Ignorance Quotes - Page 35

• Suppose that we are wise enough to learn and know - and yet not wise enough to control our learning and knowledge, so that we use it to destroy ourselves? Even if that is so, knowledge remains better than ignorance. It is better to know - even if the knowledge endures only for the moment that comes before destruction - than to gain eternal life at the price of a dull and swinish lack of comprehension of a universe that swirls unseen before us in all its wonder. That was the choice of Achilles, and it is mine, too.

  Isaac Asimov

  Life, Wise, Wisdom

  "The New Hugo Winners". Book by Isaac Asimov et al., p. 215, 1989.

  11 Copy quote

  Show source

• Even in Europe a change has sensibly taken place in the mind of man. Science has liberated the ideas of those who read and reflect, and the American example has kindled feelings of right in the people. An insurrection has consequently begun of science talents and courage against rank and birth, which have fallen into contempt. It has failed in its first effort, because the mobs of the cities, the instrument used for its accomplishment, debased by ignorance, poverty and vice, could not be restrained to rational action. But the world will soon recover from the panic of this first catastrophe.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Change, Taken, Science

  Thomas Jefferson (1977). “The Portable Thomas Jefferson”, p.426, Penguin

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• It was a reaction from the old idea of "protoplasm", a name which was a mere repository of ignorance.

  John B. S. Haldane

  Science, Names, Ideas

  7 Copy quote

• This therefore is Mathematics: She reminds you of the invisible forms of the soul; She gives life to her own discoveries; She awakens the mind and purifies the intellect; She brings light to our intrinsic ideas; She abolishes oblivion and ignorance which are ours by birth.

  Proclus

  Life, Science, Light

  26 Copy quote

• The library card is a passport to wonders and miracles, glimpses into other lives, religions, experiences, the hopes and dreams and strivings of ALL human beings, and it is this passport that opens our eyes and hearts to the world beyond our front doors, that is one of our best hopes against tyranny, xenophobia, hopelessness, despair, anarchy, and ignorance.

  Libba Bray

  Dream, Xenophobia, Book

  22 Copy quote

• Concentration is not thinking of one thing. On the contrary, it is excluding all thoughts, since all thoughts obstruct the sense of one's true being. All efforts are to be directed simply to removing the veil of ignorance. Concentrating the mind solely on the Self will lead to happiness or bliss. Drawing in the thoughts, restraining them and preventing them from straying outwards is called detachment (vairagya). Fixing them in the Self is spiritual practice (sadhana). Concentrating on the heart is the same as concentrating on the Self. Heart is another name for Self.

  Ramana Maharshi

  Spiritual, Heart, Thinking

  311 Copy quote

• Public Opinion... an attempt to organize the ignorance of the community, and to elevate it to the dignity of physical force.

  Oscar Wilde

  Community, Public Opinion, Dignity

  Oscar Wilde (2012). “The Wit and Humor of Oscar Wilde”, p.118, Courier Corporation

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• If not bliss, ignorance can at least be fun.

  Carter Burwell

  Fun, Bliss, Ifs

  7 Copy quote

• Ignorance is not bliss, but in my case, that was.

  Victoria Principal

  Bliss, Cases, Ignorance Is Not Bliss

  7 Copy quote

• These are the only two situations possible, and you are in the sad situation. Everybody may know about you - who you are - but you yourself are completely oblivious of your transcendence, of your real nature, of your authentic being. This is the only sadness in life. You can find many excuses, but the real sadness is this: you don't know who you are. How can a person be happy not knowing who he is, not knowing from where he comes, not knowing where he is going? A thousand and one problems arise because of this basic self-ignorance.

  Rajneesh

  Real, Sadness, Two

  4 Copy quote

• We are ignorant of the Beyond because this ignorance is the condition of our own life. Just as ice cannot know fire except by melting and vanishing.

  Jules Renard

  Death, Fire, Ice

  Jules Renard, Louise Bogan, Elizabeth Roget (2008). “The Journal of Jules Renard”, p.41, Tin House Books

  15 Copy quote

  Show source

• Tho' there be no such Thing as Chance in the World; our Ignorance of the real Ccause of any Event has the same Influence on the Understanding, and begets a like Species of Belief or Opinion.

  David Hume

  Real, Science, Understanding

  An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding Section VI (p. 37)

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• People are subject to moods, to temptations and fears, lethargy and aberration and ignorance, and the staunchest qualities shift under the stresses and strains of daily life.

  Ilka Chase

  Stress, People, Temptation

  7 Copy quote

• The tree of knowledge is not the tree of life! And yet can we cast out of our spirits all the good or evil poured into them by so many learned generations? Ignorance cannot be learned.

  Gerard De Nerval

  Knowledge, Evil, Tree

  7 Copy quote

• Prejudice and self-sufficiency naturally proceed from inexperience of the world, and ignorance of mankind.

  Joseph Addison

  Self, Inexperience, Prejudice

  Joseph Addison (1853). “The Works of Joseph Addison: Including the Whole Contents of Bp. Hurd's Edition, with Letters and Other Pieces Not Found in Any Previous Collection; and Macaulay's Essay on His Life and Works”, p.139

  17 Copy quote

  Show source

• ...the case for individual freedom rests largely on the recognition of the inevitable and universal ignorance of all of us concerning a great many of the factors on which the achievements of our ends and welfare depend.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Achievement, Liberty, Recognition

  9 Copy quote

• It is fortunate that each generation does not comprehend its own ignorance. We are thus enabled to call our ancestors barbarous.

  Charles Dudley Warner

  Glowing, Doe, Generations

  Charles Dudley Warner (1873). “Backlog Studies”, p.28

  36 Copy quote

  Show source

• To be born in imbecility, in the midst of pain and crisis; to be the plaything of ignorance, error, need, sickness, wickedness, and passions; to return step by step to imbecility, from the time of lisping to that of doting; to live among knaves and charlatans of all kinds; to die between one man who takes your pulse and another who troubles your head; never to know where you come from, why you come and where you are going! That is what is called the most important gift of our parents and nature. Life.

  Denis Diderot

  Pain, Fear, Passion

  14 Copy quote

• So long as the mother, Ignorance, lives, it is not safe for Science the offspring, to divulge the hidden causes of things.

  Johannes Kepler

  Life, Mother, Science

  "Somnium". Book by Johannes Kepler, 1620-1630.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• People who are very aware that they have more knowledge than the average person are often very unaware that they do not have one-tenth of the knowledge of all of the average persons put together. In this situation, for the intelligentsia to impose their notions on ordinary people is essentially to impose ignorance on knowledge.

  Thomas Sowell

  Average, People, Liberty

  32 Copy quote

• Failure is instructive. The person who really thinks learns quite as much from his failures as from his successes. Genuine ignorance is profitable because it is likely to be accompanied by humility, curiosity, and open-mindedness; whereas ability to repeat catch-phrases, can't terms, familiar propositions, gives the conceit of learning and coats the mind with varnish waterproof to new ideas.

  John Dewey

  Success, Perseverance, Humility

  4 Copy quote

• Our ignorance is God; what we know is science. When we abandon the doctrine that some infinite being created matter and force, and enacted a code of laws for their government ... the real priest will then be, not the mouth-piece of some pretended deity, but the interpreter of nature.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  God, Real, Science

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1873). “An Oration on the Gods”, p.31

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• All science is full of statements where you put your best face on your ignorance, where you say: ... we know awfully little about this, but more or less irrespective of the stuff we don't know about, we can make certain useful deductions.

  Hermann Bondi

  Knowledge, Science, Ignorant

  7 Copy quote

• I am convinced that it is impossible to expound the methods of induction in a sound manner, without resting them upon the theory of probability. Perfect knowledge alone can give certainty, and in nature perfect knowledge would be infinite knowledge, which is clearly beyond our capacities. We have, therefore, to content ourselves with partial knowledge - knowledge mingled with ignorance, producing doubt.

  William Stanley Jevons

  Knowledge, Science, Perfect

  "The Principles of Science: A Treatise on Logic and Scientific Method".

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• It is not so bad being ignorant if you are totally ignorant; the hard thing is knowing in some detail the reality of ignorance.

  Lewis Thomas

  Knowledge, Science, Reality

  Lewis Thomas (1990). “A Long Line of Cells Collected Essays”

  4 Copy quote

  Show source