Quotes from Scott Adams

If you believe people use reason for the important decisions in life, you will go through life feeling confused and frustrated that others seem to have bad reasoning skills.

A smarter approach is to think of learning as a system in which you continually expose yourself to new topics, primarily the ones you find interesting. My

I pursued a conscious strategy of managing my opportunities in a way that would make it easier for luck to find me.

For humans, honesty is a matter of degree. Engineers are always honest in matters of technology and human relationships. That's why it's a good idea to keep engineers away from customers, romantic interests, and other people who can't handle the truth.

I was no longer surprised to find unlocked doors in the city. Maybe at some subconscious level we don't believe we need protection from our own species.

Every other question has an answer to why. Only probability is inexplicable.

On all the important stuff, we are emotional creatures who make decisions first and rationalize them after the fact.

Practicality rules our perceptions. To survive, our tiny brains need to tame the blizzard of delusion generator information that threatens to overwhelm us. Our perceptions are wondrously flexible, transforming our worldview automatically and continuously until we find safe harbor in a comfortable delusion.

I have cultivated a unique relationship with failure. I invite it. I survive it. I appreciate it. And then I mug the shit out of it. Failure always brings something valuable with it. I don't let it leave until I extract that value.

simplicity is not proof of truth. But since we can never understand true reality, if two models both explain the same facts, it is more rational to use the simpler one. It is a matter of convenience.

Successwise, you're better off being good at two complementary skills than being excellent at one.

If, as you say, our minds are delusion generators, then we're all like blind and deaf sea captains shouting orders into the universe and hoping it makes a difference. We have no way of knowing what really works and what merely seems to work. So doesn't it make sense to try all the things that appear to work even if we can't be sure?

My definition of happiness is that it's a feeling you get when your body chemistry is producing pleasant sensations in your mind.

People who do affirmations will have the sensation that they are causing the environment to conform to their will. This is an immensely enjoyable feeling because the illusion of control is one of the best illusions you can have.

Es gibt zwei Arten von Menschen: intelligente und attraktive Leute wie Sie [...] und die sechs Milliarden Idioten, die uns im Weg herumstehen.

A lie that makes a voter feel good is more effective than a hundred rational arguments.

Theory of Evolution (Summary) First, there were some amoebas. Deviant amoebas adapted better to the environment, thus becoming monkeys. Then came Total Quality Management.

This was my first exposure to the idea that one should have a system instead of a goal. The system was to continually look for better options.

Goal-oriented people exist in a state of continuous presuccess failure at best, and permanent failure at worst if things never work out. Systems people succeed every time they apply their systems, in the sense that they did what they intended to do. The goals people are fighting the feeling of discouragement at each turn. The systems people are feeling good every time they apply their system.

The only reasonable goal in life is maximizing your total lifetime experience of something called happiness. That might sound selfish, but it's not. Only a sociopath or a hermit can find happiness through extreme selfishness. A normal person needs to treat others well in order to enjoy life.

The system-versus-goals model can be applied to most human endeavors. In the world of dieting, losing twenty pounds is a goal, but eating right is a system. In the exercise realm, running a marathon in under four hours is a goal, but exercising daily is a system. In business, making a million dollars is a goal, but being a serial entrepreneur is a system.

take care of yourself first and use that success as leverage to get everything else you need. I'll

Reality has a pulse, a rhythm, for lack of better words.

Consider the people who routinely disagree with you. See how confident they look while being dead wrong? That's exactly how you look to them.