"Human language can be used to inform or mislead, to clarify 
    one's own thoughts or to display one's cleverness, or simply 
    for play. If I speak with no concern for modifying your 
    behaviour or thoughts, I am not using language any less than 
    if I say exactly the same things with such intention."

   "As far as we know, possession of human language is associated
    with a specific type of mental organisation, not simply a 
    higher degree of intelligence. There seems to be no substance
    to the view that human language is simply a more complex 
    instance of something to be found elsewhere in the animal 
    world."

   "The fact that the mind is a product of natural laws does not 
    imply that it is equipped to understand these laws or to 
    arrive at them by "abduction." There would be no difficulty 
    in designing a device (say, programming a computer) that is a 
    product of natural law, but that, given data, will arrive at 
    any arbitrary absurd theory to "explain" these data."

    -Noam Chomsky (1928- ), Language and Mind (1968)


   "The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to 
    strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow 
    very lively debate within that spectrum - even encourage the 
    more critical and dissident views. That gives people the sense
    that there's free thinking going on, while all the time the 
    presuppositions of the system are being reinforced by the 
    limits put on the range of the debate."

   "... when you come back from the Third World to the West - the 
    U.S. in particular - you are struck by the narrowing of 
    thought and understanding, the limited nature of legitimate 
    discussion, the separation of people from each other. It's 
    startling how stultifying it feels, since our opportunities 
    are so vastly greater here."

   "The goal is a society in which the basic social unit is you 
    and your television set. If the kid next door is hungry, it's 
    not your problem. If the retired couple next door invested 
    their assets badly and are now starving, that's not your 
    problem either."

    -Noam Chomsky (1928- ), The Common Good (1998)