Being Wrong Quotes - Page 3

• Pedantry prides herself on being wrong by rules; while common sense is contented to be right without them.

  Charles Caleb Colton

  Pride, Common Sense, Prudence

  Charles Caleb Colton (1824). “Lacon, Or, Many Things in a Few Words: Addressed to Those who Think”, p.35

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• Good science is done by being curious in general, by asking questions all around, by acknowledging the likelihood of being wrong and taking this in good humor for granted, by having a deep fondness for nature, and by being made jumpy and nervous by ignorance.

  Lewis Thomas

  Motivational, Ignorance, Asking Questions

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• It is not so much that I have confidence in scientists being right, but that I have so much in nonscientists being wrong.

  Isaac Asimov

  Science, Scientist, Have Confidence

  "Quasar, Quasar, Burning Bright". Book by Isaac Asimov, p. 235, 1978.

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• It taught me, at an early age, that being wrong can be dangerous, but being right, when society regards the majority’s falsehood as truth, could be fatal.

  Thomas Szasz

  Age, Majority, Taught

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• When there are no consequences, being wrong is simply a diversion.

  Ian Mcewan

  Diversion, Consequence

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• The cost of being wrong is less than the cost of doing nothing.

  Seth Godin

  Inspiring, Insightful, Marketing

  Seth Godin (2015). “Poke The Box: When Was the Last Time You Did Something for the First Time?”, p.24, Penguin

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• Today, not starting is far, far worse than being wrong. If you start, you've got a shot at evolving and adjusting to turn your wrong into a right. But if you don't start, you never get a chance.

  Seth Godin

  Adjusting, Today, Chance

  Seth Godin (2015). “Poke The Box: When Was the Last Time You Did Something for the First Time?”, p.41, Penguin

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• A sports expert is the guy who writes the best alibis for being wrong

  Jimmy Cannon

  Sports, Writing, Guy

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• Separate yourself from your ideas and your work and see them as something separate from yourself, you’ll feel you truly have the right to be wrong. If an idea fails, why not let it be the idea’s fault instead of your own? Allow your ideas to fail without turning them into personal defeat. When you fail you discover your boundaries. You map out the edges of your capabilities. And this allows you to eventually move beyond them. Being wrong eventually leads to being right. And even where it doesn’t, it’s still a more interesting path than being nothing.

  Steve Pavlina

  Moving, Ideas, Interesting

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• After all we speak of people 'taking refuge' in vagueness -the more precise you are, in general the more likely you are to be wrong, whereas you stand a good chance of not being wrong if you make it vague enough.

  J. L. Austin

  People, Vagueness, Chance

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• The problem in this case was you can't be a middle-aged virgin in America without something being wrong with you. People can't conceive of a virtue in someone else that they can't conceive in themselves. Instead of believing you're stronger, it's so much easier to imagine you're weaker.

  Chuck Palahniuk

  Believe, America, People

  Chuck Palahniuk (2011). “Survivor”, p.195, Random House

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• In their zeal for particular kinds of decisions to be made, those with the vision of the anointed seldom consider the nature of the: process: by which decisions are made. Often what they propose amounts to third-party decision making by people who pay no cost for being wrong-surely one of the least promising ways of reaching decisions satisfactory to those who must live with the consequences.

  Thomas Sowell

  Party, People, Decision

  Thomas Sowell (1995). “The Vision of the Anointed: Self-congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy”, p.129, Basic Books

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• Being too early is indistinguishable from being wrong.

  Tim O'Reilly

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• Value investing is predicated on the efficient market hypothesis being wrong.

  Seth Klarman

  Investing, Hypothesis, Efficient

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• There are literally several levels of SCO being wrong. And even if we were to live in that alternate universe where SCO would be right, they'd still be wrong.

  Linus Torvalds

  Would Be, Levels, Stills

  "Online Extra: Linus Torvalds: SCO Is 'Just Too Wrong'". Interview with Jim Kerstetter, www.bloomberg.com. February 2, 2004.

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• You will get something wrong today, and tomorrow, and every day of your life. So will I, and everybody you know. You don’t have a choice about being wrong sometimes: mistakes will be your life-long companion. But you do have a choice about whether to approach your error in terror so you suppress, ignore and repeat it — or to make it your honest, open ally in trying to get to the truth.

  Johann Hari

  Mistake, Errors, Long

  "When Were You Last Wrong? We Need to Change How We Think About Our Errors" by Johann Hari, www.huffingtonpost.com. August 13, 2010.

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• Persistence and determination are incredibly important. But sometimes you need to analyze the situation and understand when you're wrong. You need to be able to cop to being wrong, learn to change, and continue to grow as a human being.

  Sasha Grey

  Determination, Persistence, Important

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• Investing is not a natural science but rather a social science. So, it's never purely empirical; what you are trying to do is everything you possibly can to enhance your probabilities of being right more often than being wrong.

  William Browne

  Trying, Investing, Natural

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• We want, and must have, a national policy, as to slavery, which deals with it as being wrong.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Slavery, Want, Deals

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• Not only does "orthodox" no longer mean being right, it practically means being wrong.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Mean, Doe, Orthodox

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• Now, I don't mean to say that being wrong is the same thing as being creative. What we do know is, if you're not prepared to be wrong, you'll never come up with anything original. If you're not prepared to be wrong. And by the time they get to be adults, most kids have lost that capacity. They have become frightened of being wrong. And we run our companies like this, by the way, we stigmatize mistakes. And we're now running national education systems where mistakes are the worst thing you can make.

  Ken Robinson

  Running, Business, Mistake

  "How Do Schools Kill Creativity?". "TED Radio Hour" with Guy Raz, www.npr.org. October 03, 2014.

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• I dont go looking for stories with the idea of wrongness in my head, no. But the fact is, a lot of great stories hinge on people being wrong.

  Ira Glass

  Ideas, People, Stories

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• The audience will always forgive you for being wrong and exciting, but never for being right and dull.

  Burt Reynolds

  Forgiving, Dull, Exciting

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• Liberals are constantly wrong. In fact, that's how you rise to the top in liberalism, by being wrong. If you are wrong, and if you are consistently wrong, it's even better. You're really one of them if you're really wrong all the time. Look at Jimmy Carter.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Looks, Facts, Carter

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• It is so easy to be wrong-and to persist in being wrong-when the costs of being wrong are paid by others.

  Thomas Sowell

  Cost, Easy, Persist

  Thomas Sowell (1995). “The Vision of the Anointed: Self-congratulation as a Basis for Social Policy”, p.136, Basic Books

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