“The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.”

— Daniel J. Boorstin

Last update Jan. 21, 2022. History

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Daniel J. Boorstin 39

American historian 1914–2004

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“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”

Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian

“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance. It is the illusion of knowledge.”

Stephen Hawking (1942–2018) British theoretical physicist, cosmologist, and author

Sometimes attributed to Hawking without a source, but originally from historian Daniel J. Boorstin. It appears in different forms in The Discoverers (1983), Cleopatra's Nose (1995), and introduction to The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1995)
Misattributed

“The great obstacle to discovering the shape of the earth, the continents, and the oceans was not ignorance, but the illusion of knowledge.”

Daniel J. Boorstin book The Discoverers

The Discoverers: A History of Man's Search to Know His World and Himself, Random House, 1983, p. 86.

“The greatest of all the accomplishments of 20th century science has been the discovery of human ignorance”

Lewis Thomas (1913–1993) American physician, poet and educator

“The history of Western science confirms the aphorism that the great menace to progress is not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge.”

Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian

This "aphorism" was expressed in different forms by Josh Billings and Socrates. note: Often misquoted as, "The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge," and often misattributed to Stephen Hawking.
Source: Cleopatra's Nose: Essays on the Unexpected (1995).