Ludwig Wittgenstein Quotes

Between the ages of 24 and 27, I read Freud's complete works, everything that had been translated into English. It was very stimulating intellectually. But I did not accept his view of neurosis or of human nature.

There is no doubt that the resistance of the conscious and unconscious ego operates under the sway of the pleasure principle: it seeks to avoid the unpleasure which would be produced by the liberation of the repressed.

One might point to the great illumination that has resulted from Freud's analysis of the abracadabra of our dreams. No one can any longer dismiss the fantasy because it is logically inconsistent, superficially absurd, or objectively untrue.

Like dreams, farces show the disguised fulfillment of repressed wishes.

An educated mind is practiced in the uses of reason, which inevitably leads to a skeptical outlook.

Rationality is the master lifehack which distinguishes which other lifehacks to use.

We have to use our reasoning capacity and set long-term goals based on our deepest values.

If we choose a weak and foolish speculation as a primary textbook illustration (falsely assuming that the tale possesses a weight of history and a sanction of evidence), then we are in for trouble - as critics properly nail the particular weakness, and then assume that the whole theory must be in danger if supporters choose such a fatuous case as a primary illustration.

I'm not a scientist either, but I can use my brain, and I can talk to one.

How dangerous can false reasoning prove!

He who can see truly in the midst of general infatuation is like a man whose watch keeps good time, when all clocks in the town in which he lives are wrong. He alone knows the right time; what use is that to him?

the anxiety arising from the perpetual activity of the death instinct, though never eliminated, is counteracted and kept at bay by the power of the life instinct.

Some facts in life are immutable. One is, trust no-one who uses the word 'trope'.

There is no idea so brilliant or original that a sufficiently-untalented writer can't screw it up.

Can you use the rational mind to transcend itself?

Everybody should be ashamed who uses the wonders of science and engineering without thinking and having mentally realized not more of it than a cow realizes of the botany of the plants which it eats with pleasure.

Figuring things out for yourself is the only freedom anyone really has. Use that freedom.

I think that one should view with philosophic admiration the strange paths of the libido and should investigate the purposes of its circuitous ways.

Night-dreams trace on Memory's wall Shadows of the thoughts of day, And thy fortunes, as they fall, The bias of the will betray.

What are wits for unless a man uses them?

Dreams are faithful interpreters of our inclinations; but there is art required to sort and understand them.

To use your head, you have to go out of your mind.

Communists must always go into the why's and wherefore's of anything, use their own heads and carefully think over whether or not it corresponds to reality and is really well founded; on no account should they follow blindly and encourage slavishness.

Psychology teaches us at every step that though two types of activity can have the same external manifestation, whether in origin or essence, their nature may differ most profoundly.

In truth, Freud sees nothing and understands nothing.