Quotations about Ignorance

The pleasures of ignorance are as great, in their way, as the pleasures of knowledge. ~Aldous Huxley


The most violent element in society is ignorance. ~Emma Goldman


A great deal of intelligence can be invested in ignorance. ~Saul Bellow


Genuine ignorance is... profitable because it is likely to be accompanied by humility, curiosity, and open mindedness; whereas ability to repeat catch-phrases, cant terms, familiar propositions, gives the conceit of learning and coats the mind with varnish waterproof to new ideas. ~John Dewey


Before we work on artificial intelligence why don't we do something about natural stupidity? ~Steve Polyak


You can swim all day in the Sea of Knowledge and still come out completely dry. Most people do. ~Norman Juster


It is impossible to defeat an ignorant man in argument. ~William G. McAdoo


A little learning is a dangerous thing, but a lot of ignorance is just as bad. ~Bob Edwards


The trouble ain't that there is too many fools, but that the lightning ain't distributed right. ~Mark Twain


The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt. ~Bertrand Russell


The trouble with people is not that they don't know but that they know so much that ain't so. ~Josh Billings


Some folks are wise and some are otherwise. ~Tobias Smollett


Anyway, no drug, not even alcohol, causes the fundamental ills of society. If we're looking for the source of our troubles, we shouldn't test people for drugs, we should test them for stupidity, ignorance, greed and love of power. ~P.J. O'Rourke


You can be sincere and still be stupid. ~Charles F. Kettering


Everybody is ignorant, only on different subjects. ~Will Rogers


Ignorance is a right! Education is eroding one of the few democratic freedoms remaining to us. ~Christopher Andrea


Your ignorance cramps my conversation. ~Anthony Hope


It's innocence when it charms us, ignorance when it doesn't. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966


A person is never happy except at the price of some ignorance. ~Anatole France


History shows that there is nothing so easy to enslave and nothing so hard to emancipate as ignorance, hence it becomes the double enemy of civilization. By its servility it is the prey of tyranny, and by its credulity it is the foe of enlightenment. ~Lemuel K. Washburn, Is The Bible Worth Reading And Other Essays


To be ignorant of one's ignorance is the malady of ignorance. ~A. Bronson Alcott


Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance, is the death of knowledge. ~Alfred North Whitehead


If ignorance is bliss, why aren't there more happy people? ~Author Unknown


Dopeler effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly. ~Author unknown, supposedly from a Washington Post reader submission word contest in which readers were asked to alter a word by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter and supply a new definition


Ignoranus: A person who's both stupid and an asshole. ~Author unknown, supposedly from a Washington Post reader submission word contest in which readers were asked to alter a word by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter and supply a new definition


Light travels faster than sound. That's why most people seem bright until you hear them speak. ~Author Unknown


Some scientists claim that hydrogen, because it is so plentiful, is the basic building block of the universe. I dispute that. I say there is more stupidity than hydrogen, and that is the basic building block of the universe. ~Frank Zappa


Two things are infinite, as far as we know - the universe and human stupidity. ~Attributed to Albert Einstein by Frederick S. Perls (Thanks, Garson O'Toole!)


We have enough youth, how about a fountain of smart? ~Author Unknown