Quotes about Knowledge

It is difficult to say what truth is, but sometimes it is so easy to recognize a falsehood.

One may say the eternal mystery of the world is its comprehensibility.

Somebody who reads only newspapers and at best books of contemporary authors looks to me like an extremely near-sighted person who scorns eyeglasses. He is completely dependent on the prejudices and fashions of his times, since he never gets to see or hear anything else. And what a person thinks on his own without being stimulated by the thoughts and experiences of other people is even in the best case rather paltry and monotonous.

The only thing you absolutely have to know, is the location of the library.

While knowledge defines all we currently know and understand, imagination points to all we might yet discover and create.

The grand aim of all science is to cover the greatest number of empirical facts by logical deduction from the smallest number of hypotheses or axioms.

If people only talked about what they understood, Earth would be a very quiet place.

It is no accident that capitalism has brought with it progress not merely in production but also in knowledge. Egoism and competition are, alas, stronger forces than public spirit and sense of duty.

Autoritätsdusel ist der größte Feind der Wahrheit. / Unthinking respect for authority is the greatest enemy of truth.

He was a philosopher, if you know what that was.' 'A man who dreams of fewer things than there are in heaven and earth,' said the Savage promptly. 'Quite so…

I used to think I had no will to power. Now I perceive that I vented it on thoughts, rather than people. Conquering an unknown province of knowledge. Getting the better of a problem. Forcing ideas to associate or come apart. Bullying recalcitrant words to assume a certain pattern. All the fun of being a dictator without any risks and responsibilities.

And it's frustrating because you've never been taught how to bridge the gap between theory and practice, between your New Year's resolutions and your actual behaviour.