Quotes About Development

phenotypic plasticity

Learning to play a musical instrument even alters the structure of the brain, from subcortical circuits that encode sound patterns to neural fibers that connect the two cerebral hemispheres and patterns of gray matter density in certain regions of the cerebral cortex.

What drove the hominins on through to larger brains, higher intelligence, and thence language-based culture? That, of course, is the question of questions.

The idea and its supporting logic came in pieces

A great deal remains to be learned about the genetic control of brain development

The great challenge of the twenty-first century is to raise people everywhere to a decent standard of living while preserving as much of the rest of life as possible.

To explore and affiliate with life is a deep and complicated process in mental development. To an extent still undervalued in philosophy and religion, our existence depends on this propensity, our spirit is woven from it hope rises on its currents.

A woman, no matter the age, is always learning, always becoming. But a man . . . stops learning at fourteen or so.

A man does not learn very well, Mr. Robbins. Women, yes, because they are used to bending with whatever wind comes along. A woman, no matter the age, is always learning, always becoming. But a man, if you will pardon me, stops learning at fourteen or so. He shuts it all down, Mr. Robbins. A log is capable of learning more than a man. To teach a man would be a battle, a war, and I would lose.

Evolution is not stupid, and works much faster than most people realize.

Humans transform the world through our creative technologies, and we cannot survive without them.

As the developmental psychologist Alison Gopnik and her colleagues have observed, general intelligence, behavioral flexibility, ability to solve novel problems, and a reliance on learning from others tends to roughly correlate with an extended period of helpless immaturity.13 This relationship is found across a broad range of animals, including birds and mammals, suggesting that it tracks a fundamental evolutionary trade-off between narrow competence and creative flexibility.

Every problem contains within itself the seeds of its own solution.

Rome wasn't deconstructed in a day.

Sanctification is like a clumsy, slow walk rather than a light switch that we turn from off to on.

Engineers are, by definition, people whose work is dedicated to making people's lives easier; or, as people used to say, whose work is dedicated to progress.

Today's science is tomorrow's technology.

Object relations theorists are interested in understanding how formative interactions between parents and children become internalized by the child and, akin to cognitive schemas, serve as mental representations that shape or guide how children establish and carry out subsequent relationships with others.

Family systems theory offers therapists an invaluable way of understanding their clients' strengths and problems—clarifying the familial rules, roles, myths, communication patterns, and boundary issues that defined their clients' development.

From the lowest animals of which we can affirm intelligence up to man this type of intellect is found.

A great tree grows from two soft leaves To spread its shade afar.

It's the guessing that develops a man's brain power. Just consider what you have to do to guess right.

Inconsistencies in men are generally testimony to their immaturity.

We all are blind until we seeThat in the human planNothing is worth the making ifIt does not make the man. Why build these cities gloriousIf man unbuilded goes?In vain we build the world, unlessThe builder also grows.