Czech Anthropologist Quotes

Ernest Gellner

Aleš Hrdlička

I am deeply sensitive to the spell of nationalism. I can play about thirty Bohemian folk songs... on my mouth-organ. My oldest friend, who is Czech and a patriot, cannot bear to hear me play them because he says I do it in such a schmalzy way, 'crying into the mouth organ'. I do not think I could have written the book on nationalism which I did write, were I not capable of crying, with the help of a little alcohol, over folk songs, which happen to be my favourite form of music.

The phenomena of the universe, brought within the range of human understanding and preserved in memory or writing, constitute knowledge; and systematic search for knowledge, on the basis of the highest standards of learning, is science.

Aleš Hrdlička