Alfred Korzybski

Recent publications · Crossref

5 total works indexed

1. Synthesis of graphene-based nanosheets via chemical reduction of exfoliated graphite oxide

   · 2007 · cited 13,055x

2. Mutation and Cancer: Statistical Study of Retinoblastoma

   · 1971 · cited 5,380x

3. G PROTEINS: TRANSDUCERS OF RECEPTOR-GENERATED SIGNALS

   · 1987 · cited 4,971x

4. Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics—2022 Update: A Report From the American Heart Association

   · 2022 · cited 4,700x

5. The Somatic Genomic Landscape of Glioblastoma

   · 2013 · cited 4,432x

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Quotes

• “To regard human beings as tools — as instruments — for the use of other human beings is not only unscientific but it is repugnant, stupid and short sighted. Tools are made by man but have not the autonomy of their maker — they have not man's time-binding capacity for initiation, for self-direction, and self-improvement.”
• “There is a fundamental confusion between the notion of the older 'semantics' as connected with a theory of verbal 'meaning' and words defined by words, and the present theory of 'general semantics' where we deal only with neuro-semantic and neuro-linguistic living reactions of Smith, Smith, etc., as their reactions to neuro-semantic and neuro-linguistic environments as environments.”
• “The map is not the territory … The only usefulness of a map depends on similarity of structure between the empirical world and the map...”
• “Any organism must be treated as-a-whole; in other words, that an organism is not an algebraic sum, a linear function of its elements, but always more than that. It is seemingly little realized, at present, that this simple and innocent-looking statement involves a full structural revision of our language...”
• “The main thesis of this non-Aristotelian system is that as yet we all (with extremely few exceptions) copy animals in our nervous processes, and that practically all human difficulties, mental ills … have this … component.”
• “Man's achievements rest upon the use of symbols.... we must consider ourselves as a symbolic, semantic class of life, and those who rule the symbols, rule us.”

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Key facts

Born

Alfred Habdank Skarbek Korzybski , ( 1879-07-03 ) July 3, 1879, Warsaw , Vistula Country , Russian Empire

Died

March 1, 1950 (1950-03-01) (aged 70), Lakeville, Connecticut , U.S.

Known for

Science and Sanity (1933)

Spouse

Mira Edgerly ​ ( married</span>"}]]}'>m. 1919 ) ​

Alma mater

Warsaw University of Technology

Era

Modern philosophy 20th-century philosophy

Region

Western philosophy American philosophy Polish philosophy

Institutions

Institute of General Semantics

Main interests

Engineering Logic Mathematics Philosophy Semantics

Notable ideas

General semantics , The map is not the territory

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Wikidata facts

Image

Alfred Korzybski.jpg

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