Errors Quotes - Page 39

• Prejudice for regularity and simplicity is a source of error that has only too often infected philosophy.

  Roger Joseph Boscovich

  Philosophy, Science, Simplicity

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• Developing fewer features allows you to conserve development resources and spend more time refining those features that users really need. Fewer features mean fewer things to confuse users, less risk of user errors, less description and documentation, and therefore simpler Help content. Removing any one feature automatically increases the usability of the remaining ones.

  Jakob Nielsen

  Mean, Simplicity, Risk

  Jakob Nielsen, Hoa Loranger (2006). “Prioritizing Web Usability”, p.519, Pearson Education

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• Fascism was an emergency makeshift. To view it as something more would be a fatal error.

  Ludwig von Mises

  Views, Would Be, Emergencies

  Ludwig Von Mises (1962). “The free and prosperous commonwealth: an exposition of the ideas of classical liberalism”

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• The ideas which now pass for brilliant innovations and advances are in fact mere revivals of ancient errors, and a further proof of the dictum that those who are ignorant of the past are condemned to repeat it.

  Henry Hazlitt

  Past, Ideas, Innovation

  Henry Hazlitt (2010). “Economics in One Lesson: The Shortest and Surest Way to Understand Basic Economics”, p.6, Crown Business

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• In vain do we seek tranquility in the desert; temptations are always with us; our passions, represented by the demons, never let us alone: those monsters created by the heart, those illusions produced by the mind, those vain specters that are our errors and our lies always appear before us to seduce us; they attack us even in our fasting or our mortifications, in other words, in our very strength.

  Baron de Montesquieu

  Lying, Passion, Heart

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• If for every error and every act of incompetence one can substitute an act of treason, many points of fascinating interpretation are open to the paranoid imagination.

  Richard Hofstadter

  Imagination, Incompetence, Substitutes

  Richard Hofstadter (2016). “The Paranoid Style in American Politics: An Essay: from The Paranoid Style in American Politics”, p.19, Vintage

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• My mind is incapable of conceiving such a thing as a soul. I may be in error, and man may have a soul; but I simply do not believe it.

  Thomas A. Edison

  Believe, Men, Interesting

  "Mr. Edison's New Argument from Design". "The Illustrated London News" Magazine, May 3, 1924.

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• The empire of Christ the King includes not only Catholic nations, not only baptized persons who, though of right belonging to the Church, have been led astray by error, or have been cut off from her by schism, but also all those who are outside the Christian faith: so that truly the whole of mankind is subject to the power of Jesus Christ.

  Pope Leo XIII

  Christian, Jesus, Kings

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• Most people define learning too narrowly as mere 'problem-solving', so they focus on identifying and correcting errors in the external environment. Solving problems is important. But if learning is to persist, managers and employees must also look inward. The need to reflect critically on their own behaviour, identify the ways they often inadvertently contribute to the organisation’s problems, and then change how they act.

  Chris Argyris

  People, Focus, Important

  "Teaching Smart People How to Learn". hbr.org. June 1991.

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• He [Thelonious Monk] played each note as though astonished by the previous one, as though every touch of his fingers on the keyboard was correcting an error and this touch in turn became an error to be corrected and so the tune never quite ended up the way it was meant to.

  Geoff Dyer

  Tunes, Never Quit, Keyboards

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• There must be no barriers to freedom of inquiry... There is no place for dogma in science. The scientist is free, and must be free to ask any question, to doubt any assertion, to seek for any evidence, to correct any errors. Our political life is also predicated on openness. We know that the only way to avoid error is to detect it and that the only way to detect it is to be free to inquire. And we know that as long as men are free to ask what they must, free to say what they think, free to think what they will, freedom can never be lost, and science can never regress.

  J. Robert Oppenheimer

  Freedom, Science, Men

  "J. Robert Oppenheimer" by L. Barnett in Life Magazine, Volume 7, No. 9, International Edition (p. 58), October 24, 1949.

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• Power must be used, but it must be tempered by soul-searching and the recognition of our human capacity for error. That is the maxim that should inform our approach to every challenge, from reforming state government to engaging in foreign affairs.

  Eliot Spitzer

  Government, Challenges, Soul

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• My loyalty to my people, to our people, and to Israel comes first and prevents me from saying anything critical of Israel outside Israel… As a Jew I see my role as a melitz yosher, a defender of Israel: I defend even her mistakes… I must identify with whatever Israel does – even with her errors.

  Elie Wiesel

  Loyalty, Mistake, Israel

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• The low view of God entertained almost universally among Christians is the cause of a hundred lesser evils everywhere among us.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Christian, Religious, Philosophy

  "The Knowledge of the Holy: The Attributes of God: Their Meaning in the Christian Life".

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• The unattended garden will soon be overrun with weeds; the heart that fails to cultivate truth and root out error will shortly be a theological wilderness.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Weed, Heart, Garden

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• Where error is irreparable, repentance is useless.

  Edward Gibbon

  Useless, Repentance, Irreparable

  Edward Gibbon (2008). “The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire”, p.35, Cosimo, Inc.

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• My dog doesn't worry about the meaning of life.  She may worry if she doesn't get her breakfast, but she doesn't sit around worrying whether she will get fulfilled or liberated or enlightened.  As long as she gets some food and a little affection, her life is fine.  But we human beings are not like dogs.  We have self-centered minds which get us into plenty of trouble.  If we do not come to understand the error in the way we think, our self-awareness, which is our greatest blessing, is also our downfall.

  Joko Beck

  Dog, Thinking, Blessing

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• It is possible to be a meta-physician without believing in a transcendent reality; for we shall see that many metaphysical utterances are due to the commission of logical errors, rather than to a conscious desire on the part of their authors to go beyond the limits of experience.

  A.J. Ayer

  Believe, Reality, Desire

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• Training errors are recorded on paper. Tactical errors are etched in stone.

  Erwin Rommel

  Training, Paper, Stones

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• High leverage is unsafe, not just for a company but the entire economy... LBOs are reducing the safety. Management loses the power to do many things. It has no margin for error and less margin for additional risk.

  Franco Modigliani

  Safety, Risk, Management

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• The kinds of errors that cause plane crashes are invariably errors of teamwork and communication.

  Malcolm Gladwell

  Teamwork, Communication, Risk

  Malcolm Gladwell (2008). “Outliers: The Story of Success”, p.127, Penguin UK

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• Anger makes us strong, Blind and impatient, And it leads us wrong; The strength is quickly lost; We feel the error long.

  George Crabbe

  Strength, Strong, Anger

  George Crabbe, John Crabbe (1834). “The poetical works of the Rev. George Crabbe: in eight volumes”, p.52

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• Testing by itself does not improve software quality. Test results are an indicator of quality, but in and of themselves, they don't improve it. Trying to improve software quality by increasing the amount of testing is like trying to lose weight by weighing yourself more often. What you eat before you step onto the scale determines how much you will weigh, and the software development techniques you use determine how many errors testing will find. If you want to lose weight, don't buy a new scale; change your diet. If you want to improve your software, don't test more; develop better.

  Steve McConnell

  Code Quality, Simplicity, Trying

  Steve McConnell (2004). “Code Complete”, p.501, Pearson Education

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• We hoped for a happy termination of this terrible war long before this; but God knows best, and has ruled otherwise. We shall yet acknowledge His wisdom and our own error therein.

  Abraham Lincoln

  Religious, War, Long

  Abraham Lincoln, H. Jack Lang (2005). “The Wit and Wisdom of Abraham Lincoln as Reflected in His Briefer Letters and Speeches”, p.240, Stackpole Books

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• We ought not to look back, unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dear bought experience. To enveigh against things that are past and irremediable, is unpleasing; but to steer clear of the shelves and rocks we have struck upon, is the part of wisdom, equally as incumbent on political as other men, who have their own little bark, or that of others, to navigate through the intricate paths of life, or the trackless ocean, to the haven of security and rest.

  George Washington

  Ocean, Past, Men

  George Washington, David Maydole Matteson (1781). “The Writings of George Washington from the Original Manuscript Sources, 1745-1799”, p.378

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