David Bohm
individual thought collective interaction people contribution
“individual thought is mostly the result of collective thought and of interaction with other people. The language is entirely collective, and most of the thoughts in it are. Everybody does his own thing to those thoughts – he makes a contribution. But very few change them very much.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
culture collective share meaning
“culture – the collectively shared meaning”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
job together cooperate opinion assumption
“If we all had to do a job together, we would likely find that each one of us would have different opinions and assumptions, and thus we would find it hard to do the job. The temperature could go way up.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
assumption think individual life
“The point is that we have all sorts of assumptions, not only about politics or economics or religion, but also about what we think an individual should do, or what life is all about, and so forth.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
sense nonsense
“Perhaps there is more sense in our nonsense and more nonsense in our 'sense' than we would care to believe.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
people think rearrange prejudice
“A great many people think they are thinking when they are merely rearranging their prejudices.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
share meaning conform distortion deception revolution culture
“Suppose we were able to share meanings freely without a compulsive urge to impose our view or conform to those of others and without distortion and self-deception. Would this not constitute a real revolution in culture?”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
perceive think different important knowledge
“The ability to perceive or think differently is more important than the knowledge gained.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
moment one eternity now
“Ultimately, all moments are really one, therefore now is an eternity.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
separate organism abstraction boundary wholeness
“The notion of a separate organism is clearly an abstraction, as is also its boundary. Underlying all this is unbroken wholeness even though our civilization has developed in such a way as to strongly emphasize the separation into parts.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
individual normal limit fragmentation paranoid schizoid psychoti
“many individuals going beyond the ‘normal’ limits of fragmentation are classified as paranoid, schizoid, psychotic, etc.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
clarity perception thought experience theories
“Clarity of perception and thought evidently requires that we be generally aware of how our experience is shaped by the insight (clear or confused) provided by the theories that are implicit or explicit in our general ways of thinking.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
prevent insight limitation knowledge change
“What prevents theoretical insights from going beyond existing limitations and changing to meet new facts is just the belief that theories give true knowledge of reality (which implies, of course, that they need never change).”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
physics development science concept relationship condition
“At any particular stage in the development of science, our concepts concerning the causal relationships will then be true only relative to a certain approximation and to certain conditions.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
old theory unclear new domain
“older theories become more and more unclear when one tries to use them to obtain insight into new domains.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
observer observed merging reality indivisible unanalysable
“both observer and observed are merging and interpenetrating aspects of one whole reality, which is indivisible and unanalysable.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
coherent world view psychological social ignore
“perhaps because we have at present no coherent world view, there is a widespread tendency to ignore the psychological and social importance of such questions almost altogether.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
essential quantum interconnect universe enfold whole
“The essential feature in quantum interconnectedness is that the whole universe is enfolded in everything, and that each thing is enfolded in the whole.”
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
dialogue suspend certainty
"Real dialogue is where two or more people become willing to suspend their certainty in each other's presence."
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
linked connections fabric evolve behavior understand
"We are all linked by a fabric of unseen connections. This fabric is constantly changing and evolving. This field is directly structured and influenced by our behavior and by our understanding."
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
learn oriented collectively know
"Can we learn to become more learning-oriented individually and collectively, rather than 'I know' oriented?"
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
universe frozen light
"Universe consists of frozen light."
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
thought system feeling body society state
"Similarly, thought is a system. That system not only includes thought and feelings, but it includes the state of the body; it includes the whole of society - as thought is passing back and forth between people in a process by which thought evolved from ancient times."
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
reality truth believe perceive true
"Reality is what we take to be true.
What we take to be true is what we believe.
What we believe is based upon our perceptions.
What we perceive depends upon what we look for.
What we look for depends on what we think.
What we think depends on what we perceive.
What we perceive determines what we believe.
What we believe determines what we take to be true.
What we take to be true is our reality"
― David Bohm (1917-1992)
physics mechanism biology psychology life
“It does seem odd… that just when physics is… moving away from mechanism, biology and psychology are moving closer to it. If the trend continues… scientists will be regarding living and intelligent beings as mechanical, while they suppose that inanimate matter is too complex and subtle to fit into the limited categories of mechanism.”
―David Bohm (1917-1992)