17 Quotes & Sayings By Timothy Leary

Timothy Leary was born on June 22, 1920 in Springfield, Massachusetts. He received his undergraduate degree from Harvard University in 1941 and his Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of California at Berkeley in 1950. He received his LLD (Honoris Causa) from the University of Hawaii in 1991 Read more

In 1964, Dr. Leary became a clinical professor at Harvard Medical School and a research psychologist at the Veterans Administration Hospital at Lexington, MA. In 1969, Dr.

Leary was fired from Harvard after he made a speech advocating the use of psychedelic chemicals for psychological purposes, including the treatment of mental illness and addiction. In 1971 Dr. Leary was indicted for possession of LSD and sentenced to 2 years in prison, but was released on appeal after serving 11 months due to ill health.

Dr. Leary died on August 3, 1996 from complications of lung cancer.

We seem to inhabit a universe made up of a...
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We seem to inhabit a universe made up of a small number of elements-particles-bits that swirl in chaotic clouds, occasionally clustering together in geometrically logical temporary configurations. Timothy Leary
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And a new philosophy emerged called quantum physics, which suggest that the individual’s function is to inform and be informed. You really exist only when you’re in a field sharing and exchanging information. You create the realities you inhabit. Timothy Leary
I declare that The Beatles are mutants. Prototypes of evolutionary...
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I declare that The Beatles are mutants. Prototypes of evolutionary agents sent by God, endowed with a mysterious power to create a new human species, a young race of laughing freemen. Timothy Leary
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The level of intelligence has been tremendously increased, because people are thinking and communicating in terms of screens, and not in lettered books. Much of the real action is taking place in what is called cyberspace. People have learned how to boot up, activate, and transmit their brains. Essentially, there’s a universe inside your brain. The number of connections possible inside your brain is limitless. And as people have learned to have more managerial and direct creative access to their brains, they have also developed matrices or networks of people that communicate electronically. There are direct brain/computer link-ups. You can just jack yourself in and pilot your brain around in cyberspace-electronic space. Timothy Leary
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In the information-communication civilization of the 21st Century, creativity and mental excellence will become the ethical norm. The world will be too dynamic, complex, and diversified, too cross-linked by the global immediacies of modern (quantum) communication, for stability of thought or dependability of behaviour to be successful. Timothy Leary
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Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition. Timothy Leary
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LSD is a psychedelic drug which occasionally causes psychotic behavior in people who have NOT taken it. Timothy Leary
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At the sensory level I am the divine receiving station..a two-legged, trembling-tissue, Jodrell Bank radar telescope, dancing, grumbling, sniffling Geiger counter"" But there's an added feature. Each generation, I..return. Each time carried onstage, blinking, puking, bawling, bewildered by the bizarre novelty of each new drama, untutored in the language of the new script (did she say her name was Mommie?) . Timothy Leary
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Throughout human history, as our species has faced the frightening, terrorizing fact that we do not know who we are, or where we are going in this ocean of chaos, it has been the authorities, the political, the religious, the educational authorities who attempted to comfort us by giving us order, rules, regulations, informing, forming in our minds their view of reality. To think for yourself you must question authority and learn how to put yourself in a state of vulnerable, open-mindedness; chaotic, confused, vulnerability to inform yourself. Timothy Leary
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Science is all metaphor. Timothy Leary
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In the information age, you don't teach philosophy as they did after feudalism. You perform it. If Aristotle were alive today he'd have a talk show. Timothy Leary
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The universe is an intelligence test. Timothy Leary
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We are dealing with the best-educated generation in history. But they've got a brain dressed up with nowhere to go. Timothy Leary
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Learning how to operate a soul figures to take time. Timothy Leary
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You're only as young as the last time you changed your mind. Timothy Leary
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Civilization is unbearable, but it is less unbearable at the top. Timothy Leary