Just as modern mass production requires the standardization of commodities, so the social process requires standardization of man, and this standardization is called equality. – Erich Fromm
Mans biological weakness is the condition of human culture. – Erich Fromm
Understanding a person does not mean condoning; it only means that one does not accuse him as if one were God or a judge placed above him. – Erich Fromm
The most beautiful as well as the most ugly inclinations of man are not part of a fixed biologically given human nature, but result from the social process which creates man. – Erich Fromm
It is well to know something of the manners of various peoples, in order more sanely to judge our own, and that we do not think that everything against our modes is ridiculous, and against reason, as those who have seen nothing are accustomed to think. РRen̩ Descartes, Discourse on the Method, 1637 (translated)