Memory has always fascinated me. Think of it. You can recall at will your first day in high school, your first date, your first love.
Eric KandelRead
I was interested in the nature of human mental processes, which is what got me interested in psychoanalysis. And it became clear to me after a while that mental processes come from the brain, and in order to understand them, you need to be a biologist of the brain.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the importance of understanding human mental processes through the lens of biology, particularly neurobiology.
Eric Kandel highlights that our thoughts and mental processes are rooted in the biological functions of the brain. He suggests that to truly understand these processes, one must study the brain's biology, implying that psychological and biological fields are closely interconnected in exploring human nature.
Themes
BrainMental ProcessesPsychoanalysisBiologistUnderstanding
In practice
Example use cases
In a psychology lecture to illustrate the importance of biological studies in understanding mental health.
More from Eric Kandel
All quotes →Psychoanalysis has a degree of unreliability about it. You will never know whether you've found the truth. You may find a subjective truth, but you don't know.
Eric KandelRead
You learn emotional experiences as much as you learn cognitive experiences, except that they are more unconscious. Sometimes one represses the cognitive component of it, but it's often more difficult to repress the emotional component.
Eric KandelRead
Ever since the Enlightenment, people thought that we were living in a rational universe. They thought that God was a mathematician and that the function of the scientist was to figure out the mathematical rules whereby the universe was created.
Eric KandelRead
A brain scan may reveal the neural signs of anxiety, but a Kokoschka painting, or a Schiele self-portrait, reveals what an anxiety state really feels like. Both perspectives are necessary if we are to fully grasp the nature of the mind, yet they are rarely brought together.
Eric KandelRead
In art, as in science, reductionism does not trivialize our perception - of color, light, and perspective - but allows us to see each of these components in a new way.
Eric KandelRead
Similar quotes
Scepticism is as important for a good journalist as it is for a good scientist.
Freeman DysonRead
Agriculture is the backbone of the livelihood security system of nearly 700 million people in the country and we need to build our food security on the foundation of home grown food.
M. S. SwaminathanRead
The incredible diversity oflife on this planet, most of which is microbial, can only beunderstood in an evolutionary framework
Carl WoeseRead
Freedom is the oxygen without which science cannot breathe.
David SarnoffRead
Clouds are not spheres, mountains are not cones, coastlines are not circles, and bark is not smooth, nor does lightning travel in a straight line.
Benoit MandelbrotRead
As a scientist, objectivity is one of my most deeply held values. If we could just try harder, I once thought, surely we could each see the world as others see it and learn to respect one another's views more readily. But I learned from the Pirahas, our expectations, our culture, and our experiences can render even perceptions of the environment nearly incommensurable cross-culturally.
Daniel EverettRead