“The greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian
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 greatest enemy of knowledge is not ignorance, it is the illusion of knowledge.”
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian
“The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance - it is the illusion of knowledge.”
Daniel J. Boorstin (1914–2004) American historian
“Ignorance is a chink in the armor a knowledgeable enemy can exploit at will.”
Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness
Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 54 (p. 462)
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.
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).
“Not ignorance, but ignorance of ignorance is the death of knowledge.”
Alfred North Whitehead (1861–1947) English mathematician and philosopher
Edward Teller (1908–2003) Hungarian-American nuclear physicist
As quoted in Forbidden Knowledge : From Prometheus to Pornography (1996) by Roger Shattuck, p. 177
“Knowledge kills action; action requires the veils of illusion.”
Friedrich Nietzsche book The Birth of Tragedy
Source: The Birth of Tragedy
“Knowledge is freedom and ignorance is slavery”
Miles Davis (1926–1991) American jazz musician
Source: Miles: The Autobiography