Quotes

Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.

All man’s miseries stem from his inability to sit quietly in a room and do nothing.

Avoid having your ego so close to your position that when your position falls, your ego goes with it.

Nothing in life is as important as you think it is, while you are thinking about it.

Social science cannot tell us what to do, only the effect of what we are doing.

Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.

Simplicity is the hallmark of truth— we should know better, but complexity continues to have a morbid attraction. When you give for an academic audience a lecture that is crystal clear from alpha to omega, your audience feels cheated and leaves the lecture hall commenting to each other: 'That was rather trivial, wasn’t it.' The sore truth is that complexity sells better.

It is impossible for a man to learn what he thinks he already knows.

Be careful to leave your sons well instructed rather than rich, for the hopes of the instructed are better than the wealth of the ignorant.

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.

Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.

Memories and possibilities are even more hideous than realities.

It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.

The circle of the English language has a well-defined centre, but no discernible circumference.

Sometime or another, someone will tell you that you are not ready to do something. If you are going to make a big jump in science, you will very likely be unqualified to succeed by definition. The truth, however, won't save you from criticism. Your very willingness to take on a very big goal will offend some people who will think that you are too big for your britches and crazy to boot.

There are two kinds of forecasters: those who don't know, and those who don't know they don't know.

Argue as though you are right, but listen as though you are wrong.

The happiness of your life depends upon the quality of your thoughts: therefore, guard accordingly, and take care that you entertain no notions unsuitable to virtue and reasonable nature.

Efficiency is doing things right, effectiveness is doing the right things.

Shallow men believe in luck, believe in circumstances. Strong men believe in cause and effect.

Open-minded people approach everything with a deep-seated fear that they may be wrong.

Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts.

Victory awaits him who has everything in order — luck, people call it.

It is not to your benefit to see and hear everything. Many injuries ought to pass over us; if you ignore them, you get no more injury from them. You want to be less angry? Ask fewer questions.

Whatsoever therefore is consequent to a time of Warre, where every man is Enemy to every man; the same is consequent to the time, wherein men live without other security, than what their own strength, and their own invention shall furnish them withall. In such condition, there is no place for Industry; because the fruit thereof is uncertain; and consequently no Culture of the Earth; no Navigation, nor use of the commodities that may be imported by Sea; no commodious Building; no Instruments of moving, and removing such things as require much force; no Knowledge of the face of the Earth; no account of Time; no Arts; no Letters; no Society; and which is worst of all, continuall feare, and danger of violent death; And the life of man, solitary, poore, nasty, brutish, and short.

I would rather have a drink with someone who’s searching for the truth than someone who’s found it.

Forecasts may tell you a great deal about the forecaster, but they tell you nothing about the future.

People spend too much time on the last 24 hours and not enough time on the last 6,000 years.