Alan WattsThinkers

Action is unnecessary. One doesn't need to do anything, because if one sees oneself in the correct way, one realizes one is just as one is, as much an extraordinary phenomenon of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water, the flickering of fire.

Alienation is the idea that instead of being a body, one 'has' a body. Instead of living and loving one 'has' instincts for survival and copulation.

Anxiety is never helpful. No amount of the stuff makes any difference to anything that is going to happen.

The Art of being is a state of wholeness in which the mind functions freely and easily, without the sensation of a second mind or ego standing over it with a club.

Artificial intelligence is a determination grounded on the idea that 'thinking' is a fraught and loaded term, and as long as a computer can mimic a thinking human, or as he puts it, 'does well in the imitation game', then, regardless of whether it 'is really conscious' it should be said to be 'thinking'.

Attitude is externalized. All that you see out in front of you is how you feel inside your head.

The Baby believes in everything while the adult doubts everything.

Belief is complete for the baby but the adult doubts everything.

Birth is not about 'coming into' this world. It is about coming out of it, just as leaves come out from a tree. Every individual is an expression of the whole realm of nature, a unique action of the total universe.

The Body is a particular and temporarily identifiable wiggle in a stream that enters us in the form of light, heat, air, water, milk, bread, fruit, beer. . .And goes out as gas and excrement, semen, babies, talk, politics, commerce, war, poetry, and music. And philosophy.