A Quote by Edward Thorndike

The intellectual evolution of the race consists in an increase in the number, delicacy, complexity, permanence and speed of formation of such associations.

Edward Thorndike

Quote Topics

Associations Complexity Consists Delicacy Evolution Formation Increase Intellectual Number Permanence Race Speed

Quote Author

Edward Thorndike
American - Psychologist
August 31, 1874 - August 9, 1949

This growth in the number, speed of formation, permanence, delicacy and complexity of associations possible for an animal reaches its acme in the case of man.

Edward Thorndike

There is a race between the increasing complexity of the systems we build and our ability to develop intellectual tools for understanding their complexity. If the race is won by our tools, then systems will eventually become easier to use and more reliable. If not, they will continue to become harder to use and less reliable for all but a relatively small set of common tasks. Given how hard thinking is, if those intellectual tools are to succeed, they will have to substitute calculation for thought.

Leslie Lamport

It's the old idea that the process of evolution is some push in the direction of greater complexity--in particular greater intellectual complexity. In one twig of the tree of life, namely ours, having a big brain happened to have advantages. But that's just what worked for a particular species of primate 5 to 7 million years ago.

Steven Pinker

Just because we increase the speed of information doesn't mean we can increase the speed of decisions. Pondering, reflecting and ruminating are undervalued skills in our culture.

Dale Dauten

As the years progressed, my spiritual evolution seemed to increase in speed. I stepped outside this world, the selves reordered. The combination, the aggregate of beings that I was, dissolved in the white light of eternity.

Frederick Lenz

An educated memory depends on an organized system of associations; and its goodness depends on two of their peculiarities: first, on the persistency of the associations; and, second, on their number.

William James

Earlier generations of machines decreased the complexity of tasks. In contrast, information technologies can increase the intellectual content of work at all levels. Work comes to depend on an ability to understand, respond to, manage, and create value from information.

Shoshana Zuboff

You cannot communicate complicated information to large groups of people. As you increase the number of people, you have to decrease the complexity of the information.

Andy Stanley

With genetic engineering, we will be able to increase the complexity of our DNA, and improve the human race. But it will be a slow process, because one will have to wait about 18 years to see the effect of changes to the genetic code. By contrast, computers double their speed and memories every 18 months. There is a real danger that computers will develop intelligence and take over. We urgently need to develop direct connections to the brain so that computers can add to human intelligence rather than be in opposition.

Stephen Hawking

The formation in geological time of the human body by the laws of physics (or any other laws of similar nature), starting from a random distribution of elementary particles and the field is as unlikely as the separation of the atmosphere into its components. The complexity of the living things has to be present within the material, from which they are derived, or in the laws, governing their formation.

Kurt Gödel

Religion's biggest crime is to slow down the Human's Intellectual Evolution! It creates an illusion as if there is a safe port somewhere. The truth is that there is no safe port; man is in emptiness! Intellectual Evolution is our only chance to build a safe port by ourselves!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

When you increase the number of gardens, you increase the number of heavens too!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

According to the concept of transformational evolution, first clearly articulated by Lamarck, evolution consists of the gradual transformation of organisms from one condition of existence to another.

Ernst Mayr

The Big Bang, the formation of sars and planets, the origin and evolution of life on this planet, the advent of human consciousness and the resultant evolution of cultures - this is the story, the one story, that has the potential to unite us, because it happens to be true.