“I suppose our capacity for self-delusion is boundless.”

— John Steinbeck, book Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Source: Travels with Charley: In Search of America

Last update June 3, 2021. History

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John Steinbeck366

American writer 1902–1968

John Twelve Hawks American writer

Fourth Realm Trilogy (2005-2009), The Traveler (2005)

“What destroys us most effectively is not a malign fate but our own capacity for self-deception and for degrading our own best self.”

George Eliot book Adam Bede

Source: Adam Bede

“The brain is very good at self-delusion.”

Daniel Levitin (1957) American psychologist

Talks at Google (Oct 28, 2014)

“Life is a planetary level phenomonon and the Earth has been alive for at least 3000 million years. To me the human move to take responsibility for the living Earth is laughable - the rhethoric of the powerless. The planet takes care of us, not we of it. Our self inflated moral imperative to guide a wayward Earth or heal a sick planet is evidence of our immense capacity for self-delusion. Rather, we need to protect us from ourselves.”

Lynn Margulis (1938–2011) American evolutionary biologist

Source: Symbiotic Planet: A New Look at Evolution

“We have misunderstood, misread, misplanned and mismanaged our honorable intentions in Iraq with an arrogant self-delusion reminiscent of Vietnam.”

Chuck Hagel (1946) United States Secretary of Defense

Hagel: U.S. should pull out of 'mismanaged' Iraq, CNN, November 27, 2006, 2016-01-03 http://edition.cnn.com/2006/POLITICS/11/26/hagel.iraq/, <br class="br">2006

“We call ourselves a “capacity building” organization; self-motivated and self-initiated capacity building. For example, in 30 years, I don’t think I have signed a check for the company.”

Talal Abu-Ghazaleh (1938) Jordanian businesspeople

December 2006, Interview with Jordan Business magazine entitled “The Grass is Greener … On Both Sides”.

“That's kind of what trust is, isn't it? A willful self-delusion.”

Brandon Sanderson (1975) American fantasy writer

Source: The Final Empire

“He had leaped into the embrace of self-delusion.
There was a lot of that going around.”

Glen Cook book Soldiers Live

Source: Soldiers Live (2000), Chapter 76, “The Taglian Territories: Another Origin Story” (p. 609)

“If history teaches anything, it teaches that self-delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is folly.”

Ronald Reagan (1911–2004) American politician, 40th president of the United States (in office from 1981 to 1989)

Speech to the House of Commons (8 June 1982) http://www.reagan.utexas.edu/archives/speeches/1982/60882a.htm <br class="br">1980s, First term of office (1981–1985) <br class="br">Context: From Stettin on the Baltic to Varna on the Black Sea, the regimes planted by totalitarianism have had more than thirty years to establish their legitimacy. But none — not one regime — has yet been able to risk free elections. Regimes planted by bayonets do not take root.... If history teaches anything, it teaches self-delusion in the face of unpleasant facts is folly.... Our military strength is a prerequisite to peace, but let it be clear we maintain this strength in the hope it will never be used, for the ultimate determinant in the struggle that's now going on in the world will not be bombs and rockets but a test of wills and ideas, a trial of spiritual resolve, the values we hold, the beliefs we cherish, the ideals to which we are dedicated.

“Vision without action which fails to touch the lives of the poor is not vision, but self delusion.”

Michael Elmore-Meegan (1959) British humanitarian

Changing the World

“I suppose our capacity for self-delusion is boundless.”

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