Quotes About Inquiry

I had to read up on the Freemasons, about secret societies, and dip my toe into art history.

Dead people never seem to address the obvious - the things you'd think they'd be bursting to talk about, and the things all of us not-yet-dead are madly curious about. Such as: 'Hey, where are you now? What do you do all day? What's it feel like being dead? Can you see me? Even when I'm on the toilet? Would you cut that out?'

Part of the scientific temperament is this tolerance for holding multiple hypotheses in mind at the same time.

I want [my daughter] to look at the world through the underside of a glass-bottom boat, to look through a microscope at the galaxies that exist on the pinpoint of a human mind.

We'll talk about this another time. Hold still. Stop breathing. Your chest keeps moving." "Kind of hard not to breathe," muttered Cerúlia. And you were the one who wanted to know everything.

The importance of knowing nothing is underrated.

Art is not supposed to repeat what you already know. It is supposed to ask questions.

Irish poet David Whyte, pausing after a complex thought, or a hoary quandary, looking out to the room of devotees who flock to his workshops around the world, and asking, "But what is the more beautiful question?" And we are immediately reminded that there is always a more beautiful question that should be asked. I've heard David explain that asking the more beautiful question (invariably the courageous one) delivers us the answer we seek.

Human beings have a voracious appetite for trying to figure things out in order to gain a sense of mastery over their lives.

There are certain questions that scientists may not ask, or, more accurately, for some questions, there are certain answers that scientists must a priori preclude from consideration.

She stared at me with that questioning look people often get when I open my mouth.

If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions?

What I learned from Jeff (and his daughter) that day is the importance of constantly, maybe even obsessively, asking "why" in your business. I learned that when you start to question things, you wind up creating these "aha" moments, which combine a sense of wonder with the knowledge of how to get something done.

My name is Carter Hall and I am a detective of history. But you are a detective, too. For to be human, at its core, is to question and quest. To seek answers about who we are. Even when--or especially when--those answers are beyond our grasp.

Every time I get tested, I ask questions about it, and I watch how they do it.

As you set off into the world, don't be afraid to question your leaders. But don't ask too many questions at one time or that are too hard because your leaders get tired and/or cranky.

Where do you come from? And where are you going? Look up, speak nicely, and don't twiddle your fingers all the time.

People are whupped. I'm whupped. My wife is whupped. Unless it's your job to be curious, who really has the time to sit and ask questions and explore issues?

The only time a question should be asked is when all other possibilities of finding the answer for yourself have been eliminated.

Well, does he still have his fingernails? Making inquiries while negotiating the release of a US Army pilot from North Korea, in Time.

Why do they call it research if I've only done it this one time?

We live in a time of fear," Skulduggery said, "where we're too scared of upsetting the status quo to ask the questions we need to be asking.

Every time I'm in a foreign place and a different city, I'm always asking around to say, OK, well, what's special here in this particular place? What makes these people move here and why?

So why are we practicing this, anyway?" Percy asked. "Do you guys spend a lot of time laying siege to fortified cities?