John Fletcher

“In the case of human exceptionalism, the story conceals the possibility that there might be alternatives to encountering the more-than-human world through the lens of mechanistic thought. It also conceals the possibility that there might be (self)consciousness, intelligence, and agency beyond the species divide.”
― Martin Lee Mueller, Being Salmon, Being Human: Encountering the Wild in Us and Us in the Wild

“As Neil Evernden has pointed out, our freedom lies not primordially in our actions within a story, but rather in the choosing of our story.”
― Martin Lee Mueller, Being Salmon, Being Human: Encountering the Wild in Us and Us in the Wild

“The development of a kind of local patriotism for the firm, of an “esprit de corps” similar to that of college and university students, as recommended by Wyatt and other British social psychologists, would only reinforce the asocial and egotistical attitude which is the essence of alienation. All such suggestions in favor of “team” enthusiasm ignore the fact that there is only one truly social orientation, namely the one of solidarity with mankind. Social cohesion within the group, combined with antagonism to the outsider, is not social feeling but extended egotism.”
― Erich Fromm, The Sane Society

“When a man follows the way of the world, or the way of the flesh, or the way of tradition (i.e. when he believes in religious rites and the letter of the scriptures, as though they were intrinsically sacred), knowledge of Reality cannot arise in him.”
― Aldous Huxley, The Perennial Philosophy: An Interpretation of the Great Mystics, East and West