Quotes About Knowledge

In 1943, incoming college freshmen—only 6 percent of whom could list the original thirteen colonies—named Abraham Lincoln as the first president and the one who "emaciated [sic] the slaves." The

The Dunning-Kruger Effect, in sum, means that the dumber you are, the more confident you are that you're not actually dumb.

the more specific reason that unskilled or incompetent people overestimate their abilities far more than others is because they lack a key skill called "metacognition.

In this hypercompetitive media environment, editors and producers no longer have the patience—or the financial luxury—to allow journalists to develop their own expertise or deep knowledge of a subject. Nor is there any evidence that most news consumers want such detail. Experts are often reduced to sound bites or "pull quotes," if they are consulted at all.

more exasperating is that there is no way to educate or inform people who, when in doubt, will make stuff up.

The resulting flood of information, always of varying quality and sometimes of uncertain sanity, creates a veneer of knowledge that actually leaves people worse off than if they knew nothing at all. It's an old saying, but it's true: it ain't what you don't know that'll hurt you, it's what you do know that ain't so.

There aren't enough pages in this or any other book to catalog the amount of bad information on the Internet. Miracle cures, conspiracy theories, faked documents, misattributed quotes—all of these and more are the crabgrass and weeds that have rapidly overgrown a global garden of knowledge. The healthier but less sturdy grasses and flowers don't stand a chance.

If the public has no idea about the substance of an issue, and will vote based on who they like rather than what they want, it is difficult to put too much blame on policymakers and their expert advisers for being confused themselves. How can a republic function if the people who have sent their representatives to decide questions of war and peace cannot tell the difference between Agrabah, Ukraine, or Syria?

In this hypercompetitive media environment, editors and producers no longer have the patience—or the financial luxury—to allow journalists to develop their own expertise or deep knowledge of a subject. Nor is there any evidence that most news consumers want such detail. Experts

Just as we are not all equally able to carry a tune or draw a straight line, many people simply cannot recognize the gaps in their own knowledge or understand their own inability to construct a logical argument. Education

Why can't people simply accept these differences in knowledge or competence? This is an unreasonable question, since it amounts to saying "Why don't people just accept that other people are smarter than they are?" (Or, conversely, "Why don't smart people just explain why other people are dumber than they are?") The reality is that social insecurity trips up both the smart and the dumb. We all want to be liked. In

Some educators even repeat the old saw that "I learn as much from my students as they learn from me!" (With due respect to my colleagues in the teaching profession who use this expression, I am compelled to say: if that's true, then you're not a very good teacher.) The

Students, well intentioned or otherwise, are poorly served by the idea that students and teachers are intellectual and social equals and that a student's opinion is as good as a professor's knowledge. Rather than disabusing young people of these myths, college too often encourages them, with the result that people end up convinced they're actually smarter than they are.

A people who mean to be their own Governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. James Madison

Many of the people who campaign against established knowledge are otherwise adept and successful in their daily lives. In some ways, it is all worse than ignorance: it is unfounded arrogance, the outrage of an increasingly narcissistic culture that cannot endure even the slightest hint of inequality of any kind. By

Experts can go wrong, for example, when they try to stretch their expertise from one area to another. This is not only a recipe for error, but is maddening to other experts as well.

Knowing things is not the same as understanding them. Comprehension is not the same thing as analysis. Expertise is a not a parlor game played with factoids.

So you'll never guess who I heard from," said Kelly. "Who would that be?" "Not 'whom'?" asked Kelly, her face momentarily clouded by doubt. "No, my dear. It's a subject, not an object. At least in my question.

I think it will be found that experience, the true source and foundation of all knowledge, invariably confirms its truth.

There are so many different kinds of stupidity, and cleverness is one of the worst.

The least of the work of learning is done in the classroom.

The problem of consciousness is all about subjective experience, about the structure of our inner life, and not about knowledge of the outer world.

Education is not the piling on of learning, information, data, facts, skills, or abilities - that's training or instruction - but is rather making visible what is hidden as a seed.

Education is not the piling on of learning, information, data, facts, skills, or abilities--that's training or instruction--but is rather a making visible what is hidden as a seed... To be educated, a person doesn't have to know much or be informed, but he or she does have to have been exposed vulnerably to the transformative events of an engaged human life... One of the greatest problems of our time is that many are schooled but few are educated.