Thinking quotes
95.1K quotes on this topic — from poets, philosophers, and thinkers across history.
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Browse quotes that often appear alongside thinking — connected by shared ideas and recurring themes.
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"I love America more than any other country in the world, and, exactly for this reason, I insist on the right to criticize her perpetually. I think all theories are suspect, that the finest principles may have to be modified, or may even be pulverized by the demands of life, and that one must find, therefore, one's own moral center and move through the world hoping that this center will guide one aright."
"When our relatives are at home, we have to think of all their good points or it would be impossible to endure them."
"We are more gullible and superstitious today than we were in the Middle Ages, and an example of modern credulity is the widespread belief that the Earth is round. The average man can advance not a single reason for thinking that the Earth is round. He merely swallows this theory because there is something about it that appeals to the twentieth century mentality."
"I think it's important to break taboos for the same reason it's important to break laws and rules - because either you're a slave to them, or you're taking matters into your hands."
"Regarding jam sessions: Jazz musicians are the only workers I can think of who are willing to put in a full shift for pay and then go somewhere else and continue to work for free."
"Providence and Manifest Destiny are synonyms often invoked to support arguments based on wishful thinking."
"You aren't thinking or really existing unless you're willing to risk even your own sanity in the judgement of your existence."
"There is nothing more uncommon than common sense."
"Mighty cultures never - are almost never conquered. They crumble from within. And frankly, I think that a lot of Americans are acting like spoiled brats because everything that isn't working out perfectly every time."
"I think on some level, all of us have a little bit of belief in the possibility of different energies and forces and things like that. Otherwise, we wouldn't be afraid of them. Or there wouldn't be so many movies about them."
"I think the reason people are dealing with science less well now than 50 years ago is that it has become so complicated."
"Tolerance is the first principle of community; it is the spirit which conserves the best that all men think."
"I think one of the worst things people can do is try and fight the people they've agreed to work with."
"When people come up to me expecting me to be just like what they thought a Beatle would be, they're disappointed. I never was a Beatle, except musically. I don't think any of us was. What is a Beatle anyway? I'm not a Beatle or an ex-Beatle or even the George Harrison. I'm just a man. Very ordinary."
"We laughed a lot. That's one thing we forgot about for a few years - laughing. When we went through all the lawsuits, it looked as if everything was bleak, but when I think back to before that, I remember we used to laugh all the time."
"Sometimes when we think we are keeping a secret, the secret is actually keeping us."
"Nationwide thinking, nationwide planning and nationwide action are the three great essentials to prevent nationwide crises for future generations to struggle through."
"That is the spiral galaxy in Andromeda. It is as large as our Milky Way. It is one of a hundred million galaxies. It consists of one hundred billion suns. Now I think we are small enough."
"When you’ve been poor all your life, you never really think it could be any other way. And sometimes you’re even happy, because at least you’ve got your family and your health and your arms and legs and a roof over your head."
"If the process don't transfer, they cannot even be called thinking. They can be called learning, memory, or habit, but not thinking. The purpose of a course on thinking is to enhance student's abilities to face new challenges and to attack novel problems confidently, rationally and productively."
