5 Quotes by Jaak Panksepp

When scientific conversations cease, then dogma rather than knowledge begins to rule the day.

The propensity to play is situated in very ancient regions of the brain. Rats that have had their neocortex removed still engage in normal play.

Descartes’ s faith in his assertion “I think, therefore I am” may be superseded by a more primitive affirmation that is part of the genetic makeup of all mammals: “I feel, therefore I am.”34 Evolutionary.

Skepticism is certainly a beneficial tool, to the extent that it yields a dialectic of ideas that can progress toward empirical resolution of difficult issues, but at present it is too commonly an attitude, a well-cultivated academic pretense, that leads to the neglect of important problems.

It is all too easy to accept emotions as primitive “givens” and proceed toward a superficial understanding based on words, arbitrary definitions, and the quiddities of logic rather than biology.