IGNORANCE
Quote: There's a sucker born every minute. Author: P.T. Barnum 1810-1891, American Showman, Entertainer, Circus Builder
Quote: Unintelligent people always look for a scapegoat. Author: Ernest Bevin 1881-1951, British Statesman
Quote: The sage awakes to light in the night of all creatures. That which the world calls day is the night of ignorance to the wise. Author: Bhagavad Gita c. BC 400-, Sanskrit Poem Incorporated Into the Mahabharata
Quote: If you think education is expensive, try ignorance. Author: Derek Bok American academic
Quote: Ignorance is not innocence, but sin. Author: Robert Browning 1812-1889, British Poet
Quote: I do not believe in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance. Author: Thomas Carlyle 1795-1881, Scottish Philosopher, Author
Quote: I am not ashamed to confess I am ignorant of what I do not know. Author: Marcus T. Cicero c. 106-43 BC, Great Roman Orator, Politician
Quote: The reason there's so much ignorance is that those who have it are so eager to share it. Author: Frank A. Clark
Quote: Ignorance is the night of the mind, but a night without moon or star. Author: Confucius BC 551-479, Chinese Ethical Teacher, Philosopher
Quote: Ignorance is never out of style. It was in fashion yesterday, it is the rage today and it will set the pace tomorrow. Author: Frank Dane
Quote: I am an agnostic; I do not pretend to know what many ignorant men are sure of. Author: Clarence Darrow 1857-1938, American Lawyer
Quote: I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure -- that is all that agnosticism means. Author: Clarence Darrow 1857-1938, American Lawyer
Quote: To be conscience that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge. Author: Benjamin Disraeli 1804-1881, British Statesman, Prime Minister
Quote: The highest form of ignorance is when you reject something you don't know anything about. Author: Wayne Dyer 1940-, American Psychotherapist, Author, Lecturer
Quote: Ignorance of one's misfortunes is clear gain. Author: Euripides BC 480-406, Greek Tragic Poet
Quote: A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance. Author: Anatole France 1844-1924, French Writer
Quote: A learned blockhead is a greater blockhead than an ignorant one. Author: Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790, American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
Quote: Being ignorant is not so much a shame as being unwilling to learn. Author: Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790, American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
Quote: He was so learned that he could name a horse in nine languages; so ignorant that he bought a cow to ride on. Author: Benjamin Franklin 1706-1790, American Scientist, Publisher, Diplomat
Quote: It is harder to conceal ignorance than to acquire knowledge. Author: Arnold H. Glasgow
Quote: Nothing is more terrible than to see ignorance in action. Author: Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe 1749-1832, German Poet, Dramatist, Novelist
Quote: Where ignorance is bliss, 'Tis folly to be wise. Author: Thomas Gray 1716-1771, British Poet
Quote: There are many who talk on from ignorance rather than from knowledge, and who find the former an inexhaustible fund of conversation. Author: William Hazlitt 1778-1830, British Essayist
Quote: Naivete in grownups is often charming; but when coupled with vanity it is indistinguishable from stupidity. Author: Eric Hoffer 1902-1983, American Author, Philosopher
Quote: A child-like man is not a man whose development has been arrested; on the contrary, he is a man who has given himself a chance of continuing to develop long after most adults have muffled themselves in the cocoon of middle-aged habit and convention. Author: Aldous Huxley 1894-1963, British Author
Quote: Most ignorance is evincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know. Author: Aldous Huxley 1894-1963, British Author
Quote: The opposite of love is not hate, the opposite of love is ignorance. Author: Brian Hwang
Quote: Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong. Author: Thomas Jefferson 1743-1826, Third President of the USA
Quote: The fact is that we all seem capable of living, because at some time or other we have taken refuge in a lie, in blindness, in enthusiasm, in optimism, in some conviction, in pessimism or something of the sort. He has never taken refuge in anything. He is absolutely incapable of lying. He has nothing to take refuge in, no shelter. It's as if he were naked and everyone else had clothes on. Author: Milena Jesenska
Quote: Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. Author: Martin Luther King Jr. 1929-1968, American Black Leader, Nobel Prize Winner, 1964
Quote: Ignorance is a voluntary misfortune. Author: Nicholas Ling
Quote: Ignorance breeds monsters to fill up the vacancies of the soul that are unoccupied by the verities of knowledge. Author: Horace Mann 1796-1859, American Educator
Quote: Ignorance is like the itch -- the less you have of it the better off you are. Author: Harry Mendelson 1855-1937, American Financier, Philanthropist, Statesman
Quote: The greater the ignorance the greater the dogmatism. Author: Sir William Osler 1849-1919, Canadian Physician
Quote: Ignorance is no excuse, it's the real thing. Author: Irene Peter
Quote: Better to ask a question than to remain ignorant. Author: Proverb
Quote: What you don't know can't hurt you . Author: Proverb
Quote: You must not enthrone ignorance just because there is much of it. Author: American Proverb Sayings of American Origin
Quote: A man profits more by the sight of an idiot than by the orations of the learned. Author: Arabian Proverb Sayings of Arabian Origin
Quote: Ignorance doesn't kill you, but it makes you sweat a lot. Author: Haitian Proverb Sayings of Haitian Origin
Quote: Everybody is ignorant -- only on different subjects. Author: Will Rogers 1879-1935, American Humorist, Actor
Quote: Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education. Author: Bertrand Russell 1872-1970, British Philosopher, Mathematician, Essayist
Quote: There is no darkness, but ignorance. Author: William Shakespeare 1564-1616, British Poet, Playwright, Actor
Quote: Have the courage to be ignorant of a great number of things, in order to avoid the calamity of being ignorant of everything. Author: Sydney Smith 1771-1845, British Writer, Clergyman
Quote: There is one principle that can keep a man in everlasting ignorance. That is contempt prior to investigation. Author: Herbert Spencer 1820-1903, British Philosopher
Quote: The greatest pride, or the greatest despondency, is the greatest ignorance of one's self. Author: Baruch (Benedict de) Spinoza 1632-1677, Dutch Philosopher and Theologian
Quote: Better to be ignorant of a matter than half know it. Author: Publilius Syrus 1st Century BC, Roman Writer
Quote: Ignorance is bold and knowledge reserved. Author: Thucydides BC 460-400, Greek Historian of Athens
Quote: Ignorance and inconsideration are the two great causes of the ruin of mankind. Author: John Tillotson 1630-1694, British Theologian - Archbishop of Canterbury
Quote: I would rather have my ignorance than another man's knowledge, because I have so much of it. Author: Mark Twain 1835-1910, American Humorist, Writer
Quote: When I was fourteen, my father was so ignorant I could hardly stand to have him around. When I got to be twenty-one, I was astonished at how much he had learned in seven years. Author: Mark Twain 1835-1910, American Humorist, Writer
Quote: If ignorance is bliss, why aren't more people jumping up and down for joy. Author: Source Unknown
Quote: Ignorance is not bliss -- ignorance is ignorance. Author: Source Unknown
Quote: In the battle for survival the ignorant man has a considerable advantage. Author: Source Unknown
Quote: Never forget public ignorance is the government's best friend. Author: Source Unknown
Quote: The mark of your ignorance is the depth of your belief in injustice and tragedy. What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the master calls a butterfly. Author: Source Unknown
Quote: Ignorance is like a delicate fruit; touch it, and the bloom is gone. Author: Oscar Wilde 1856-1900, British Author, Wit
Quote: The most violent element in society is ignorance. Author: Emma Goldman
Quote: Genuine ignorance is... profitable because it is likely to be accompanied by humility, curiosity, and open mindedness; whereas ability to repeat catch-phrases, cant terms, familiar propositions, gives the conceit of learning and coats the mind with varnish waterproof to new ideas. Author: John Dewey
Quote: One part of knowledge consists in being ignorant of such things as are not worthy to be known. Author: Crates
Quote: Discussion is an exchange of knowledge; argument an exchange of ignorance. Author: Robert Quillen
Quote: A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance. Author: Saul Bellow
Quote: Before we work on artificial intelligence why don't we do something about natural stupidity? Author: Steve Polyak
Quote: You can swim all day in the Sea of Knowledge and still come out completely dry. Most people do. Author: Norman Juster
Quote: It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument. Author: William G. McAdoo
Quote: The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right. Author: Mark Twain
Quote: The trouble with people is not that they don't know but that they know so much that ain't so. Author: Josh Billings
Quote: Some folks are wise and some are otherwise. Author: Tobias Smollett
Quote: Anyway, no drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power. Author: P. J. O'Rourke
Quote: You can be sincere and still be stupid. Author: Charles F. Kettering
Quote: The greatest obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents and the ocean was not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge. Author: Daniel J. Boorstin
Quote: Everybody is ignorant, only on different subjects. Author: Will Rogers
Quote: Ignorance is a right! Education is eroding one of the few democratic freedoms remaining to us. Author: Christopher Andrea
Quote: It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't. Author: Mignon McLaughlin
Quote: A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance. Author: Anatole France
Quote: Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge. Author: Alfred North Whitehead
Quote: Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly. Author: Unknown
Quote: Light travels faster than sound. That's why most people seem bright until you hear them speak. Author: Unknown
Quote: Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe. Author: Frank Zappa
Quote: Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. Author: Albert Einstein
Quote: We have enough youth, how about a fountain of smart? Author: Unknown
Quote: We cannot but be astonished at the ease with which men resign themselves to ignorance about what is most important for them to know; and we may be certain that they are determined to remain invincibly ignorant if they once come to consider it as axiomatic that there are no absolute principles. Author: Frederic Bastiat
Quote: Ignorance and superstition ever bear a close and mathematical relation to each other. Author: James Fenimore Cooper
Quote: ...it is always advisable to perceive clearly our ignorance. Author: Charles Darwin
Quote: Now as of old the gods give men all good things, excepting only those that are baneful and injurious and useless. These, now as of old, are not gifts of the gods: men stumble into them themselves because of their own blindness and folly. Author: Democritus
Quote: Most fools think they are only ignorant. Author: Benjamin Franklin
Quote: Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action. Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Quote: Ignorant men raise questions that wise men answered a thousand years ago. Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Quote: Mysteries are not necessarily miracles. Author: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Quote: Ever since the beginning of modern science, the best minds have recognized that the range of acknowledged ignorance will grow with the advance of science. Unfortunately, the popular effect of this scientific advance has been a belief, seemingly shared by many scientists, that the range of our ignorance is steadily diminishing and that we can therefore aim at more comprehensive and deliberate control of all human activities. It is for this reason that those intoxicated by the advance of knowledge so often become the enemies of freedom. Author: F. A. Hayek
Quote: All political theories assume, of course, that most individuals are very ignorant. Those who plead for liberty differ from the rest in that they include among the ignorant themselves as well as the wisest. Author: F. A. Hayek
Quote: ...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. Author: F. A. Hayek
Quote: It may indeed prove to be far the most difficult and not the least important task for human reason rationally to comprehend its own limitations. It is essential for the growth of reason that as individuals we should bow to forces and obey principles which we cannot hope fully to understand, yet on which the advance and even the preservation of civilization depend. Author: F. A. Hayek
Quote: This is the constitutional limitation of man's knowledge and interests, the fact that he cannot know more than a tiny part of the whole of society and that therefore all that can enter into his motives are the immediate effects which his actions will have in the sphere he knows. Author: F. A. Hayek
Quote: 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. Author: Henry Hazlitt
Quote: An empty head is not really empty; it is stuffed with rubbish. Hence the difficulty of forcing anything into an empty head. Author: Eric Hoffer
Quote: Far more crucial than what we know or do not know is what we do not want to know. One often obtains a clue to a person's nature by discovering the reasons for his or her imperviousness to certain impressions. Author: Eric Hoffer
Quote: There is no slavery but ignorance. Author: Robert G. Ingersoll
Quote: The inspiration of the Bible depends upon the ignorance of the gentleman who reads it. Author: Robert G. Ingersoll
Quote: He who knows nothing is closer to the truth than he whose mind is filled with falsehoods and errors. Author: Thomas Jefferson
Quote: If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be. Author: Thomas Jefferson
Quote: Ignorance is preferable to error, and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing than he who believes what is wrong. Author: Thomas Jefferson
Quote: Nothing in the world is more dangerous than a sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity. Author: Martin Luther King, Jr.
Quote: We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them. Author: Livy
Quote: Nothing is so firmly believed as what we least know. Author: Michel de Montaigne
Quote: Reason and Ignorance, the opposites of each other, influence the great bulk of mankind. If either of these can be rendered sufficiently extensive in a country, the machinery of Government goes easily on. Reason obeys itself; and Ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it. Author: Thomas Paine
Quote: Men are born ignorant, not stupid; they are made stupid by education. Author: Bertrand Russell
Quote: Every man takes the limits of his own field of vision for the limits of the world. Author: Arthur Schopenhauer
Quote: Physicists have determined that even the most solid and heavy mass of matter we see is mostly empty space. But at the submicroscopic level, specks of matter scattered through a vast emptiness have such incredible density and weight, and are linked to one another by such powerful forces, that together they produce all the properties of concrete, cast iron and solid rock. In much the same way, specks of knowledge are scattered through a vast emptiness of ignorance, and everything depends upon how solid the individual specks of knowledge are, and on how powerfully linked and coordinated they are with one another. Author: Thomas Sowell
Quote: Considering the enormous range of human knowledge, from intimate personal knowledge of specific individuals to the complexities of organizations and the subtleties of feelings, it is remarkable that one speck in this firmament should be the sole determinant of whether someone is considered knowledgeable or ignorant in general. Yet it is a fact of life that an unlettered person is considered ignorant, however much he may know about nature and man, and a Ph.D. is never considered ignorant, however barren his mind might be outside his narrow specialty and however little he grasps about human feeling or social complexities. Author: Thomas Sowell
Quote: Beware of the man of one book. Author: Thomas Aquinas
Quote: We keep, in science, getting a more and more sophisticated view of our essential ignorance. Author: Warren Weaver
Quote: Every now and then you meet a man whose ignorance is encyclopedic. Author: Stanislaw J. Lec
Quote: If ignorance is bliss, why aren't more people jumping up and down for joy? Author: Unknown
Quote: Ignorance is the primary source of all misery and vice. Author: Victor Cousin
Quote: Ignorance is not bliss - it is oblivion. Author: Philip Wylie
Quote: To be conscious that you are ignorant is a great step to knowledge. Author: Benjamin Disraeli
Quote: Ignorance is always afraid of change. Author: Jawaharlal Nehru
Quote: Ignorance and error are necessary to life, like bread and water. Author: Anatole France
Quote: Ignorance is the night of mind, a night without moon or star. Author: Confucius
Quote: Your ignorance cramps my conversation. Author: Anonymous
Quote: The little I know I owe to my ignorance. Author: Sacha Guitry
Quote: Ignorance is a voluntary misfortune. Author: Nicholas Ling
Quote: There is natural ignorance and there is artificial ignorance. I should say at the present moment the artificial ignorance is about eighty-five per cent. Author: Ezra Pound
Quote: It is certain, in any case, that ignorance, allied with power, is the most ferocious enemy justice can have. Author: James Baldwin
Quote: There can be no more ancient and traditional American value than ignorance. English-only speakers brought it with them to this country three centuries ago, and they quickly imposed it on the Africans-who were not allowed to learn to read and write-and on the Native Americans, who were simply not allowed. Author: Barbara Ehrenreich
Quote: It is in the admission of ignorance and the admission of uncertainty that there is a hope for the continuous motion of human beings in some direction that doesn't get confined, permanently blocked, as it has so many times before in various periods in the history of man. Author: Richard P. Feynman
Quote: To become educated is to move from cocksure ignorance to thoughtful uncertainty. Author: Unknown
Quote: I count religion but a childish toy, And hold there is no sin but ignorance. Author: Christopher Marlowe
Quote: To surrender to ignorance and call it God has always been premature, and it remains premature today. Author: Isaac Asimov
Quote: The notion that faith in Christ is to be rewarded by an eternity of bliss, while a dependence upon reason, observation, and experience merits everlasting pain, is too absurd for refutation, and can be relieved only by that unhappy mixture of insanity and ignorance called 'faith.' Author: Robert G. Ingersoll
Quote: Mystery is but another name for ignorance; if we were omniscient, all would be perfectly plain! Author: Tryon Edwards
Quote: Real knowledge is to know the extent of one's ignorance. Author: Confucius
Quote: Ignorance is bliss - until it kills you. Author: L. MacLeod
Quote: I want nothing to do with any religion concerned with keeping the masses satisfied to live in hunger, filth, and ignorance. I want nothing to do with any order, religious or otherwise, which does not teach people that they are capable of becoming happier and more civilized on this earth, capable of becoming master of his fate and captain of his soul. Author: Jawaharlal Nehru
Quote: You see many stars at night in the sky but find them not when the sun rises; can you say that there are no stars in the heaven of the day? So, O man! as you behold not God in the days of your ignorance, say not that there is no God. Author: Ramakrishna
Quote: Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance. Author: Will Durant
Quote: Cruelty to dumb animals is one of the distinguishing vices of low and base minds. Wherever it is found, it is a certain mark of ignorance and meanness; a mark which all the external advantages of wealth, splendour, and nobility, cannot obliterate. It is consistent neither with learning nor true civility. Author: William Jones
Quote: There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance--that principle is contempt prior to investigation. Author: Herbert Spencer
Quote: The only solid piece of scientific truth about which I feel totally confident is that we are profoundly ignorant about nature... It is this sudden confrontation with the depth and scope of ignorance that represents the most significant contribution of twentieth-century science to the human intellect. Author: Lewis Thomas
Quote: Ignorance of one's misfortunes is clear gain. Author: Greek Proverb
Quote: I would rather be ignorant than knowledgeable of evils. Author: Aeschylus
Quote: Isn't it curious that narrowminded people are often the most thick-headed? Author: Frank Baer
Quote: Behind every argument is someone's ignorance. Author: Louis Brandeis
Quote: Ignorance is never out of style. It was in fashion yesterday, it is the rage today, and it will set the pace tomorrow. Author: Franklin K. Dane
Quote: His ignorance is encyclopaedic. Author: Abba Eban