„It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it!“

„We have come out of the time when obedience, the acceptance of discipline, intelligent courage and resolution were most important, into that more difficult time when it is a man's duty to understand his world rather than simply fight for it.“

—  Ernest Hemingway American author and journalist 1899 - 1961

Introduction to Treasury of the Free World (1946)

„Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.“

—  Samuel Johnson English writer 1709 - 1784

September 19, 1777, p. 351, often misquoted as being hanged in the morning.
Vol III
Forrás: The Life of Samuel Johnson LL.D. Vol 3

„There would be no society if living together depended upon understanding each other.“

—  Eric Hoffer American philosopher 1898 - 1983

„… our enjoyment of the great works of literature depends more upon the depth of our sympathy than upon our understanding.“

—  Helen Keller, könyv The Story of My Life

Forrás: The Story of My Life

„It has an unhappy effect upon the human understanding and temper, for a man to be compelled in his gravest investigation of an argument, to consider, not what is true, but what is convenient.“

—  William Godwin English journalist, political philosopher and novelist 1756 - 1836

Kontextus: It has an unhappy effect upon the human understanding and temper, for a man to be compelled in his gravest investigation of an argument, to consider, not what is true, but what is convenient. The lawyer never yet existed who has not boldly urged an objection which he knew to be fallacious, or endeavoured to pass off a weak reason for a strong one. Intellect is the greatest and most sacred of all endowments; and no man ever trifled with it, defending an action to-day which he had arraigned yesterday, or extenuating an offence on one occasion, which, soon after, he painted in the most atrocious colours, with absolute impunity. Above all, the poet, whose judgment should be clear, whose feelings should be uniform and sound, whose sense should be alive to every impression and hardened to none, who is the legislator of generations and the moral instructor of the world, ought never to have been a practising lawyer, or ought speedily to have quitted so dangerous an engagement.

The Life of Geoffrey Chaucer vol. 1, p. 370 (1803)

„What is evidence to a man will depend upon those of his faculties whk at work upon the things which are presented as evidence.“

—  Henry Ward Beecher American clergyman and activist 1813 - 1887

The Nature, Importance and Liberties of Belief (1873)
Kontextus: Now, evidence to a man is that which convinces his mind. It varies with different men. An argument to a man who cannot reason is no evidence. Facts are no evidence to a man who cannot perceive them. A sentimental appeal is evidence to a man whose very nature moves by emotion, though it may not be to his neighbor.
So then, when men come to the investigation of truth, they are responsible, first, for research, for honesty therein, for being diligent, and for attempting to cleanse their minds from all bias of selfishness and pride. They are responsible for sincerity and faithfulness in the investigation of truth. And when they go beyond that to the use of their faculties, the combination of those faculties will determine very largely, not, perhaps, the generic nature of truth, but specific developments of it. And as long as the world stands there will be men who will hold that God is a God of infinite love and sympathy and. goodness with a residunm of justice; and there will be men who will believe that God is a God of justice with a residunm of love and sympathy and goodness; and each will follow the law of his own mind. As a magnet, drawn through a vessel containing sand and particles of iron, attracts the particles of iron but does not attract the sand; so the faculties of a man's mind appropriate certain facts and reject others. What is evidence to a man will depend upon those of his faculties whk at work upon the things which are presented as evidence.

„The complete irresponsibility of man for his actions and his nature is the bitterest drop which he who understands must swallow.“

—  Friedrich Nietzsche, könyv Human, All Too Human

Forrás: Human, All Too Human

„We cannot exert our understanding without from time to time understanding something of importance; and this act of understanding may be accompanied by the awareness of our understanding, by the understanding of understanding, by noesis noesos, and this is so high, so pure, so noble an experience that Aristotle could ascribe it to his God.“

—  Leo Strauss Classical philosophy specialist and father of neoconservativism 1899 - 1973

“What is liberal education,” p. 8
Liberalism Ancient and Modern (1968)

„In order to depict a man one must understand him, and to understand him one must be like him; in order to portray his psychological activities one must be able to reproduce them in oneself. To understand a man one must have his nature in oneself.“

—  Otto Weininger, könyv Sex and Character

Forrás: Sex and Character (1903), p. 105.

„Man's future welfare and probably even his survival depend upon his learning to live in harmony, rather than in combat, with these forces.“

—  Rachel Carson American marine biologist and conservationist 1907 - 1964

"Essay on the Biological Sciences" in Good Reading (1958)
Kontextus: If we have been slow to develop the general concepts of ecology and conservation, we have been even more tardy in recognizing the facts of the ecology and conservation of man himself. We may hope that this will be the next major phase in the development of biology. Here and there awareness is growing that man, far from being the overlord of all creation, is himself part of nature, subject to the same cosmic forces that control all other life. Man's future welfare and probably even his survival depend upon his learning to live in harmony, rather than in combat, with these forces.

„The man-machine will crucify any conscious man who tries to help him; and convert his wisdom into an empty, mechanical dogma that suits his own understanding.“

—  Barry Long Australian spiritual teacher and writer 1926 - 2003

Knowing Yourself: The True in the False (1996)

„The understanding of art depends finally upon one's willingness to extend one's humanity and one's knowledge of human life.“

—  Ralph Ellison American novelist, literary critic, scholar and writer 1914 - 1994

"The Art of Fiction: An Interview" (The Paris Review, Spring 1955), in The Collected Essays, ed. John F. Callahan (New York: Modern Library, 1995), p. 217.

„The futures of both peace and Civilization depend upon understanding and cooperation among the political, spiritual, and intellectual leaders of the world’s major civilizations.“

—  Samuel P. Huntington American political scientist 1927 - 2008

Forrás: The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (1996), Ch. 12 : The West, Civilizations, and Civilization, § 4 : The Commonalities Of Civilization, p. 321
Kontextus: The futures of both peace and Civilization depend upon understanding and cooperation among the political, spiritual, and intellectual leaders of the world’s major civilizations. In the clash of civilizations, Europe and America will hang together or hang separately. In the greater clash, the global “real clash,” between Civilization and barbarism, the world’s great civilizations, with their rich accomplishments in religion, art, literature, philosophy, science, technology, morality, and compassion, will also hang together or hang separately. In the emerging era, clashes of civilizations are the greatest threat to world peace, and an international order based on civilizations is the surest safeguard against world war.

„He understands not only with his brain but with his heart.“

—  Anne Bancroft American actress 1931 - 2005

On her husband Mel Brooks Associated Press interview (1997).
Kontextus: He understands not only with his brain but with his heart. And that might be called love. Not quite sure, but maybe that's the key.

„Fifty years from now, if an understanding of man's origins, his evolution, his history, his progress is not in the common place of the school books, we shall not exist.“

—  Jacob Bronowski, The Ascent of Man

Episode 13: "The Long Childhood"
The Ascent of Man (1973)

„To understand is difficult; to act is easy.“

—  Sun Yat-sen Chinese physician, politician and revolutionary 1866 - 1925

As quoted in Great Britain and the East, Vol. 61, Issues 1727-1742 (1944), p. 19 https://books.google.com/books?id=94AyAQAAIAAJ&q=%22To+understand+is+difficult;+to+act+is+easy%22&dq=%22To+understand+is+difficult;+to+act+is+easy%22&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiey5eF27fXAhWMHpQKHS3JCYAQ6AEILDAB

„Understanding the concept of competency is a prerequisite to understanding his integrated model of management.“

—  Richard Boyatzis American business theorist 1946

Forrás: Competent manager (1982), p. 10.

„Until you understand a writer's ignorance, presume yourself ignorant of his understanding.“

—  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, könyv Biographia Literaria

Forrás: Biographia Literaria (1817), Ch. XII

„God’s plan and His ways of working out His plan are frequently beyond our ability to fathom and understand. We must learn to trust when we don’t understand.“

—  Jerry Bridges American writer 1929 - 2016

Forrás: Trusting God: Even When Life Hurts