Ideas quotes
16.4K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
Explore further
Browse quotes that often appear alongside ideas — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
Quote collection
Follow a thought to its author, or read the full quote page.
"If everything must have a cause, then God must have a cause. If there can be anything without a cause, it may just as well be the world as God, so that there cannot be any validity in that argument... The idea that things must have a beginning is really due to the poverty of our imagination."
"I've always been amazed by Da Vinci, because he worked out science on his own. He would work by drawing things and writing down his ideas. Of course, he designed all sorts of flying machines way before you could actually build something like that."
"To get a big company moving fast, especially on a many-headed opportunity like the Internet, you have to have hundreds of people participating and coming up with ideas."
"The challenge here is to design a system where market incentives, including profits and recognition, drive those principles to do more for the poor. I like to call this idea creative capitalism, an approach where governments, businesses, and nonprofits work together to stretch the reach of market forces so that more people can make a profit, or gain recognition, doing work that eases the world's inequities."
"Everybody has their own idea of what's a poet. Robert Frost, President Johnson, T.S.Eliot, Rudolf Valentino - they're all poets. I like to think of myself as the one who carries the light bulb."
"Gotta head full of ideas that are driving me insane."
"People today are still living off the table scraps of the sixties. They are still being passed around - the music and the ideas."
"You see, Africa makes a fool of our idea of justice. It makes a farce of our idea of equality. It mocks our pieties. It doubts our concern. It questions our commitment. Because there is no way we can look at what's happening in Africa, and if we're honest, conclude that it would ever be allowed to happen anywhere else."
"The dreadful truth is that when people come to see their MP, they have run out of better ideas."
"I wanted to write something visual that I could read to the children. This was when I created the idea of Redwall Abbey in my imagination. As I wrote, the idea grew, and the manuscript along with it."
"I think the critical thing is the product or service that you're trying to raise money for. And probably the best description of that, people should say when they hear, "This is what I want to do. This is what I want to bring to the market." They should say, "Gee! That's a great idea" or "Gee! Why hasn't somebody else thought of that before? Well, that's an incredible idea!" In other words, the more a person is delighted, or astonished, or happy with your product, or service, or idea, the more happy they are to put up money for it."
"I tend to be a subscriber to the idea that you have everything you need by the time you're 12 years old to do interesting writing for most of the rest of your life - certainly by the time you're 18."
"I was looking for some way to put my music to some service on a nightly basis. You go into a town, you play a little music, you leave something behind. That idea connected us to the local community. It was a very simple idea, but it really resonated with me."
"If you're also in the arena and you're putting your ideas out and you're owning them and you're saying "I disagree with you about this and that, I think you've got this wrong" - then not only do I invite that, I freaking love that. I love that. I'm an academic. I'm hardwired for a good debate."
"I'm not a parenting expert. In fact, I'm not sure that I even believe in the idea of 'parenting experts.' I'm an engaged, imperfect parent and a passionate researcher. I'm an experienced mapmaker and a stumbling traveler. Like many of you, parenting is by far my boldest and most daring adventure."
"The difficulty for most of us in the modern world is that the old-fashioned idea of God has become incredible or implausible."
"I've seen of enough of people who die for an idea. I don't believe in heroism; I know it's easy and I've learned it can be murderous. What interests me is living and dying for what one loves."
"It is this mythical, or rather symbolic, content of the religious traditions which is likely to come into conflict with science. This occurs whenever this religious stock of ideas contains dogmatically fixed statements on subjects which belong in the domain of science."
"Although words exist for the most part for the transmission of ideas, there are some which produce such violent disturbance in our feelings that the role they play in the transmission of ideas is lost in the background."
"All systems of morality are based on the idea that an action has consequences that legitimize or cancel it. A mind imbued with the absurd merely judges that those consequences must be considered calmly."
