Quotes about ignorance
page 17

“Democracy is a pathetic belief in the collective wisdom of individual ignorance.”

H.L. Mencken (1880–1956) American journalist and writer

Des MacHale, Wit, Andrews McMeel Publishing, Kansas City (KS), 2003, ISBN 978-0-7407-3330-7, page 197 https://books.google.ca/books?id=Dhlgd_Af1C4C&pg=PA197 Misattributed

Wisdom, Democracy

“I have been accused of being ignorant of economics (although I am the founder and Chairman of the Board of a company which publishes seven professional economic newsletters), of being ignorant of sociology (although I am trained in sociology and was C. Wright Mills' research assistant at Columbia), of being unable to use statistics (although I earned my living as a professional statistician for five years) and of ignoring political factors”

Lloyd deMause (1931) American thinker

although all my graduate training was in political science
Source: Foundations of Psychohistory (1982), Ch. 2, ibid.

Science, Training

“The days of deadly ignorance will end, and they will end soon.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

2010s, 2016, June, Speech about the Orlando Shooting (June 13, 2016)

“For it was my master who taught me not only how very little I knew but also that any wisdom to which I might ever aspire could consist only in realizing more fully the infinity of my ignorance.”

Karl Popper (1902–1994) Austrian-British philosopher of science

Wisdom

“The attack should not have happened, of course. The rice farmer sergeant had been perfectly right; the Federation could not afford to risk its own great cites to punish the villagers of Venus. He was right—from his viewpoint.
A rice farmer has one logic; the men who live by and for power have another and entirely different logic. Their lives are built on tenuous assumptions, fragile as reputation; they could not afford to ignore a challenge to their power—the Federation could not afford not to punish the insolent colonists.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 10, “While I Was Musing the Fire Burned” (p. 113)

Men

“We are all equal, despite the country we come from, and national differences should be ignored. We are all a unity. We must shed all jealousy and envy because they are harmful. We are all one with each other and with God.”

Haidakhan Babaji teacher in northern India

2 April 1980.
The Teachings of Babaji

God, Jealousy, Envy, Country

“Nothing can be more vulgar or more untrue than the ignorant assertion that the world owes its progress of knowledge of any particular race. The whole world is interdependent and a constant stream of thought has throughout ages enriched the common heritage of mankind. It is the realization of this mutual interdependence that has kept the mighty fabric bound together and ensured the continuity of permanence of civilization.”

Jagadish Chandra Bose (1858–1937) Bengali polymath, physicist, biologist, botanist and archaeologist

In pages=106-97
Science and National Consciousness in Bengal: 1870-1930

Age, World, Knowledge

“The rise of new science in the seventeenth century laid hold upon general culture in the next century. The enlightenment… testified to the widespread belief that at last light had dawned, that dissipation of ignorance, superstition, and bigotry was at hand, and the triumph of reason was assured -- for reason was counterpart in man of the laws of nature which science was disclosing. The reign of law in the natural world was to be followed by the reign of law in human affairs.”

John Dewey (1859–1952) American philosopher, psychologist, and educational reformer

Time and Individuality (1940)

World, Law, Nature, Light

“If man puts his honor first in relying upon himself, knowing himself and applying himself, this in self-reliance, self-assertion, and freedom, he then strives to rid himself of the ignorance which makes a strange impenetrable object a barrier and a hindrance to his self-knowledge.”

Max Stirner book The False Principle of our Education

Source: The False Principle of our Education (1842), p. 23

Knowledge, Freedom

“All you are seeing is your own nostalgia for your girlhood trips up here into the hills, which were no doubt colored with the pleasantries of youth and idealism, which is—won’t you admit it?—finally just a form of ignorance.”

Samuel R. Delany book Tales of Nevèrÿon

Source: Tales of Nevèrÿon (1979), Chapter 2, “The Tale of Old Venn” Section 1 (p. 76)

Youth, Color, Nostalgia

“I do not see that it is possible, nor can I discover that it would be right, for me now to withdraw from the cause in which I have so long taken so deep an interest. The work is great, and vast are the results depending upon it, and unhappily our laborers are not abundant…But conscious of the increasing hazard we run owing to the long continuance of monopolies, and beholding the appalling sufferings of multitudes of my fellow-creatures, and satisfied that all benevolence and charity and the teaching of religion and of schools fall short of much of their full effect owing to the degraded and impoverished condition of the people—I should feel myself guilty, as possessing abundance and leaving others to hunger, nakedness and immorality and deepest ignorance and crime, if I were to retire into domestic quiet and leave the struggle to be carried on entirely by others.”

John Bright (1811–1889) British Radical and Liberal statesman

Letter to his mother-in-law Mrs. Priestman (November 1842), quoted in G. M. Trevelyan, The Life of John Bright (London: Constable, 1913), pp. 102-103.
1840s

Hunger, People, School, Religion

“Our intelligence and our technology have given us the power to affect the climate. How will we use this power? Are we willing to tolerate ignorance and complacency in matters that affect the entire human family? Do we value short-term advantages above the welfare of the Earth? Or will we think on longer time scales, with concern for our children and our grandchildren, to understand and protect the complex life-support systems of our planet? The Earth is a tiny and fragile world. It needs to be cherished.”

Carl Sagan book Cosmos

Source: Cosmos (1980), p. 103

Life, Children, World, Family

“One musn't overrate the culture of what used to be called "top people" before the wars. They had charming manners, but they were as ignorant as swans.”

Kenneth Clark (1903–1983) Art historian, broadcaster and museum director

Source: Civilisation (1969), Ch. 13: Heroic Materialism

War, People

“The danger does not lie with individuals, however criminal they may be. Far more, it lies in the ignorance of our entire society, which confirms these people in the lies that they were obliged to believe in childhood. Teachers, attorneys, doctors, social workers, priests, and other respected representatives of society protect parents from the mistreated child's every accusation and see to it that the truth about child abuse remains concealed. Even the child protection agencies insist that this crime, and this crime alone, should go unpunished.”

Alice Miller (1923–2010) Swiss psychologist

Breaking Down the Wall of Silence (Abbruch der Schweigemauer) (1990)

People, Truth, Lie, Parent

“How many gay people have not had children as a result of coming out of the closet and being gay? Millions, isn't that correct? Some of our most talented, wonderful, intelligent people, because of the openness of modern American society going back for now 40 years, have opted out of being hidden or closeted. In the old days, if a person was gay, or felt an attraction to the same sex, they probably would have gotten married to hide it. And they probably would've had a family, producing children. But because of this 'let it all hang out,' 'if you feel gay, act gay,' 'if it feels good, do it,' they've opted not to have children. And as a result, number one, society has lost millions of remarkable children. That's one point that is almost irrefutable. And for years I have thought about this. Why is society devolving so rapidly? One of the reasons is some of our most talented intelligent people have not had children. That's one point. And then there's another point I wanna make, and this is more important… I kept asking myself, why are gay people liberal? Why are most of them so liberal? Why is society unraveling on so many other levels, putting aside the issue of sexuality. And one of the reasons is because some of our most intelligent…passionate people happen to be gay. And while in the past they would've taken on other causes that are so critical for the betterment of society, they've been single-focused only on gay issues. And as a result society has again devolved, because the gay movement has sucked so many people into a single issue. They've ignored all the other important issues of our society, which is why we're collapsing. Why would a gay person want open borders? Why would a gay person want unlimited welfare? Why would a gay person want to be tolerant for Islamists coming into America? Because they're not focused on any of it. Their community has focused them only on one issue. And as a result the entire society has lost out. … And therefore I would say to you that a traditional society has offered us protections, both obvious and not so obvious, that we may not be aware of, and that openness is not necessarily for the betterment of the people or for society.”

Michael Savage book The Savage Nation

The Savage Nation The Savage Nation (1995- ), 2015-04-29 Radio (Audio: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YFNm7C_uJpI&feature=youtu.be&t=40m27s) 2015

Children, People, Family, Sex

“Perhaps there are none more lazy, or more truly ignorant, than your everlasting readers.”

William Cobbett (1763–1835) English pamphleteer, farmer and journalist

“To a Father,” letter 5.
Advice to Young Men (1829)

“Since Lord Brougham assailed Dr Young, the world has seen no such specimen of the insolence of a shallow pretender to a Master in Science as this remarkable production, in which one of the most exact of observers, most cautious of reasoners, and most candid of expositors, of this or any other age, is held up to scorn as a "flighty" person, who endeavours "to prop up his utterly rotten fabric of guess and speculation," and whose "mode of dealing with nature" is reprobated as "utterly dishonourable to Natural Science."
And all this high and mighty talk, which would have been indecent in one of Mr. Darwin's equals, proceeds from a writer whose want of intelligence, or of conscience, or of both, is so great, that, by way of an objection to Mr. Darwin's views, he can ask, "Is it credible that all favourable varieties of turnips are tending to become men?"; who is so ignorant of paleontology, that he can talk of the "flowers and fruits" of the plants of the Carboniferous epoch; of comparative anatomy, that he can gravely affirm the poison apparatus of the venomous snakes to be "entirely separate from the ordinary laws of animal life, and peculiar to themselves"…
Nor does the reviewer fail to flavour this outpouring of preposterous incapacity with a little stimulation of the odium theologicum. Some inkling of the history of the conflicts between Astronomy, Geology, and Theology, leads him to keep a retreat open by the proviso that he cannot "consent to test the truth of Natural Science by the word of Revelation;" but, for all that, he devotes pages to the exposition of his conviction that Mr. Darwin's theory "contradicts the revealed relation of the creation to its Creator," and is "inconsistent with the fulness of his glory."”

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895) English biologist and comparative anatomist

If I confine my retrospect of the reception of the 'Origin of Species' to a twelvemonth, or thereabouts, from the time of its publication, I do not recollect anything quite so foolish and unmannerly as the Quarterly Review article...
Huxley's commentary on the Samuel Wilberforce review of the Origin of Species in the Quarterly Review.
1880s, On the Reception of the Origin of Species (1887)

Life, Men, Truth, Age

“Knowledge leads to unity, and Ignorance to diversity.”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

Saying 368
Râmakrishna : His Life and Sayings (1898)

Knowledge

“Donald Trump misses so much. He doesn’t see the success of black leaders in every field… The vibrancy of black-owned businesses…Or the strength of the black church… He doesn’t see the excellence of historically black colleges and universities or the pride of black parents watching their children thrive… And he certainly doesn’t have any solutions to take on the reality of systemic racism and create more equity and opportunity in communities of color. It takes a lot of nerve to ask people he’s ignored and mistreated for decades, "What do you have to lose?"”

Hillary Clinton (1947) American politician, senator, Secretary of State, First Lady

The answer is everything!
Presidential campaign (April 12, 2015 – 2016), Speech in Reno, Nevada (August 25, 2016)

Children, People, Color, Communication

“We don't distinguish between the various forms of child abuse. Emotional abuse … is pretty much ignored. When someone spends their life being told, 'You're stupid, you're a disgrace, I should have aborted you, you ruined my life,' it scars them in ways that are almost impossible to describe with words. And yet, such a person describing their life would be told, 'Oh, you weren't an incest victim? Oh, you weren't burned with cigarettes? So, how abused were you really?”

Andrew Vachss (1942) American writer and lawyer

Patty Satalia WPSU on October 24, 2004 [www.wpsu.org/radio/Audio/takenote/TN544.ram

Life, Stupidity, Way, Personality

“In short order they fell into the same pit as their rivals, who had for decades ignored the plain and simple fact that to a starving man “freedom” implies a full rice-bowl—or, if he has an exceptional imagination, a healthy ox to pull his plough. It has nothing to do with voting for a political delegate.”

John Brunner book Stand on Zanzibar

context (8) “Isolation”
Stand on Zanzibar (1968)

Imagination, Freedom

“To know you are ignorant is the beginning of wisdom,” Viviane said. “Then, when you begin to learn, you will not have to forget all the things you think you know.”

Marion Zimmer Bradley book The Mists of Avalon

Source: The Mists of Avalon (1983)

Wisdom, Thinking, Learning, Forgetting

“If in the present work I have dwelt at some length on the worship of trees, it is not, I trust, because I exaggerate its importance in the history of religion, still less because I would deduce from it a whole system of mythology; it is simply because I could not ignore the subject in attempting to explain the significance of a priest who bore the title of King Of the Wood, and one of whose titles to office was the plucking of a bough — the Golden Bough”

James Frazer book The Golden Bough

from a tree in the sacred grove.
Preface, 1 Brick Court Temple, London, June 1922.
The Golden Bough (1890)

Religion, History, Tree

“Much of this street violence I mentioned is directed exclusively against non-Muslims, forcing many native people to leave their neighbourhoods, their cities, their countries. Moreover, … Muslims are now a swing vote not to be ignored.”

Geert Wilders (1963) Dutch politician

2000s, Speech at the Four Seasons, New York (25 September 2008)

People, Country

“By contrast with diamonds or asbestos or granite or the minerals we burn for fuel, the lowly agate is the victim of scientific disinterest, the same kinds of structured apathy I have elsewhere called 'the social construction of ignorance.' Agates seem to fall outside the orbit of geological knowledge, and therefore tend to be regarded — if at all — as geological accidents or oddities not really deserving systematic study.”

Robert N. Proctor (1954) American historian

Robert N. Proctor, Agate Eyes: A Lapidary Journey (book-in-progress), cited in: Nancy Marie Brown, " The Agateer: How do agates form? http://news.psu.edu/story/140641/2001/09/01/research/agateer," Penn State News, September 1, 2001

Knowledge, Study

“You see many stars in the sky at night, but not when the sun rises. Can you therefore say that there are no stars in the heavens during the day? O man, because you cannot find God in the days of your ignorance, say not that there is no God.”

Ramakrishna (1836–1886) Indian mystic and religious preacher

Source: Sayings of Sri Ramakrishna (1960), p. 1

God, Star, Sun, Night

“For too long, African societies have been identified as superstitious, consisting of people who cannot question, reason or think critically. Dogma and blind faith in superstition, divinity and tradition are said to be the mainstay of popular thought and culture. African science is often equated with witchcraft and the occult; African philosophy with magical thinking, myth-making and mysticism, African religion with stone-age spiritual abracadabra, African medicine with folk therapies often involving pseudoscientific concoctions inspired by magical thinking. Science, critical thinking and technological intelligence are portrayed as Western — as opposed to universal — values, and as alien to Africa and to the African mindset. An African who thinks critically or seeks evidence and demands proofs for extraordinary claims is accused of taking a “white” or Western approach. An African questioning local superstitions and traditions is portrayed as having abandoned or betrayed the essence of African identity. Skepticism and rationalism are regarded as Western, un-African, philosophies. Although there is a risk of overgeneralizing, there are clear indicators that the continent is still socially, politically and culturally trapped by undue credulity. Many irrational beliefs exist and hold sway across the region. These are beliefs informed by fear and ignorance, misrepresentations of nature and how nature works. These misconceptions are often instrumental in causing many absurd incidents, harmful traditional practices and atrocious acts.”

Leo Igwe (1970) Nigerian human rights activist

A Manifesto for a Skeptical Africa (2012)

People, Age, Fear, Faith

“Good God, what a brute man becomes when ignorant and oppressed. Oh Liberty! What horrors are committed in thy name! May every virtuous revolutionist remember the horrors of Wexford!”

Daniel O'Connell (1775–1847) Irish political leader

Written in his Journal, 2nd Jan 1799, referring to the recent 1798 Rebellion. Quoted from Vol I, p. 205, of O'Neill Daunt, W. J., Personal Recollections of the Late Daniel O'Connell, M.P., 2 Vols, London, 1848.

God

“Chief, perhaps it would be clearest to say that the fasarta modulates the garbab in such a phase relationship that the thrimaleen is forced to bast—or, to put it another way, somebody loosed mice in the washroom. Seriously, there is no popular way to explain it. If you were willing to spend five hard years with me, working up through the math, I could probably bring you to the same level of ignorance and confusion that I enjoy.”

Robert A. Heinlein book Between Planets

Source: Between Planets (1951), Chapter 17, “To Reset the Clock” (p. 176)

Way

“All racist and anti-semitic attacks must be stamped out. However, the reality is that the great bulk of racist attacks in Europe today are on black people, Asians and Muslims — and they are the primary targets of the extreme right. For 20 years Israeli governments have attempted to portray anyone who forcefully criticises the policies of Israel as anti-semitic. The truth is the opposite: the same universal human values that recognise the Holocaust as the greatest racist crime of the 20th century require condemnation of the policies of successive Israeli governments — not on the absurd grounds that they are Nazi or equivalent to the Holocaust, but because ethnic cleansing, discrimination and terror are immoral.
They are also fuelling anger and violence across the world. For a mayor of London not to speak out against such injustice would not only be wrong — but would also ignore the threat it poses to the security of all Londoners.”

Ken Livingstone (1945) Mayor of London between 2000 and 2008

Commentary in The Guardian (4 March 2005)

People, Truth, World, Reality

“You humans seem to have a profound capacity for ignoring obvious evidence.”

Robert J. Sawyer book Calculating God

Source: Calculating God (2000), Chapter 2 (p. 23)

“You guys are all into that born again thing, which is great. We do need to be born again, since Jesus said that to a guy named Nicodemus. But if you tell me I have to be born again to enter the kingdom of God, I can tell you that you just have to sell everything you have and give it to the poor, because Jesus said that to one guy too…[And he paused in the awkward silence. ] But I guess that’s why God invented highlighters, so we can highlight the parts we like and ignore the rest.”

Rich Mullins (1955–1997) American christian musician

The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical by Shane Claiborne

God, Guy, Silence, Parting

“Mankind has advanced. Human progress is ceaseless. We can look at Bosnia or Zaire or Rwanda and conclude that building just societies is a fool's errand. We are always, despite our advances, only one sin away from slipping into the abyss of terror and ignorance.
But that is not so. Generations upon generations have driven the human race farther and farther from darkness. Past episodes of abominable human cruelty are kept vivid in the memories of succeeding generations. "Never again," is the admonition passed from the survivors of the Holocaust to their descendants and to us all. And although such an important reminder will not always prevent the occurrence of cruelty and violence even at levels approaching genocide, the civilized world is more inclined to organize opposition to such tragedies if not as early as we should, at least sooner than we once would have.”

John McCain (1936–2018) politician from the United States

1990s, Speech at Ohio Wesleyan University (1997)

World, Fools, Memory, Past

“All the copy-cat predictions of a Muslim takeover of Europe not only ignore history and Europe’s ineradicable viciousness and Europe's ineradicable piousness, but do a serious disservice by exacerbating fear and hatred. And when it comes to hatred, trust me: The Europeans don't need our help.”

Ralph Peters (1952) American military officer, writer, pundit

Source: 2000s, Wars of Blood and Faith: The Conflicts That Will Shape the Twenty-First Century (2007), p. 334

Fear, History, Cats, Help

“We should not go to the people and say, "Here we are. We come to give you the charity of our presence, to teach you our science, to show you your errors, your lack of culture, your ignorance of elementary things." We should go instead with an inquiring mind and a humble spirit to learn at that great source of wisdom that is the people.”

Ernesto Che Guevara (1928–1967) Argentine Marxist revolutionary

On Revolutionary Medicine (1960)

Wisdom, People, Error, Learning

“But, I remember, we students used to discuss among ourselves that there was lot of 'white washing' and 'polishing' and suppressio veri in what we were taught in the class room. …. I became convinced that until this "gagging of others" was not challenged, their brand of history would go unchecked. Since then I have challenged them in my books…. And since I do no believe that "Muslim rule should not attract any criticism. Destruction of temples by Muslim invaders and rulers should not be mentioned and forcible conversions to Islam should be ignored and deleted, etc. etc.", my books are free from such restrictions. I now also apply the same yardstick to medieval Indian history as is done with respect to modem Indian history. If British imperialism was bad for the Indian people so also was Muslim imperialism. Both these sought sustenance from cooperation of indigenous elements but neither of them became indigenous in nature. We in India write the history of British rule not from the point of view of European imperialism but from that of the victims of colonization. I apply the same methodology to the history of Muslim rule. I write about it from the people's point of view rather than from the view of Islamic imperialists. We cannot apply different standards of approach and methodology to different periods of Indian history.”

K. S. Lal book Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India

Source: Theory and Practice of Muslim State in India (1999), Chapter 7

People, Books, History, Nature

“What ideas individuals may attach to the term "Millennium" I know not; but I know that society may be formed so as to exist without crime, without poverty, with health greatly improved, with little, if any misery, and with intelligence and happiness increased a hundredfold; and no obstacle whatsoever intervenes at this moment except ignorance to prevent such a state of society from becoming universal.”

Robert Owen (1771–1858) Welsh social reformer

Address to the Inhabitants of New Lanark (1816)

Happiness, Health, Intelligence, Idea

“Price dispersion is a manifestation — and, indeed, it is the measure — of ignorance in the market. Dispersion is a biased measure of ignorance because there is never absolute homogeneity in the commodity if we include the terms of sale within the concept of the commodity. Thus, some automobile dealers might perform more service, or carry a larger range of varieties in stock, and a portion of the observed dispersion is presumably attributable to such differences. But it would be metaphysical, and fruitless, to assert that all dispersion is due to heterogeneity.”

George Stigler (1911–1991) American economist

Source: "The economics of information," 1961, p. 214

“I'm sure for some people saying they’re bisexual feels less scary than making a statement that they're gay. For me, it’s not really an issue because I’m someone who believes being bisexual is actually a thing. It’s not made up. It’s not a lack of decision. It’s not being greedy or numerous other ignorant things I’ve heard at this point. For a bisexual, it’s not about gender. That’s not the deciding factor for who they’re attracted to.”

Anna Paquin (1982) Canadian-born New Zealand actress

I still like women': Pregnant Anna Paquin on why she will always be bisexual... despite being married to Stephen Moyer http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2138717/Anna-Paquin-bisexual-Actress-likes-women-despite-married-Stephen-Moyer.html By Daily Mail Reporter - Published: 3-5-2012 Anna Paquin: My Bisexuality 'Is Not Made Up' Despite Being Married To Stephen Moyer http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/05/03/anna-paquin-bisexuality-zooey-magazine-_n_1475128.html - Published: 5-3-2012.

People, Feeling, Decision

“Alas, because I'm no longer innocent. We're civilized beings. Whether we like it or not, we have the cares and concerns of classical civilization in our bones. I want to express myself clearly when I paint. In people who feign ignorance there is a kind of barbarism even more detestable than the academic kind: it's no longer possible to be ignorant today. One no longer is. We come into the world armed with facility. Facility is the death of art and we must rid ourselves of it.”

Paul Cézanne (1839–1906) French painter

Source: Quotes of Paul Cezanne, after 1900, Cézanne, - a Memoir with Conversations, (1897 - 1906), p. 155, in: 'What he told me – I. The motif': Cited in: George Pattison. God and Being: An Enquiry, (2011). p. 64

Death, People, World, Art

“To his complete astonishment, he later found himself offering up a stumbling prayer that the dog would be protected. It was a moment in which he felt a desperate need to believe in a God that shepherded his own creations. But, even praying, he felt a twinge of self-reproach, and knew he might start mocking his own prayer at any second.
Somehow, though, he managed to ignore his iconoclastic self and went on praying anyway. Because he wanted the dog, because he needed the dog.”

Richard Matheson book I Am Legend

Source: I Am Legend (1954), Ch. 12

God, Dogs

“After all there is the two edged sword that will never fail you, with enthusiasm for one of its edges and irony for the other. However mired and weedy be the current of life there will be always joy and loyalty enough left to keep you unwavering in the faith that politics is not as it seems in clouded moments, a mere gabble and squabble of selfish interests, but that it is the State in action. And the State is the name by which we call the great human conspiracy against hunger and cold, against loneliness and ignorance; the State is the foster-mother and warden of the arts, of love, of comradeship, of all that redeems from despair that strange adventure which we call human life.”

Thomas Kettle (1880–1916) Irish politician

The Day's Burden: Studies Literary & Political, and Miscellaneous Essays (1910).

Love, Life, Hunger, Faith

“My generation comes from a world that has been molded by crass TV programs, movies, comic books, popular music, advertisements and commercials. My brain is a huge garbage dump of all this stuff and it is this, mainly, that my work comes out of, for better or for worse. I hope that whatever synthesis I make of all this crap contains something worthwhile, that it's something other than just more smarmy entertainment—or at least, that it's genuine high quality entertainment. I also hope that perhaps it's revealing of something, maybe. On the other hand, I want to avoid becoming pretentious in the eagerness to give my work deep meanings! I have an enormous ego and must resist the urge to come on like a know-it-all. Some of the imagery in my work is sorta scary because I'm basically a fearful, pessimistic person. I'm always seeing the predatory nature of the universe, which can harm you or kill you very easily and very quickly, no matter how well you watch your step. The way I see it, we are all just so much chopped liver. We have this great gift of human intelligence to help us pick our way through this treacherous tangle, but unfortunately we don't seem to value it very much. Most of us are not brought up in environments that encourage us to appreciate and cultivate our intelligence. To me, human society appears mostly to be a living nightmare of ignorant, depraved behavior. We're all depraved, me included. I can't help it if my work reflects this sordid view of the world. Also, I feel that I have to counteract all the lame, hero-worshipping crap that is dished out by the mass-media in a never-ending deluge.”

Robert Crumb (1943) American cartoonist

The R. Crumb Handbook by Robert Crumb and Peter Poplaski (2005), p. 363

Books, World, Fear, Hope

“The only possible innocence that remains to me, while I pay forced tribute to the system, while I profit by its corrupting influences and agencies, while I bear my part in the culpable public ignorance and guilty moral apathy, is that of protest and exhaustless effort.”

George D. Herron (1862–1925) American clergyman, writer and activist

Source: Between Caesar and Jesus (1899), p. 22

Effort, Parting

“The history of civilization proves beyond doubt just how sterile the repeated attempts of metaphysics to guess at nature' s laws have been. Instead, there is every reason to believe that when the human intellect ignores reality and concentrates within, it can no longer explain the simplest inner workings of life' s machinery or of the world around us.”

Santiago Ramón y Cajal (1852–1934) Spanish neuroscientist

Advice for a Young Investigator (1897), p. 2

Life, World, Law, History

“You see," said my Teacher, "how little your words have done. So far as the Monarch understands them at all, he accepts them as his own — for he cannot conceive of any other except himself — and plumes himself upon the variety of 'Its Thought' as an instance of creative Power. Let us leave this God of Pointland to the ignorant fruition of his omnipresence and omniscience: nothing that you or I can do can rescue him from his self-satisfaction.”

Edwin Abbott Abbott book Flatland

Source: Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (1884), PART II: OTHER WORLDS, Chapter 20. How the Sphere Encouraged Me in a Vision

God, Understanding, Teachers

“I believe the art of the future including poetry will be simple, fresh and strongly coloured and will be understood and loved by the ignorant as well as the most cultivated. A popular art in the finest sense of the word.”

Max Michelson (1880–1953) American poet

Love, Art, Sense, Future

“The educated classes were apt to speak in a patronizing tone of the "masses of the people", and to talk of political education as if it were only needed by those masses, but the fact was that the middle classes needed education, especially on this Irish question, quite as much as the masses. The whole trouble and difficulty of our dealings with Ireland had arisen from our ignorance. … He confidently believed that the country would arrive at but one conclusion, and that that would be in favour of Home Rule. The work would not be a long one, because two or three years would undoubtedly see the solution of this question in the sense which they desired to see it concluded—a consummation which was so much to be desired not only in the interests of Ireland but also of England, Scotland, and Wales.”

James Bryce, 1st Viscount Bryce (1838–1922) British academic, jurist, historian and Liberal politician

Speech to the Home Rule Union at the National Liberal Club, London (24 February 1887), quoted in The Times (25 February 1887), p. 4
1880s

People, Education, Home, Confidence

“The general ignorance of the visual arts, especially their theoretical bases, deplorable even in the so-called intellectual world; the artist’s well-founded despair of ever reaching the mythical “masses” with “advanced art”; the resulting ghetto mentality predominant in the narrow and incestuous art world itself, with its resentful reliance on a very small group of dealers, curators, critics, editors, and collectors who are all too frequently and often unknowingly bound by invisible apron strings to the “real world’s” power structure—all of these factors may make it unlikely that conceptual art will be any better equipped to affect the world any differently than, or even as much as, its less ephemeral counterparts.”

Lucy R. Lippard (1937) American art curator

John Chandler and Lucy R. Lippard, " The Dematerialization of Art http://www.c-cyte.com/OccuLibrary/Texts-Online/Lippard-Chandler_The_Dematerialization_of_Art.pdf," in Conceptual Art: A Critical Anthology, ed. Alexander Alberro and Blake Stimson (Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 1999).

World, Art, Despair

“Whoever imagines himself a favorite with God, holds other people in contempt. Whenever a man believes that he has the exact truth from God, there is in that man no spirit of compromise. He has not the modesty born of the imperfections of human nature; he has the arrogance of theological certainty and the tyranny born of ignorant assurance. Believing himself to be the slave of God, he imitates his master, and of all tyrants, the worst is a slave in power.”

Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer

Some Reasons Why (1881)

God, People, Truth, Imagination

“Let true Christians then, with becoming earnestness, strive in all things to recommend their profession, and to put to silence the vain scoffs of ignorant objectors. Let them boldly assert the cause of Christ in an age when so many, who bear the name of Christians, are ashamed of Him: and let them consider as devolved on Them the important duty of suspending for a while the fall of their country, and, perhaps, of performing a still more extensive service to society at large; not by busy interference in politics, in which it cannot but be confessed there is much uncertainty; but rather by that sure and radical benefit of restoring the influence of Religion, and of raising the standard of morality.”

William Wilberforce (1759–1833) English politician

Source: Real Christianity (1797), p. 350.

Age, Religion, Business, Silence

“According to my first birth I am nothing but unclean slime and dust of earth, conceived and born in sin from my mother's womb, and educated all my life in all manner of ignorance, sin and blindness, until the clear light of grace and knowledge appeared unto me from high heaven and which has given me such a heart, will and desire, that I willingly seek after that which is good, and strive, with holy Paul to "follow after, if that I may apprehend that for which also I am apprehended of Christ Jesus," Phil. 3: 12.”

Menno Simons (1496–1561) Dutch theologian, founder of the Mennonites

Ibid, p.248

Life, Education, Birth, Knowledge

“Trump is an ignorant demagogue who traffics in racist and misogynistic slurs and crazy conspiracy theories. He champions protectionism and isolationism — the policies that brought us the Great Depression and World War II. He wants to undertake a police-state roundup of undocumented immigrants and to bar Muslims from coming to this country. He encourages his followers to assault protesters and threatens to sue or smear critics. He would abandon Japan and South Korea and break up the most successful alliance in history — NATO. But he has kind words for tyrants such as Vladimir Putin. There has never been a major party nominee in U. S. history as unqualified for the presidency. The risk of Trump winning, however remote, represents the biggest national security threat that the United States faces today.”

Max Boot (1969) American writer and historian

The Republican Party is dead, May 8, 2016, latimes.com, Los Angeles Times http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-boot-republicans-in-exile-20160508-story.html,

War, World, History, Success

“It was easy to cover up ignorance by the mystical word “intuition.””

Isaac Asimov (1920–1992) American writer and professor of biochemistry at Boston University, known for his works of science fiction …

Source: The Foundation series (1951–1993), Foundation’s Edge (1982), Chapter 18 “Collision” section 4, p. 377

“What they do in heaven we are ignorant of; what they do not we are told expressly: that they neither marry, nor are given in marriage.”

Jonathan Swift (1667–1745) Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, and poet

Thoughts on Various Subjects from Miscellanies (1711-1726)

Marriage

“[the authors in Justice Belied made a] compelling case that this system is not only flawed but produces serious and systematic injustice. One major theme pressed in a number of chapters is that the international criminal justice system (ICJS) that has emerged in the age of tribunals and “humanitarian intervention” has replaced a real, if imperfect, system of international justice with one that misuses forms of justice to allow dominant powers to attack lesser countries without legal impediment. No tribunals have been established for Israel’s actions in Palestine or Kagame’s mass killings in the DRC. Numerous authors in Justice Belied stress the remarkable fact of the ICC’s [International Criminal Court] exclusive focus on Africans, with not a single case of charges brought against non-Africans. And within Africa itself the selectivity is notorious – U. S. clients Kagame and Museveni are exempt; U. S. targets Kenyatta, Taylor, and Gadaffi are charged. […] The system has worked poorly in service to justice, as the authors point out, but U. S. policy has had larger geopolitical and economic aims, and underwriting Kagame’s terror in Rwanda and the DRC and directing the ICC toward selected African targets while ignoring others served those aims. Many of the statutes and much political rhetoric accompanying the new ICJS proclaimed the aim of bringing peace and reconciliation. But this was blatant hypocrisy as the exclusion of aggression as a crime, the selectivity of application, the frequency of applied victor’s justice, and the manifold abuses of the judicial processes have made for war, hatred, and exacerbated conflict. The authors of Justice Belied do a remarkable job of spelling out these sorry conditions and calling for a dismantling of the new ICJS and return to the UN Charter and nation-based attention to dealing with injustice.”

Edward S. Herman (1925–2017) American journalist

Herman, review of Justice Belied: The Unbalanced Scales of International Criminal Justice, Z Magazine, January 2015.
2010s

War, Age, Peace, Justice

“Although the Mathematicks according to its Etymology, signifies only Discipline, yet it merits the Name of Science better than any other, because its Principles are self-evident, and independent on any sensible Experience, and its Propositions demonstrated beyond all possible Doubt or Opposition. Youth were anciently instructed herein before Philosophy, on which Account Aristotle called it the Science of Children. This was taught them not only to raise and excite their Genius, but also as a fit preparative to the Study of Nature; and it was upon this Account that the Divine Plato inscribed on his School… that none wholly ignorant of Geometry should be admitted there.”

Jacques Ozanam (1640–1718) French mathematician

Source: A Mathematical Dictionary: Or; A Compendious Explication of All Mathematical Terms, 1702, p. 1, The Introduction; Lead paragraph

Children, Youth, School, Nature

“It is better to have the child in the chimney corner moved by what happens in the poem, in spite of his ignorance of its real meaning, than to have the poem a puzzle to which that meaning is the only key. Still, complicated subjects make complicated poems, and some of the best poems can move only the best readers; this is one more question of curves of normal distribution. I have tried to make my poems plain, and most of them are plain enough; but I wish that they were more difficult because I had known more.”

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

"Answers to Questions," from Mid-Century American Poets, edited by John Ciardi, 1950 [p. 170]
Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964 (1980)

Question

“The European Union is happy to suck money from member states like a giant leech, with absolutely no respect for how it is spent. Whenever more transparency is called for, they simply hide behind smoke and mirrors and fancy words, and completely ignore common sense. They show a total lack of respect to the citizens of the European Union. The problem with the EU is that it spends money like it is going out of fashion, when actually it’s the Euro which is going out of fashion right now, with so many countries now questioning its membership.”

Jill Seymour (1958) British politician

Where is the transparency? More EU smoke and mirrors… http://jillseymourukip.org/where-is-the-transparency-more-eu-smoke-and-mirrors/ (February 28, 2017)

Money, Happiness, Fashion, Question

“We all would like to know more and, at the same time, to receive less information. In fact, the problem of a worker in today's knowledge industry is not the scarcity of information but its excess. The same holds for professionals: just think of a physician or an executive, constantly bombarded by information that is at best irrelevant. In order to learn anything we need time. And to make time we must use information filters allowing us to ignore most of the information aimed at us. We must ignore much to learn a little.”

Mario Bunge (1919) Argentine philosopher and physicist

Mario Bunge, Philosophy in Crisis: The Need for Reconstruction, 2001, p. 20.
2000s

Knowledge, Problem, Thinking, Learning

“You could tell those two had been married by the way that she ignored him.”

Lindsey Davis book Shadows in Bronze

Shadows in Bronze

Way

“Forts, arsenals, garrisons, armies, navies, are means of security and defence, which were invented in half-civilized times and in feudal or despotic countries; but schoolhouses are the republican line of fortifications, and if they are dismantled and dilapidated, ignorance and vice will pour in their legions through every breach.”

Horace Mann (1796–1859) American politician

The Common School Journal, Vol. III, No. 17 (1 September 1841)

Time, Country

“Dandish was the ideal empiricist. Pushing back the borders of ignorance, that was his only reason for living.”

Sean Russell (1952) author

Source: World Without End (1995), Chapter 5 (p. 64)

“The road to ignorance is paved with good editions. Only the illiterate can afford to buy good books now.”

George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950) Irish playwright

As quoted in Days with Bernard Shaw (1949) by Stephen Winsten
1940s and later

Books

“If we would taste God, and feel in ourselves Eternal Life above all things, We must go forth into God with a faith that is far above our reason, And there dwell, simple, idle, without image, Lifted up by love into the Unwalled Bareness of our intelligence. For when we go out from ourselves in love, and die to all observances in ignorance and darkness, Then we are made complete, And transfigured by the Eternal Word, Image of the Father. And in this emptiness of spirit we receive the Incomprehensible Light, Which enfolds and penetrates us as air is penetrated by the light of the sun; And this Light is nought else but a fathomless gazing and seeing. What we are, that we gaze at; and what we gaze at, that we are. For our thought, our life, our being, are lifted up in simplicity, And united with the Truth, that is God. Therefore in this simple gazing we are one life and one spirit with God
—And this I call the seeing life.”

John Ruysbroeck (1293–1381) Flemish mystic

The Sparkling Stone (c. 1340)

Love, Life, God, Truth

“The solution… was found only after the rise of nuclear physics, and, strange to relate, was not known to Eddington when he developed his celebrated theory of stellar structure between 1916 and 1924. Indeed, it is one of the most intriguing facts in the history of science that the two most influential theories concerning the stars—Newton's theory of gravitation and Eddington's theory of stellar construction—were each developed so successfully although Newton was ignorant of the origin of gravitation and Eddington of the origin of stellar energy.”

Gerald James Whitrow (1912–2000) British mathematician

"Why the Sun Shines" (18 July 1957)

History, Star, Science

“I am not a businessman. I never have been. I have problems dealing with money. My entire career has been managed by family members or managers who have looked after my affairs. I am totally ignorant as far as money matters are concerned. For me to suddenly be thrown into this huge corporate ocean without adequate managerial capacity was perhaps the unmaking of the corporation”

Amitabh Bachchan (1942) Indian actor

On the reason behind the failure of ABCL
Quotable quotes by Amitabh Bachchan.

Money, Family, Failure, Problem

“The ascent of man into heaven is not the key, but rather his ascent here into the spirit and the descent also of the Spirit into his normal humanity and the transformation of this earthly nature. For that and not some post mortem salvation is the real new birth for which humanity waits as the crowning movement of its long obscure and painful course…. Therefore the individuals who will most help the future of humanity in the new age will be those who will recognise a spiritual evolution as the destiny and therefore the great need of the human being…. They will especially not make the mistake of thinking that this change can be effected by machinery and outward institutions; they will know and never forget that it has to be lived out by each man inwardly or it can never be made a reality for the kind…. Failures must be originally numerous in everything great and difficult, but the time comes when the experience of past failures can be profitably used and the gate that so long resisted opens. In this as in all great human aspirations and endeavours, an a priori declaration of impossibility is a sign of ignorance and weakness, and the motto of the aspirant's endeavour must be the solvitur ambulando of the discoverer. For by the doing the difficulty will be solved. A true beginning has to be made; the rest is a work for Time in its sudden achievements or its long patient labour….”

Sri Aurobindo (1872–1950) Indian nationalist, freedom fighter, philosopher, yogi, guru and poet

July, 1918
India's Rebirth

Pain, Age, Birth, Failure

“The extreme ignorance and gullibility of the foreign press provides the negationists with a strategic cover. Most English-knowing Indians believe that the Western intelligentsia is more objective and competent, and they keep on believing this even in domains where the West is completely ignorant and incompetent. So the negationists feel supported in the back by an outside world which they can manipulate but which many in India still consider as a standard of truth. If the Hindu leadership had taken the trouble of studying the mental determinants of India's political configuration, it would have blown this cover away by spreading first-hand information to the foreign media, and educating them about the Stalinist-Islamic grip on the Indian establishment.”

Koenraad Elst (1959) orientalist, writer

1990s, Negationism in India, (1992)

Truth, World, Education, Feeling

“In recent times the rainbow (albeit with some different colors) has come to represent something far different. To many people it means freedom, love, pride, a new era, and, specifically, the LGBTQ movement… But the rainbow itself wasn’t designed to be a symbol of freedom, love, pride, or the LGBTQ movement. God created this beautiful, colorful phenomenon and designated it as a sign of His covenant with Noah and his descendants forever. Sadly, people ignore what God intended the rainbow to represent and proudly wave rainbow-colored flags in defiance of God’s command and design for marriage. Because of this, many Christians shy away from using the rainbow colors. But the rainbow was a symbol of God’s promises before the LGBTQ movement—and will continue to be after that movement has ended. As Christians, we need to take the rainbow back and teach our young people its true meaning.”

Ken Ham (1951) Australian young Earth creationist

Rainbow Lights at the Ark https://answersingenesis.org/blogs/ken-ham/2016/12/20/rainbow-lights-at-ark/, Around the World with Ken Ham (December 20, 2016) Around the World with Ken Ham (May 2005 - Ongoing)

Love, God, Marriage, People

“While Hindu activists are always treated like animals in a zoo, never allowed to speak for themselves, always condemned to be judged by what someone else has written on the signboard in front of their cage, Muslim fanatics are invited to serve as zoo guides, competent to inform the ignorant outsider about the meanness of these beasts safely locked up in their cages.”

Koenraad Elst (1959) orientalist, writer

K. Elst : The Ayodhya Demolition: an Evaluation, in India., & Dasgupta, S. (1995). The Ayodhya reference: The Supreme Court judgement and commentaries.
1990s, The Ayodhya Demolition: an Evaluation (1995)

Animals

“Unfortunately there was one thing that the white South feared more than Negro dishonesty, ignorance, and incompetency, and that was Negro honesty, knowledge, and efficiency.”

W.E.B. Du Bois book The Negro

Source: The Negro (1915), Ch. XI: The Negro in the United States

Fear, Knowledge

“Our ignorance of history causes us to slander our own times. (8 September 1871)”

Gustave Flaubert (1821–1880) French writer (1821–1880)

Correspondence, Letters to George Sand

History, Time

“Ignorance immediately knows things in an ordinary, conceptual way. Because ignorance and its accompanying mental states arise first, wrong beliefs ensue. Therefore the texts say, "Ignorance conceals the true nature of obejcts."”

Mahasi Sayadaw (1904–1982) Burmese Buddhist philosopher

Source: Manual of Insight (1945), p. 67

Way, Nature

“If only Ed Fleming had a mother who gave such sound advice. The manager of Wazoo's, a downtown Denver restaurant, Fleming is a CSU alum who has been darned giddy about the Rams' recent success. So giddy that he donned a necklace made of Pez candies, a red blazer - and nothing else. A few people gaped (some actually set aside their beers), but most ignored Fleming as he strutted like a red-blazered rooster, demanding that all hail the Mighty Naked Beer King.”

J. R. Moehringer (1964) American journalist

The Rocky Mountain News, Going Gonzo In Ft. Collins - CSU Fans Let It All Hang Out As They Cavort And Revel Before Big Football Game Against Utah, October 23, 1994

People, Beer, Success

“Keen intelligence is two-edged, It may be used constructively or destructively like a knife, either to cut the boil of ignorance, or to decapitate one's self. Intelligence is rightly guided only after the mind has acknowledged the inescapability of spiritual law.”

Yukteswar Giri (1855–1936) Indian yogi and guru

Autobiography of a Yogi (1946)

Law, Intelligence

“Oh, I'm terribly ignorant of Czech literature. It's disgraceful really.”

John Banville (1945) Irish writer

John Banville: Using words to paint pictures of "magical" Prague (2006)

Literature

“Anyone who has read Yeats’s wonderful Autobiography will remember his Sligo—shabby, shadowed, half country and half sea, full of confused romance, superstition, poverty, eccentricity, unrecognized anachronism, passion and ignorance and the little boy’s misery. Yeats was treated well but was bitterly unhappy; he prayed that he would die, and used often to say to himself: “When you are grown up, never talk as grown-up people do of the happiness of childhood.””

Randall Jarrell (1914–1965) poet, critic, novelist, essayist

“The Development of Yeats’s Sense of Reality”, p. 89
Kipling, Auden & Co: Essays and Reviews 1935-1964 (1980)

Happiness, People, Boy, Passion

“(…) creation itself is rooted in ignorance; matter itself is ignorance. Not to know, and not to know that one does not know, is the cause of endless suffering.”

Nisargadatta Maharaj (1897–1981) Indian guru

Suffering
Source: I am That, P.116.

Suffering

“I knew a poet who was totally ignorant about botany. And I said: you can't be a poet without knowing any botany or plants and things like that; it's impossible, that's the first thing you should know.”

Cy Twombly (1928–2011) American painter

Source: 2000 - 2011, Cy Twombly, 2000', by David Sylvester (June 2000), p. 173

“Ambitious men spend their youth in rendering themselves worthy of patronage; it is their great mistake. While the foolish creatures are laying in stores of knowledge and energy, so that they shall not sink under the weight of responsible posts that recede from them, schemers come and go who are wealthy in words and destitute of ideas, astonish the ignorant, and creep into the confidence of those who have a little knowledge.”

Honoré de Balzac (1799–1850) French writer

La faute des hommes supérieurs est de dépenser leurs jeunes années à se rendre dignes de la faveur. Pendant qu'ils thésaurisent, leur force est la science pour porter sans effort le poids d'une puissance qui les fuit; les intrigants, riches de mots et dépourvus d'idées, vont et viennent, surprennent les sots, et se logent dans la confiance des demi-niais.
The Wild Ass’s Skin (1831), Part II: A Woman Without a Heart

Men, Youth, Confidence, Idea

“Men usually remain unmarried for three reasons: either because they cannot afford to marry or there are no girls to marry (neither of these factors need have deterred Jesus); or because it is inexpedient for them to marry in the light of their vocation (we have already ruled this out during the ‘hidden years’ of Jesus’ life); or because they are homosexual in nature, in as much as women hold no special attraction for them. The homosexual explanation is one which me must not ignore.”

Hugh Montefiore (1920–2005) British bishop

Source: Jesus, the Revelation of God, p. 109

Life, Women, Men, Girl

“Then I (al- Sadiq) asked him (the thief) about his act. He said: 'perhaps, you are Ja'far b. Mohammed?' 'Yes,' I said. He said to me:'What does your noble origin avail you while you are ignorant?' 'Which verse of the Quran am I ignorant at?' I asked. He said these Words of Allah, the Great and Almighty:Whoever brings a good deed, he shall have ten like it, and whoever brings and evil deed he shall be recompensed only with the like of it.(Quran, 6:160) 'When I stole the two loaves of bread, they were two evil deeds. And When I stole the two pomegranates, they were two evil deeds, too. So these are four evil deeds. When I gave each one of them as alms, Allah has subtracted 4 evil deeds from 40 good deeds. So, I have 36 good deeds.' I (al- Sâdiq) said: 'May your mother loses you! It is you who are ignorant at the Book of Allah. Have you not heard that Allah said: (Allah) accepts-(deeds) from the pious only.(Quran, 5:27) When you stole the two loaves of bread, they were two evil deeds. And when you stole the two pomegranates, they were two evil deeds, too. And when you gave them to other than their owner without the permission of their owner, you have added four evil deeds to the four evil deeds, and you have not added four evil deeds to forty good deeds. So, he began looking at me. Then I left him and went away.”

Ja'far al-Sadiq (702–765) Muslim religious person

Tafsir

Books, Evil

“The world is full, at every scale, and every scale ignores the higher and lower ones.”

Ivar Ekeland (1944) French mathematician

Source: The Best of All Possible Worlds (2006), Chapter 2, The Birth of Modern Science, p. 34.

World

“The deva asked,
What causes ruin in the world?
What breaks off friendships?
What is the most violent fever?
Who is the best physician?"

The Blessed One replied,
Ruin in the world is caused by ignorance;
friendships are broken off by envy and selfishness;
the most violent fever is hatred;
the best physician is the Buddha.”

Paul Carus (1852–1919) American philosopher

The Gospel of Buddha http://reluctant-messenger.com/gospel_buddha/preface.htm (1894), a compilation of translations from ancient records.

Friendship, World, Envy, Selfishness

“We're mortal - which is to say, we're ignorant, stupid, and sinful - but those are only handicaps. Our pride is that nevertheless, now and then, we do our best. A few times we succeed. What more dare we ask for?”

Poul Anderson (1926–2001) American science fiction and fantasy writer

Ensign Flandry (1966)

Stupidity, Time

“Current Catholic worship often ignores the essential connection between truth and beauty, body and soul, at the center of the Catholic worldview. The Church requires that we be faithful, but must we also be deaf, dumb, and blind? I deserve to suffer for my sins, but must so much of that punishment take place in church?”

Dana Gioia (1950) American writer

30
Essays, Can Poetry Matter? (1991), The Catholic Writer Today (2013)

Truth, Faith, Beauty, Soul

“Projects for integral human development cannot ignore coming generations, but need to be marked by solidarity and inter-generational justice”

Pope Benedict XVI (1927) 265th Pope of the Catholic Church

2009, Cartias in Vertitate (29 June 2009)

Justice

“As for myself, if I could have removed my doubts by so simple a step as that of becoming an atheist, I should have done it, no matter what scandal or punishment had followed. I studied the subject thoroughly, and found that for one doubt removed, another was raised, only to reach at last a result more inconceivable than that reached by the church, and infinitely more hopeless besides. What do you gain by getting rid of one incomprehensible only to put a greater one in its place, and throw away your only hope besides? The atheists offer no sort of bargain for one's soul. Their scheme is all loss and no gain. At last both they and I come back to a confession of ignorance; the only difference between us is that my ignorance is joined with a faith and hope.”

Henry Adams (1838–1918) journalist, historian, academic, novelist

The Rev. Stephen Hazard in Ch. X
Esther: A Novel (1884)

Faith, Hope, Soul, Study

“Economic theory in general ignores processes which take time to occur, and instead assumes that everything occurs in equilibrium.”

Steve Keen (1953) Australian economist

Source: Debunking Economics - The Naked Emperor Of The Social Sciences (2001), Chapter 8, Let's Do The Time Warp Again, p. 166

Time

“We are not really a godless bunch. We are just the sort who ignore the gods—probably in the unconscious hope that the gods will not notice us.”

Glen Cook book She Is the Darkness

Source: She Is the Darkness (1997), Chapter 104 (p. 652)

God, Hope

“Our last call in Zagreb before returning to Washington was on U. N. Secretary-General Boutros-Ghali's senior representative in the former Yugoslavia, Yasushi Akashi, whom I had known since my two visits to Cambodia in 1992. Akashi had been harshly treated by the press and castigated by critics of the U. N. for his weakness. But it was entirely not his fault: he was operating under tight constraints imposed by Boutros-Ghali. Furthermore, Akashi was virtually ignored by General Janvier and the U. N. military. (…) He was leaving Zagreb with his previously distinguished records blemished, but his mission had been doomed from the start beacuse of limits imposed from New York. The United States was delighted with his replacement: Kofi Annan (…), the U. N. official in whom we had the greatest confidence, and his arrival was good news.”

Richard Holbrooke (1941–2010) American diplomat

Source: 1990s, To End a War (1998), p. 200

Confidence

“In my country at present, women have no participation in the higher levels of government and none whatsoever in the judiciary. Even within the democratic movement only 14 out of the 485 MPs elected in 1990 were women -- all from my own party, the National League for Democracy. These 14 women represent less than 3 percent of the total number of successful candidates. They, like their male colleagues, have not been permitted to take office since the outcome of those elections has been totally ignored. Yet the very high performance of women in our educational system and in the management of commercial enterprises proves their enormous potential to contribute to the betterment of society in general. Meanwhile our women have yet to achieve those fundamental rights of free expression, association and security of life denied also to their menfolk.”

Aung San Suu Kyi (1945) State Counsellor of Myanmar and Leader of the National League for Democracy

Opening Keynote Address at NGO Forum on Women, Beijing China (1995)

Life, Women, Education, Democracy

“Man, no doubt, owes many other moral duties to his fellow men; such as to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, care for the sick, protect the defenceless, assist the weak, and enlighten the ignorant. But these are simply moral duties, of which each man must be his own judge, in each particular case, as to whether, and how, and how far, he can, or will, perform them. But of his legal duty—that is, of his duty to live honestly towards his fellow men—his fellow men not only may judge, but, for their own protection, must judge. And, if need be, they may rightfully compel him to perform it. They may do this, acting singly, or in concert. They may do it on the instant, as the necessity arises, or deliberately and systematically, if they prefer to do so, and the exigency will admit of it.”

Lysander Spooner (1808–1887) Anarchist, Entrepreneur, Abolitionist

Section II, p. 6
Natural Law; or The Science of Justice (1882), Chapter I. The Science of Justice.

Men, Clothes

“(…) who is he that is not 'he' because of an idiot's ignorance?”

Jack Kerouac book Vanity of Duluoz

Vanity of Duluoz (1968)

“The American capitalists are richer and stronger than their counterparts in other lands. They are also younger and more ignorant, and therefore more inclined to seek a rough settlement of difficulties without diplomatic subtlety and finesse. All that does not change the fact that American capitalism operates according to the same laws as the others, is confronted with the same fundamental problems, and is headed toward the same catastrophe.”

James P. Cannon (1890–1974) American politician

Fascism and the workers' part

Law, Problem, Change

“For the first time in history, men and women are seriously exploring the possibilities of relationships based on separateness rather than togetherness. Instead of clinging to Yahweh, to a rigid set of laws established by a jealous Father-God who will rant in fury if he is disobeyed, they are simply ignoring that ranting, walking away from it, and attempting to put their trust in the irrational. In other words, they are trying to live by the spirit.”

Marion Woodman (1928–2018) Canadian writer

Source: Addiction to Perfection (1982), pp. 186–7

Women, Men, God, Law

“And that, of course, is the tragic flaw in the narcotics laws — that possession of marijuana is a felony. Regardless of whether it is as harmless as some believe, or as evil and vicious as others believe, savage and uncompromising law is bad law, and the good and humane judge will jump at any technicality that will keep him from imposing a penalty so barbaric and so cruel. The self-righteous pillars of church and society demand that "the drug traffic be stamped out" and think that making possession a felony will do the trick. Their ignorance of the roots of the drug traffic is as extensive as their ignorance of the law.”

John D. MacDonald (1916–1986) writer from the United States

Travis McGee series, (1969)

Law, Penalty, Thinking, Evil

“It took centuries of intellectual, philosophical development to achieve political freedom. It was a long struggle, stretching from Aristotle to John Locke to the Founding Fathers. The system they established was not based on unlimited majority but on its opposite: on individual rights, which were not to be alienated by majority vote or minority plotting. The individual was not left at the mercy of his neighbors or his leaders: the Constitutional system of checks and balances was scientifically devised to protect him from both. This was the great American achievement—and if concern for the actual welfare of other nations were our present leaders' motive, this is what we should have been teaching the world. Instead, we are deluding the ignorant and the semi-savage by telling them that no political knowledge is necessary—that our system is only a matter of subjective preference—that any prehistorical form of tribal tyranny, gang rule, and slaughter will do just as well, with our sanction and support. It is thus that we encourage the spectacle of Algerian workers marching through the streets [in the 1962 Civil War] and shouting the demand: "Work, not blood!"—without knowing what great knowledge and virtue are required to achieve it. In the same way, in 1917, the Russian peasants were demanding: "Land and Freedom!" But Lenin and Stalin is what they got. In 1933, the Germans were demanding: "Room to live!" But what they got was Hitler. In 1793, the French were shouting: "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity!"”

Ayn Rand (1905–1982) Russian-American novelist and philosopher

What they got was Napoleon. In 1776, the Americans were proclaiming "The Rights of Man"—and, led by political philosophers, they achieved it. No revolution, no matter how justified, and no movement, no matter how popular, has ever succeeded without a political philosophy to guide it, to set its direction and goal.
The Ayn Rand Column

War, World, Way, Motivation

“A beetle may or may not be inferior to a man — the matter awaits demonstration; but if he were inferior by ten thousand fathoms, the fact remains that there is probably a beetle view of things of which a man is entirely ignorant. If he wishes to conceive that point of view, he will scarcely reach it by persistently revelling in the fact that he is not a beetle.”

G. K. Chesterton book The Defendant

"A Defence of Humilities"
The Defendant (1901)

Quotes about ignorance page 17

Quotes about ignorance
page 17