Quotes About Knowledge

When he spoke, he illuminated a truth I had always yearned for and yet always run from. I am known as an authority on the holy texts, and yet when he spoke, I realized I knew nothing. And what I did know, I had cloaked in my own selfish interpretations. In so doing, I had turned the truth into lies.

The conversion of all truths into questions of power has attacked the very heart of the distinction between true and false.

Osaan jo itse lukea / siis kirjoja on oltava. - Myssy-Kasperi matkustaa (Kasper Mütze darf verreisen)

The past was still a Golden Age, of ignorance, while the present is an Iron Age of willful bliss.

Factual knowledge is not always sufficient by itself to motivate an adaptive behavior. At times a symbolic belief system that departs from factual reality fares better.

Information could be spread far more widely, more accurately, and in more detail by writing than it could be transmitted by mouth.

Knowledge brings power. Hence writing brings power to modern societies, by making it possible to transmit knowledge with far greater accuracy and in far greater quantity and detail, from more distant lands and more remote times.

literacy made the Spaniards heirs to a huge body of knowledge about human behavior and history. By contrast, not only did Atahuallpa have no conception of the Spaniards themselves, and no personal experience of any other invaders from overseas, but he also had not even heard (or read) of similar threats to anyone else, anywhere else, anytime previously in history. That gulf of experience encouraged Pizarro to set his trap and Atahuallpa to walk into it. THUS

Without diffusion, fewer technologies are acquired, and more existing technologies are lost.

Education is a process involving two sets of participants who supposedly play different roles: teachers who impart knowledge to students, and students who absorb knowledge from teachers. In fact, as every open-minded teacher discovers, education is also about students imparting knowledge to their teachers, by challenging the teachers' assumptions and by asking questions that the teachers hadn't previously thought of.

This table is sure to horrify any knowledgeable scholar

literacy made the Spaniards heirs to a huge body of knowledge about human behavior and history.

Knowledge brings power. Hence writing brings power to modern societies, by making it possible to transmit knowledge with far greater accuracy and in far greater quantity and detail, from more distant lands and more remote times. Of

Thus, part—not all, but part—of the reason for Japan initiating World War Two against such hopeless odds was that young army leaders of the 1930's lacked the knowledge base and historical experience necessary for honest, realistic, cautious self-appraisal. The result was disastrous for Japan.

Benjamin Jones at Northwestern University and Benjamin Olken of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

For all the harmless innocence conjured by the word library, the Friedmans knew the truth: a library, properly maintained, could save the world - or burn it down.

One way of thinking about science is that it's a check against the natural human tendency to see patterns that might not be there. It's a way of knowing when a pattern is real and when it's a trick of your mind.

A library, properly maintained, could save the world, or burn it down.

To really live a life in search of knowledge, you must admit when you are wrong.

There were possibly three or at most four persons" in the whole United States who knew the slightest thing about codes

No one who is learning should ever feel stupid

Being right is the enemy of staying right because it leads you to forget the way the world works

Every profession is a conspiracy against the laity, and every profession's jargon is meant to confuse and exclude those who aren't part of the guild.

You see? I know where every single book used to be in the library.' She pointed to the shelf opposite. 'Over there was Catch-22 , which was a hugely popular fishing book and one of a series, I believe.