Variant translation: The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, clear, and well-defined will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance. The main source of our ignorance lies in the fact that our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.
Conjectures and Refutations: The Growth of Scientific Knowledge (1963)
Context: The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance. For this, indeed, is the main source of our ignorance — the fact that our knowledge can be only finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.
“Whatever we know about society, or indeed about the world in which we live, we know through the mass media. This is true not only of our knowledge of society but also of our knowledge of nature.”
Source: The reality of the Mass Media (2000), p. 1.
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Niklas Luhmann 12
German sociologist, administration expert, and social syste… 1927–1998Related quotes
“Our weapon is our knowledge. But remember, it may be a knowledge we may not know that we possess.”
Source: The A.B.C. Murders
"Why We Need To Understand Science" in The Skeptical Inquirer Vol. 14, Issue 3 (Spring 1990) http://www.csicop.org/si/show/why_we_need_to_understand_science
Warren G. Bennis (1990) Why leaders can't lead: the unconscious conspiracy continues. p. 143
1990s
“Western Civ,” p. 18.
Giants and Dwarfs (1990)