Bias Quotes

• Human beings are poor examiners, subject to superstition, bias, prejudice, and a PROFOUND tendency to see what they want to see rather than what is really there.

  M. Scott Peck

  Profound, Prejudice, Want

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• There is no neutrality. There is only greater or lesser awareness of one's bias.

  Phyllis Rose

  Acceptance, Judging, Neutrality

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• Bias, like beauty, is often in the eye of the beholder. Facts are your firewall against bias.

  Tom Brokaw

  Eye, Facts, Beholder

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• We can at least try to understand our own motives, passions, and prejudices, so as to be conscious of what we are doing when we apeal to those of others. This is very difficult, because our own prejudice and emotional bias always seems to us so rational.

  T. S. Eliot

  Passion, Emotional, Justice

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• What a sad era when it is easier to smash an atom than a prejudice.

  Albert Einstein

  Inspirational, Sad, Spiritual

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• Listening without bias or distraction is the greatest value you can pay another person.

  Denis Waitley

  Motivational, Listening, Pay

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• No man is allowed to be a judge in his own cause, because his interest would certainly bias his judgment.

  James Madison

  Men, Judging, Causes

  James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay (2016). “The Federalist Papers: The Making of the US Constitution”, p.43, Arcturus Publishing

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• Fortunately for serious minds, a bias recognized is a bias sterilized.

  Benjamin Haydon

  Mind, Prejudice, Serious

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• A gentleman can see a question from all sides without bias.
  The small man is biased and can see a question only from one side.

  Confucius

  Men, Gentleman, Sides

  Confucius “The Analects”, W. W. Norton & Company

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• It is doubtless impossible to approach any human problems with a mind free from bias.

  Simone de Beauvoir

  Mind, Impossible, Problem

  Simone de Beauvoir (1953). “The second sex”, Vintage

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• Bias and impartiality is in the eye of the beholder.

  Samuel Johnson

  Eye, Perspective, Beholder

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• There are only two ways to be quite unprejudiced and impartial. One is to be completely ignorant. The other is to be completely indifferent. Bias and prejudice are attitudes to be kept in hand, not attitudes to be avoided.

  Charles Curtis

  Attitude, Hands, Bias And Prejudice

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• Everybody is sitting around saying, 'Well, jeez, we need somebody to solve this problem of bias.' That somebody is us. We all have to try to figure out a better way to get along.

  Wilma Mankiller

  Tolerance, Trying, Prejudice

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• A man without a bias cannot write interesting history - if indeed such a man exists.

  Bertrand Russell

  Writing, Men, History

  Bertrand Russell (2014). “The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell”, p.465, Routledge

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• If a person is capable of rectifying his erroneous judgments in the light of new evidence he is not prejudiced. Prejudgments become prejudices only if they are reversible when exposed to new knowledge. A prejudice, unlike a simple misconception, is actively resistant to all evidence that would unseat it. We tend to grow emotional when a prejudice is threatened with contradiction. Thus the difference between ordinary prejudgments and prejudice is that one can discuss and rectify a prejudgment without emotional resistance.

  Gordon Allport

  Simple, Emotional, Light

  "The Nature of Prejudice" by Gordon Allport, (p. 9), 1954.

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• Mental illness is nothing to be ashamed of, but stigma and bias shame us all.

  William J. Clinton

  Healing, Bipolar, Helpful

  "10 Male Celebrities Who Are Smashing Mental Health Stereotypes" by Lindsay Holmes, www.huffingtonpost.com. June 16, 2016.

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• Bias has to be taught. If you hear your parents downgrading women or people of different backgrounds, why, you are going to do that.

  Barbara Bush

  Women, People, Parent

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• Of all the causes which conspire to blind Man's erring judgement, and misguide the mind, What the weak head with strongest bias rules, Is PRIDE, the never-failing vice of fools.

  Alexander Pope

  Failure, Pride, Men

  Alexander Pope (1808). “The poetical works of Alexander Pope. To which is prefixed the life of the author”, p.54

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• It is a well known fact that reality has liberal bias.

  Stephen Colbert

  Reality, Facts, Well Known

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• Bias and prejudice are attitudes to be kept in hand, not attitudes to be avoided.

  Charles Curtis

  Attitude, Hands, Bias And Prejudice

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• The human mind can hardly remain entirely free from bias, and decisive opinions are often formed before a thorough examination of a subject from all its aspects has been made.

  H. P. Blavatsky

  Mind, Examination, Opinion

  H. P. Blavatsky (2011). “The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion, and Philosophy”, p.17, Cambridge University Press

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• Two quite opposite qualities equally bias our minds - habits and novelty.

  Jean de la Bruyere

  Opposites, Two, Mind

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• The bias of the mainstream media is toward sensationalism, conflict, and laziness.

  Jon Stewart

  Media, Laziness, Conflict

  Interview with Chris Wallace, www.foxnews.com. June 19, 2011.

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• Would there not be the greatest reason to apprehend, that error in the first sentence would be the parent of error in the second sentence? That the strong bias of one decision would be apt to overrule the influence of any new lights, which might be brought to vary the complexion of another decision? Those, who know any thing of human nature, will not hesitate to answer these questions in the affirmative.

  Alexander Hamilton

  Strong, Light, Errors

  Thomas Paine, Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, John Jay (2017). “The Origin of the Nation: Declaration of Independence, Constitution, Bill of Rights and Other Amendments, Federalist Papers & Common Sense: Creating America - Landmark Documents that Shaped a New Nation”, p.378, Madison & Adams Press

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• Reality looks much more obvious in hindsight than in foresight. People who experience hindsight bias misapply current hindsight to past foresight. They perceive events that occurred to have been more predictable before the fact than was actually the case.

  Hersh Shefrin

  Past, Reality, People

  Hersh Shefrin (2000). “Beyond Greed and Fear: Understanding Behavioral Finance and the Psychology of Investing”, p.110, Oxford University Press

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