This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, native form is Csíkszentmihályi Mihály
Moral codes have become necessary because evolution, in liberating humankind from complete dependence on instincts, has also made it possible for us to act with malice that no organism ruled by instincts alone could possess.
Dependence | Evolution | Malice | Moral codes |
Mortimer J. Adler, fully Mortimer Jerome Adler
The teacher is like the farmer or the physician. The farmer doesn’t produce the grains of the field; he merely helps them grow. The physician does not produce the health of the body; he merely helps the body maintain its health or regain its health. And the teacher does not produce knowledge in the mind; he merely helps the mind discover it for itself.
The best teacher is not necessarily the one who possesses the most knowledge but the one who most effectively enables his students to believe in their ability to learn.
Experience is a good teacher but she runs up big bills.
Experience | Good | Teacher |
Time is the teacher most sublime.
Nāgārjuna, fully Acharya Nāgārjuna NULL
Things derive their being and nature by mutual dependence and are nothing in themselves.
Dependence | Nature | Nothing |
A book is the most delightful companion.. An inanimate thing, yet it talks... It stimulates your latent talents. There is in the world no friend more faithful and attentive, no teacher more proficient... It will join you in solitude, accompany you in exile, serve as a candle in the dark, and entertain you in you loneliness. It will do you good, and ask no favor in return. It gives, and does not take.
Friend | Good | Loneliness | Solitude | Will | World | Teacher |
Mortimer J. Adler, fully Mortimer Jerome Adler
The teacher does not produce knowledge in the mind; he merely helps the mind discover it for itself.
Addictive spirituality creates dependence in the practitioner (frequently to authoritarian leaders and their communities), an avoidance of personal responsibility, and loss of individuality through social controls, such as fear, guilt, or greed for power or bliss. It also tends to suppress rational inquiry into the teachings. Healthy spirituality, on the other hand, supports the practitioner's freedom, autonomy, self-esteem, and social responsibility. It is based on experience, rather than belief or dogma; it does not create idols out of spiritual teachers; and it empowers students by emphasizing democratic forms of learning and teaching, rather than the authoritarian model that has dominated spiritual life for millennia.
Belief | Dependence | Dogma | Esteem | Experience | Fear | Freedom | Greed | Guilt | Individuality | Inquiry | Learning | Life | Life | Model | Power | Responsibility | Self | Self-esteem | Spirituality | Loss |
Everyone who remembers his own educational experience remembers teachers, not methods and techniques. The teacher is the kingpin of the educational situation. He makes or breaks programs.
Experience | Teacher |
Thomas Szasz, fully Thomas Stephen Szasz
A teacher should have maximal authority, and minimal power.
Wilferd Peterson, fully Wilferd Arlan Peterson
The art of humility begins with a recognition of our dependence on others and an appreciation of God’s gift of life... He discovers that those of a gentle spirit do have the earth for their possession; that humility opens the gates of the mind and heart so greatness can flow through.
Appreciation | Art | Dependence | Earth | God | Greatness | Heart | Humility | Life | Life | Mind | Spirit | Appreciation | Art |
Bertrand Russell, fully Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
Reverence requires imagination and vital warmth; it requires least actual achievement or power. The child is weak and superficially foolish, the teacher is strong, and in an everyday sense wiser than the child. The teacher without reverence, or the bureaucrat without reverence, easily despises the child for these outward inferiorities.
Achievement | Imagination | Power | Reverence | Sense | Child | Teacher |
A teacher who tends to lower the self-esteem and confidence of his students should either change this tendency or change professions. One of the most important lessons an educator can convey to students is that they have inherent worth and should strive to utilize their potential.
Change | Confidence | Esteem | Important | Self | Self-esteem | Worth | Teacher |
Desiderius Erasmus Roterodamus, sometimes known as Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam
I have no patience with the stupidity of the average teacher of grammar who wastes precious years in hammering rules into children's heads. For it is not by learning rules that we acquire the powers of speaking a language, but by daily intercourse with those accustomed to express themselves with exactness and refinement and by copious reading of the best authors.
Children | Language | Learning | Patience | Reading | Refinement | Stupidity | Teacher |