jacque fresco quotes from investigating behavior - video and highlights

Below is a collection of fascinating quotes from an October 12 2010 talk with Jacques Fresco, the 92-year-old design prodigy who now works with the Venus Project and Zeitgeist Movement. Here is the video of the first video of the five-part discussion.

If you are not familiar with the Venus Project, Fresco recommends that you read his book Designing the Future.

Fresco starts off by emphasizing that the brain cannot be understood without respect to its response to its environment. There must be context of the situation in which the brain is reacting to stimulation. He repeats an argument he makes frequently - that behavior is defined by environment rather than genetics. He emphasizes knowing the difference between human projections and human reactions. The discussion moves in many directions, but it feels natural because of the diversity of issues surrounding investigation of behavior. Fresco's deep wisdom is a very rare find.

You have to take in the whole picture, and ask, "What is it you want? What kind of world do you want?" So, I have drawings of different cities. Those cities have an end goal; they're not just cities. The end goal of those cities is to make things relevant to people that they respond to. There's no other way.

You can teach people specific reasoning, such as how to fly a kite or build a wheel. General reasoning cannot be imparted upon people, particularly if they like things the way they are - meaning, if their reactions are very simple. The reason most people behave badly or poorly is because they understand simple things.

Loving is not meeting another's needs. It's giving that person the tools they need to meet their own needs. . . An innovative mind is not an inborn process. It's a person with a hell of a lot of tools.

You can never be free - you cannot be free of your background.

The Zietgiest movement should be a system that indoctrinates people to a working system that's beneficial to most people.

People say to me, "Will people be happier in the future?" They're using today's standards for the future. Happiness is not what people need. What they need is security and evaluation of the real world. That brings equilibrium. And, to the extent that your notions of the world are unreal, you will suffer.

The question of how the brain works cannot be studied independently of culture. . . We all live within the trap of time and culture.

Senators make laws, but they can't change natural law.

All single [isolated] professions will disappear in the future - I have no question of it. You have to be so general. I can't use the word "all-encompassing."

The only way you should feel depressed - there are real reasons. If Hitler won the war and put you in solitary confinement, you would feel depressed. If you were around 500 normal people, they can make you feel depressed - they can cut you out. But, it depends how much you know about normal people so they you don't let them do that to you. You know how far you can go - or you think you know how far you can go. You'll find out fast enough.

Of particular interest are quotes which remind me of the work of the psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. If you are familiar with his work, you will probably won't be too surprised to see his concepts unintentionally emerging from another great thinker.

If all things keep changing, how can you become sane? We can become sane-er, but never sane. Sane meaning the most upward behavior to fit a given set of circumstances. . . Wiser, never wise. Smarter, never smart. When somebody asks, "What's the answer to all of these questions?" that's absurd. There is no answer, there are answers, along the way.

The purpose of language is not to communicate. It is to control other people.

A neurologist can measure reactions the brain may have. He can draw a map of feelings, depression - he can map out the brain, look for toxins in the brain. But, he can't understand the mind, he can't understand that it's a responding organism. That's all you have, is an associative system. You can never become sane. If there's a society that claims to achieve the ultimate, there can be no such thing (ultimate means they are all dead). We don't adjust - we are made that way by circumstances. We either do, or we are locked up. There are people out there who believe that what they have in their head is the real world. They end up in institutions. But, what they have is only their unique differences. If a person says they are not well mentally, say, "What is it that you want?" - "I want a fair relationship with people." Well, if you went to live in a Seminal Indian village, if you don't speak their language, you'll never get along with them. So, do you want to be a Seminal Indian, or do you want to be YOU, in their village? You can't be you in the village. You have to change the village. It's almost impossible - they'll kill you.

Language is an attempt at controlling other people. It is not a mechanism. It is an attempt.

You have to remember, you are drifting away from the average person. You have to update your communication - or try. If you're not working with the people around you, you can get lost. They might say, "What are you, a perfectionist?" - they have no other words. A perfectionist is a guy who died - that's it. You can't be a perfectionist. You can be particular about things. Just get away from the wholistic words, like "truth." I've said this before, in order to tell the truth, you have to know everything.