Famously Said Random quote

Quotes about thinking

552 quotes from 279 people

Most readBy personPage 15 of 37

Unreason is to reason as dazzlement is to daylight.
Michel Foucault1926–1984History of Madness (1961)
It is by acts, and not by ideas that people live.
Anatole France1844–1924The Literary Life (1888-1892), Series I: Sérénus
- Ideas
It is human nature to think wisely and to act in an absurd fashion.
Anatole France1844–1924Le livre de mon ami (1885): Le livre de Pierre, part I, ch. II: La dame en blanc
- Wisdom
Genius without education is like silver in the mine.
Benjamin Franklin1706–1790Poor Richard’s Almanack
- Education
- Genius
So convienent a thing it is to be a reasonable creature, since it enables one to find or make a reason for everything one has a mind to do.
Benjamin Franklin1706–1790The Autobiography (1818), Part I, p. 28
The Way to see by Faith is to shut the Eye of Reason: The Morning Daylight appears plainer when you put out your Candle.
Benjamin Franklin1706–1790“July. VII Month.”, Poor Richard’s Almanack (1758), Philadelphia: B. Frankin and D. Hall
- Faith
In the small matters trust the mind, in the large ones the heart.
Sigmund Freud1856–1939
Thinking is an experimental dealing with small quantities of energy, just as a general moves miniature figures over a map before setting his troops in action.
Sigmund Freud1856–1939“New Introductory Lectures on Psycho-analysis” (1933), Anxiety and Instinctual Life (Lecture 32)
The voice of the intellect is a soft one, but it does not rest until it has gained a hearing.
Sigmund Freud1856–1939The Future of an Illusion (1927)
- Intelligence
Only a crisis⁠—actual or perceived⁠—produces real change. When that crisis occurs, the actions that are taken depend on the ideas that are lying around.
Milton Friedman1912–2006Capitalism and Freedom (1962), preface to the 1982 edition, p. ix
- Change
- Ideas
Thinking is a momentary dismissal of irrelevancies.
Buckminster Fuller1895–1983Utopia or Oblivion: The Prospects of Humanity (1969)
We are powerfully imprisoned in these Dark Ages simply by the terms in which we have been conditioned to think.
Buckminster Fuller1895–1983Cosmography (1992)
Gods die. And when they truly die they are unmourned and unremembered. Ideas are more difficult to kill than people, but they can be killed, in the end.
Neil Gaimanborn 1960American Gods (2001), Ch. 3
- Ideas
- Religion
To apply oneself to great inventions, starting from the smallest beginnings, is no task for ordinary minds; to divine that wonderful arts lie hid behind trivial and childish things is a conception for superhuman talents.
Galileo Galilei1564–1642Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems (1632)
- Genius
- Ideas
A man is but the product of his thoughts. What he thinks, he becomes.
Mahatma Gandhi1869–1948In Ethical Religion, (Madras: S. Ganesan, 1922), p. 62, Scan from Harvard University Library (both only work with an U.S. source IP address)