Hans Eysenck Quotes

“If you admit that to silence your opponent by force is to win an intellectual argument, then you admit the right to silence people by force.”

“It is generally agreed by philosophers of science that important contributions which have a revolutionary impact on science are often methodologically inadequate, reveal many anomalies, and may indeed be factually erroneous.”

“Psychotherapy is the prostitution of friendship.”

“Scientists, especially when they leave the particular field in which they are specialized, are just as ordinary, pig-headed, and unreasonable as everybody else, and their unusually high intelligence only makes their prejudices all the more dangerous.”

“The influence of Marx has been rather similar to that of Freud. Not only because he too based his whole case on 'interpretations', and discounted direct evidence, but also because very few of the people who now claim to hold his views have ever bothered to read his original contributions or look at the criticism, however cogent, of these views.

Indeed, present-day Marxists often hold views exactly opposite to those of Marx and Lenin, as in the question of the inheritance of intelligence. Both Marx and Lenin were quite explicit about their belief that 'equality', as an idea essentially to socialism, meant social equality, not biological equality, and they emphasized their belief that the latter was absolutely impossible to attain.

It is quite clear from their writings that they supported the view that intelligence and other abilities had a clear genetic foundation, but some of their followers nowadays claim exactly the opposite!

Much the same is true of Freud, his followers, too, have created a 'climate of opinion', which deviates markedly from what he himself would have approved. Nevertheless, there is a traceable ancestry, and Freud himself cannot be completely absolved of guilt.”

“What is new in his theories is not true, and what is true in his theories is not new.”

“They bought research as they bough vegetables – a wonderful insight into official thinking about science.”

“Modern education does no favour to the children it is supposed to teach when it de-emphasizes facts. Although facts are not the only important things in life, in science, and in the arts, they nevertheless constitute the absolutely essential substructure without which nothing worthwhile can be built.”

“Nothing succeeds like success; children who opt out of school have had a continued record of failure, and it would be difficult to blame the children themselves for voting with their feet and playing truant as much as possible.

This failure is not necessary; it is imposed on the children by inappropriate methods of teaching which do not take into account the innate patterns of abilities of these children.

A return to sanity is long overdue; we must pay close attention to the genetic basis of our children's abilities.”

“Positive discrimination, so called, is still discrimination against somebody. One man's positive discrimination is another man's negative discrimination.

Furthermore, who shall define a minority? Why are some minorities more minor than others?”

“Quotas were considered undesirable when they were used against minority groups; they do not become desirable when they are used against majority groups.”

“The American Government is in fact enforcing a system of employment on the universities under which they are required, under pain of bankruptcy, to employ members of minority groups in spite of the fact that a better qualified member of a non-minority group is applying for the job.”

“It would be very peculiar if a very general mental capability that, among other things, involves the ability to reason, plan, solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complexities, learn quickly, and benefit from experience, did not have very important implications.”

“The social problems that arise, arise from the facts, not our investigation of these facts.”

“What you read in the newspapers, hear on the radio and see on television, is hardly even the truth as seen by experts.

It is the wishful thinking of journalists, seen through filters of prejudice and ignorance.”

“I always felt that a scientist owes the world only one thing, and that is the truth as he sees it.”

“Tact and diplomacy are fine in international relations, in politics, perhaps even in business; in science only one thing matters, and that is the facts.”

“If the truth contradicts deeply held beliefs, that is too bad.”

“The more psychotherapy, the smaller the recovery rate.”

“There thus appears to be an inverse correlation between recovery and psychotherapy; the more psychotherapy, the smaller the recovery rate.”

“They show that roughly two-thirds of a group of neurotic patients will recover or improve to a marked extent within about two years of the onset of their illness, whether they are treated by means of psychotherapy or not.”

“If the reader does not like some of the facts that emerge, I hope against hope that he will not blame me for their existence.”