was YOU, you made them do it.
Of course, it was the peoples' responsibility to think about it -- it's not entirely Hitler's fault, because any one of the Nazis could have had the courage to stop killing people because he knew it was wrong.
I agree, it IS a good warning...just Hitler has no right to say it.
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Those who find stupidity and nonsense in these quotes find them either because it's all you can see, or it's all you want to see.
Posts: 1 | Registered: Aug 2006
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quote:Originally posted by Pelegius: "Discussing people is gossip."
If that is the case, then all historians, novelists, poets and philosophers have been nothing but "gossips."
"To the extent that you discuss people and their ideas, that's discussing ideas."
Exactly, but there is no room in the false scenario she set up to discuss both.
To understand the quote you can't quite take it literally. I agree completely that there is room to discuss people and do so in a lofty and unchildish manner. Usually this is when you say NICE things about them and share non personal good news and to speculate on that person's future prospects.
One way to better understand what AER meant is to change the word dicuss to [i]insult[\i].
Dissing ideas is just debate. No one gets hurt and hopefully thinking was involved.
Dissing an event is not great, but not awful. If it was a recent event- people might be offended or it may be a call to arms.
Dissing people is just rude. You can't describe dissing a whole person as anything but rude. If you are dissing what they DID, their actions, that's an EVENT. If you are making fun of what they think, that's an idea. Of course, if you call someone stupid for what they think, well, that's small, don't you think?
You may say it's far fetched to change dicuss to insult, but if something needs to be discussed- it's because there are two opinions and one probably is negative.
However to call poets, historians and novelists small minds misses the point of what they do.
People in poems don't represent people. They are vehicles to describe emotions- which are really ideas in disguise. Yes the subjects may be people to the authors, but they are something more in the poem.
Historians look at people, but in a broader sense. They want to understand what IDEAS and EVENTS influenced people of the past to make the world the way they did. Biographers analyze the way ideas and events affect one person. They are attracted by the legend, not the person themselves, but that is what they seek to uncover.
With novels the people are still vehicles to express ideas. Good books disguise their motives by making the events rather interesting. If the book has any literary merit at all you'll want to discuss what happened and what it means to you. Again ideas.
There are petty novels, poems and history books- gossip novels, bad romance novels, exposes. You can find great examples if you think hard enough.
Posts: 1757 | Registered: Oct 2004
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It makes it sound like Hitler thought all the Nazis just followed him blindly...because men never think. But...he must have known how charismatic he was. It's like he's trying to back out of the responsibility for what happened by saying, It's all their fault, they never think. Like I said, the quote in itself is a good one, I just don't like the "--Adolf Hitler" part.
That maybe be too much to infer from such a tiny quote, without context -- which is why, standing alone, it's stupid.
Posts: 464 | Registered: Jul 2004
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So far as I can tell, Adolph Hitler didn't try to avoid responsibility for what he did. He gloried in it.
The quote is about he and other leaders being lucky because their barely disguised grabs for power only work in a world where most of the people don't really think. If it were different, they'd have to work much harder. But he's really not one to say "It wasn't my fault. I didn't really do it." He was more of the "I did it because I rock." type.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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quote:To understand the quote you can't quite take it literally.
I think that if a quote is only acceptable if you change it from its literal meaning then it didn't do a very good job of communicating in the first place.
Posts: 26077 | Registered: Mar 2000
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quote:Discussing people is gossip. Discussing events is watercooler crap. Discussing ideas is all that really matters.
Discussing people builds and delineates identity and community. Discussing events is coping with and developing adaptations for the changing world. Discussing ideas is discovering why the first two are important.
If the first two are completely irrelevant, you aren't doing the third one very well.
I agree with this.
Posts: 4655 | Registered: Jan 2002
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The reasoning that ideas come from people, so talking about people is the best way to talk about ideas, is the same as reasoning that ideas come from our brains, so talking about neurons and neurochemistry is the best way to talk about ideas. They're related, to be sure, but that doesn't make them equivalent.
I'm not sure E Roosevelt is right here, but she's not stupid. She's saying that Scientific American, for example, really does have something over People and the Star. They do. I think where she's wrong is in suggesting that there are people who talk about ideas rather than people. It's the same people, but sometimes they're thinking big and sometimes they're thinking small. It may also be OK to think small at times.
Posts: 1877 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:I think that if a quote is only acceptable if you change it from its literal meaning then it didn't do a very good job of communicating in the first place.
I don't think this is entirely true. Take the quotes "Don't count your chickens before they're hatched" and "Don't put all your eggs in one basket." Almost invariably, when a person uses a quote like that they are not talking about chickens or eggs in the literal sense.
That's an extreme example, but it shows that a quote can have meaning and relevance apart from literal interpretation.
Many aphorisms (which were at one point quotes) fall into this same non-literal application to other situations, e.g "look before you leap," "a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush," "don't cry over spilled milk."
Soara, I don't think Hitler was avoiding responsibility with that quote, but instead saying something along the lines of "I benefited from the failings of others." It's like a skilled baseball pitcher saying he was lucky none of the batters were any good. He accomplished a lot through charisma and skillful propaganda and politicking, but he benefited from the fact that people are much more likely to blindly follow the herd than to think critically.
I would say it's *more* powerful that it came from Hitler. If it came from, say, James Polk, it wouldn't carry the same resonance. The lack of thinking on the part of people had far more serious consequences during Hitler's reign than during Polk's administration - pointing out just how important it is to think.
Are you against the quote perhaps just because you don't think Hitler should ever be quoted about anything?
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I don't think "big" and "small" are the distinctions to be made. Maybe it is instead "abstract" and "concrete", or maybe "intellectual" and "social". I think it's all important.
The reason I don't like Roosevelt's original quote is the hypocricy and arrogance in assuming that she is not part of the social dance. If she actually believed that people and events were not important, I doubt she'd have chosen a life dedicated to serving people and shaping events. It's like the people with trust funds managed by professionals who say that worrying about money is vulgar.
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kat, You are using that quote in a way that she didn't intend. Your criticisms only work if you misinterpret it.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
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I'm pretty sure I'm not, but your error here is not exactly difficult to see, nor has it gone uncommented on. You're making a fuss about something you don't understand. I think you'd benefit from an attempt look for alternative interpretations to your rather limited one.
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