13 Quotes & Sayings By Robert Winston

Sir Robert Winston is a British psychologist and Professor of Science at Cambridge University. He has been a member of the British Psychological Society since 1981. He was born in Sussex, England on January 22, 1940 and grew up in a household where books were a constant presence. He studied at the University of London where he obtained his first degree in psychology and then studied medicine at St Read more

Thomas's Hospital, London. At St. Thomas's he discovered his love for teaching and decided to pursue a career as a psychologist.

In 1975 he received his PhD from the University of Cambridge and has been lecturing there ever since.

1
I think that good parenting should allow children to be children. That naivety and slightly open way of looking at the world is very valuable. Robert Winston
2
I did not study science at school until I was 13, when I was totally turned on by a seemingly dreary old teacher who suddenly, unannounced, manufactured a huge explosion in the middle of a totally boring monologue. From then on, all of his class wanted to make explosions. Robert Winston
3
I don't believe in regretting - one should try to move on. My mum was good at that. She was deeply in love with my father, and he died when I was nine. She remarried, and her second husband died, too. I saw the grieving process she went through. My mother had this way of moving on. It was a fine trait. Robert Winston
4
Now we have technology where we can modify the genomics of individuals by gene transfer and genetic meddling, we may find that people will want to modify their children, enhance their intelligence, their strength and their beauty and all the other so-called desirable characteristics. Robert Winston
5
Of course it is a very simple matter to identify genes which might modify intelligence or memory and start thinking about whether you want to enhance a human, and the next generation is going to have to deal with that issue. Should we be trying to enhance humans rather than trying to educate them and so on? Robert Winston
6
By discovering how our minds work, we can improve our learning power and unlock our true potential. Robert Winston
7
Religion has endured since the dawn of human consciousness precisely because it encompasses so much of being human. No idea has endured so long, gathered up so many disparate needs and wants and feelings, and inspired so many different paths towards understanding it. Robert Winston
8
Childhood depression tends to be more common in inner cities, being most frequently related to serious social deprivation, bullying, domestic violence, wartime experience and famine. It is, for example, a serious problem among children who are traumatised refugees. Robert Winston
9
I went to school with butterflies of fear every day for years - from primary school onwards - not just worried about being bullied by classmates, but by teachers. Robert Winston
10
My first vote was for a communist in east London when I was a medical student. But I've voted Tory, Labour and Lib Dem in my time. Robert Winston
11
I've been all over the world on my own because, as a scientist, you travel a great deal if your work is reasonably successful or published. I get invitations to go to all sorts of strange countries where I would mostly be by myself and just meet other people there, instead of having travelling companions. Robert Winston
12
Nearly all inventions are not recognised for their positive side either when they're made. So, for example, scientists didn't go out to design a CD machine: they designed a laser. But we got all sorts of things from a laser which we never remotely imagined, and we're still finding things for a laser to do. Robert Winston