Wishful Thinking Quotes - Page 5

• [Freud's] sense of reality is less clouded by wishful thinking than is the case with other people and [he combines] the qualities of critical judgment, earnestness and responsibility.

  Albert Einstein

  Responsibility, Reality, Thinking

  Albert Einstein (2017). “Einstein on Peace”, p.274, Pickle Partners Publishing

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• At first glance, the idea that some UFOs may be vehicles from outside the Earth seems utterly preposterous, the baseless result of wishful thinking by highly unscientific minds.

  Don Berliner

  Thinking, Ideas, Mind

  4 Copy quote

• A large number of well-trained scientists outside of evolutionary biology and paleontology have unfortunately gotten the idea that the fossil record is far more Darwinian than it is. This probably comes from the oversimplification inevitable in secondary sources: low-level textbooks semipopular articles, and so on. Also, there is probably some wishful thinking involved. In the years after Darwin, his advocates hoped to find predictable progressions. In general. these have not been found-yet the optimism has died hard and some pure fantasy has crept into textbooks.

  David M. Raup

  Thinking, Years, Ideas

  56 Copy quote

• Peace is a militant state, which is not secured by wishful thinking. . . . If we are to be sure of our liberty, we must be ready to fight for it.

  Jonathan M. Wainwright

  Peace, Military, Fighting

  8 Copy quote

• The 'Rise, Rebel, Resist' video is a reflection of the outrage the American people are feeling at the absurd hypocrisy, and overwhelming nonsense and balderdash plaguing Washington D.C. It uses a bit of satire and a bit of wishful thinking to form this powerful amalgam of imagery that nourishes and empowers the living art of the song. Our message is clear: Either these elected officials do their job and protect the rights and lives of ALL Americans or be prepared to face the consequences.

  Otep Shamaya

  Song, Art, Jobs

  14 Copy quote

• I get by on wishful thinking that when you come home you'll want to stay.

  Amanda Marshall

  Home, Thinking, Want

  Song: Wishful Thinking, Album: Tuesday's Child, 1999

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The investment business has taught me – increasingly as the years have passed – that people, especially investors (and, I believe, Americans), prefer good news and wishful thinking to bad news; and that there are always vested interests to offer facile, optimistic alternatives to the bad news.

  Jeremy Grantham

  Believe, Optimistic, Thinking

  8 Copy quote

• Violence, naked force, has settled more issues in history than has any other factor, and the contrary opinion is wishful thinking at its worst. Breeds that forget this basic truth have always paid for it with their lives and freedoms.

  W. E. B. Du Bois

  Thinking, Issues, Violence

  34 Copy quote

• Theorems often tell us complex truths about the simple things, but only rarely tell us simple truths about the complex ones. To believe otherwise is wishful thinking or "mathematics envy."

  Marvin Minsky

  Believe, Simple, Thinking

  "Music, Mind, and Meaning". Computer Music Journal, Volume 5, Number 3, web.media.mit.edu. 1981.

  12 Copy quote

  Show source

• There is wishful thinking in Hell as well as on Earth.

  C. S. Lewis

  Thinking, Earth, Screwtape Letters

  1942 The Screwtape Letters, preface.

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• Providence and Manifest Destiny are synonyms often invoked to support arguments based on wishful thinking.

  Frank Herbert

  Destiny, Thinking, Support

  "Whipping Star". Book by Frank Herbert, "From The Wreave Commentary"; p. 136, 1969.

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• The whole iconography of ancient science is simply the fruit of wishful thinking.

  George Sarton

  Thinking, Iconography, Fruit

  George Sarton (1993). “Hellenistic Science and Culture in the Last Three Centuries B.C.”, p.13, Courier Corporation

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• What you wish to do you are apt to think you ought to do.

  Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach

  Thinking, Wish, Ought

  4 Copy quote

• Thea was still under the belief that public opinion could be placated; that if you clucked often enough, the hens would mistake you for one of themselves.

  Willa Cather

  Mistake, Thinking, Public Opinion

  Willa Cather (2013). “The Best of Willa Cather”, p.265, Simon and Schuster

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Geopolitics needs not just rhetoric, not just certain instincts, not just political skillful manipulation; it needs vision and what the Germans call erdung - you have to be connected to the ground always. You cannot float on your wishful thinking and hope that some miracles will become reality.

  Ehud Barak

  Reality, Thinking, Miracle

  Source: www.politico.com

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• We have hopes that we can see rational American presidents; fair, obey the international law, deal with other countries according to mutual respect, parity, etc., but we all know that this is only wishful thinking and fantasy.

  Bashar al-Assad

  Country, Thinking, Law

  The Associated Press Interview, www.foxnews.com. September 21, 2016.

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• Everything in Athens is probably a good example. Any time when there really isn't a need for these facilities in these cities, but they get built anyway for the games, everybody has kind of wishful thinking about what the afterlife of these spaces is going to be. If there is not demand for it before the Olympics, there's probably not going to be demand for it afterwards.

  Gary Hustwit

  Thinking, Games, Cities

  Source: www.salon.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• you've always been living on prospects; for my part, I'd rather have a mole-hill in possession than a mountain in prospect.

  Maria Edgeworth

  Thinking, Expectations, Mountain

  Maria Edgeworth, Richard Lovell Edgeworth (1825). “Works of Maria Edgeworth: Harrington. Ormond. 1825”, p.236

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The age of credulity is every age the world has ever known. Men have always turned from the ascertained, which is limited and discouraging, to the dubious, which is unlimited and full of hope for everybody.

  Agnes Repplier

  Men, Thinking, Age

  7 Copy quote

• The cure-alls of the present day are infinitely various and infinitely obliging. Applied psychology, autosuggestion, and royal roads to learning or to wealth are urged upon us by kindly, if not altogether disinterested, reformers. Simple and easy systems for the dissolution of discord and strife; simple and easy systems for the development of personality and power. Booklets of counsel on 'How to Get What We Want,' which is impossible; booklets on 'Visualization,' warranted to make us want what we get, which is ignoble.

  Agnes Repplier

  Simple, Thinking, Personality

  34 Copy quote

• It's a glorious universe the positive thinkers have come up with, a vast, shimmering aurora borealis in which desires mingle freely with their realizations. ... Dreams go out and fulfill themselves; wishes need only to be articulated.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Dream, Thinking, Optimism

  Barbara Ehrenreich (2009). “Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America”, p.73, Metropolitan Books

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• I realize that after decades of positive thinking the notion of realism, of things as they are, may seem a little quaint. ... When the stakes are high enough and the risks obvious, we still turn to people who can be counted on to understand those risks and prepare for worst-case scenarios. A chief of state does not want to hear a general in the field say that he 'hopes' to win tomorrow's battle or that he's 'visualizing victory'.

  Barbara Ehrenreich

  Positive Thinking, Winning, Reality

  Barbara Ehrenreich (2009). “Bright-sided: How the Relentless Promotion of Positive Thinking Has Undermined America”, p.198, Metropolitan Books

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• memory is so selective; wishful thinking presses it into service all the time.

  Fay Weldon

  Memories, Thinking, Selective

  Fay Weldon (2014). “Fay Weldon Omnibus: Collected Works of Fay Weldon”, p.1211, Head of Zeus

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• No one seemed able to look at themselves, coolly, from the outside. Their reality was all that could be seen in the light cast ahead by their own wishful thinking.

  Fay Weldon

  Reality, Thinking, Light

  4 Copy quote

• I suspect that, though Craig indulges in a bit of wishful thinking, playing taps for various critical approaches still quite far from death's door, he may well be correct that New Testament scholarship is more conservative than it once was. This has more than he admits to do with which denominations can afford to train the most students, hire more faculty, and send more members to the SBL.

  Robert M. Price

  Thinking, Doors, Indulge In

  4 Copy quote