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Julian Jaynes Quotes (1920-1997)
About Julian Jaynes
Julian Jaynes (27 February 1920 – 21 November 1997) was an American psychologist, best known for his book The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976), in which he argued that ancient peoples were not conscious.
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“There is no such thing as a complete consciousness.”
“The vestiges of the bicameral mind do not exist in any empty psychological space.”
“We are greatly in need of specific research in this area of schizophrenic experience to help us understand Mesolithic man.”
“These esoteric poses of philosophy and even the paper theories of behaviorists are mere subterfuges to avoid the material we are talking about.”
“Consciousness is a much smaller part of our mental life than we are conscious of, because we cannot be conscious of what we are not conscious of.”
“The bicameral mind with its controlling gods was evolved as a final stage of the evolution of language. And in this development lies the origin of civilization.”
“The importance of writing in the breakdown of the bicameral voices is tremendously important. What had to be spoken is now silent and carved upon a stone to be taken in visually.”
“Our sense of justice depends on our sense of time. Justice is a phenomenon only of consciousness, because time spread out in a spatial succession is its very essence.”
“Civilization is the art of living in towns of such size that everyone does not know everyone else.”
“'''The mind is still haunted with its old unconscious ways; it broods on lost authorities; and the yearning, the deep and hollowing yearning for divine volition and service is with us still.”
“The changes in the Catholic Church since Vatican II can certainly be scanned in terms of this long retreat from the sacred which has followed the inception of consciousness into the human species.”
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Julian Jaynes on Metaphors 2 quotes
“The divine kingdom to be regained is psychological not physical. It is metaphorical not literal. It is "within" not in extenso.”
Julian Jaynes on Meaning of life
“"What is the meaning of life?" This question has no answer except in the history of how it came to be asked. There is no answer because words have meaning, not life or persons or the universe itself. Our search for certainty rests in our attempts at understanding the history of all individual selves and all civilizations. Beyond that, there is only awe.”
Quotes About Julian Jaynes
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Daniel Dennett on Julian Jaynes
“Darwin was convinced that language was the prerequisite for "long trains of thought," and this claim has been differently supported by several recent theorists, especially Julian Jaynes (1976) and Howard Margolis (1987).”
About Julian Jaynes
Julian Jaynes (27 February 1920 – 21 November 1997) was an American psychologist, best known for his book The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976), in which he argued that ancient peoples were not conscious.