Conventional Wisdom Quotes

“It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.”
― Jonathan Swift

“And that's just the beginning. More and more, conventional wisdom says that the responsible thing is to make the unemployed suffer. And while the benefits from inflicting pain are an illusion, the pain itself will be all too real.”
― Paul Krugman

“When your efforts run in the face of conventional wisdom and accepted mastery, persistence can look like madness. If you succeed in the end, this extreme originality reformulates into a new level of mastery, sometimes even genius; if you fail in the end, you remain a madman in the eyes of others, and maybe even yourself. When you are in the midst of the journey…there’s really no way of knowing which one you are.” (p.129)”
― Hilary Austen, Artistry Unleashed: A Guide to Pursuing Great Performance in Work and Life

“The shortcomings of economics are not original error but uncorrected obsolescence. The obsolescence has occurred because what is convenient has become sacrosanct. Anyone who attacks such ideas must seem to be a trifle self-confident and even aggressive. The man who makes his entry by leaning against an infirm door gets an unjustified reputation for violence. Something is to be attributed to the poor state of the door.”
― John Kenneth Galbraith, The Affluent Society

“The author concedes that humanity had the fatal tendency to shape truth to our beliefs rather than beliefs to the Truth.”
― Frank Turek, I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist

“গতানুগতিক প্রজ্ঞা সব সময় সত্য নয়। সমাজজীবনে সত্য অত্যন্ত জটিল। তার সঠিক উপলদ্ধি করতে হলে অনেক মানসিক পরিশ্রমের প্রয়োজন। এ পরিশ্রম এড়ানোর জন্য মানুষ গতানুগতিক প্রজ্ঞা আঁকড়ে ধরে থাকতে চায়। গতানুগতিক প্রজ্ঞার ব্যাখ্যা হলো সহজ, সুবিধাজনক, স্বস্তিদায়ক ও চিন্তামুক্ত। গতানুগতিক প্রজ্ঞা আমাদের স্বার্থ সংরক্ষণ করে এবং আমাদের মনে কোনো উদ্বেগের সৃষ্টি হতে দেয়না। কিন্তু গতানুগতিক প্রজ্ঞায় সব সময় সত্য মেলেনা।”
― Akbar Ali Khan, আজব ও জবর-আজব অর্থনীতি

“Emily Dickinson sublimely unnames even the blanks.”
― Harold Bloom, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

“A written constitution is needed to protect values AGAINST prevailing wisdom.”
― Antonin Scalia, Scalia Dissents: Writings of the Supreme Court's Wittiest, Most Outspoken Justice

“It has always been dangerous to institutionalize hope, and we no longer live in a society in which we will be allowed to institutionalize memory.”
― Harold Bloom, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

“Shakespeare and his few peers invented all of us.”
― Harold Bloom, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

“When critics surrender to the prevailing orthodoxy, the author says they adopt the rhetoric of an occupied country, "one that expects no liberation from liberation.”
― Harold Bloom, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

“One mark of originality that can win canonical status for a literary work is strangeness that we either never altogether assimilate, or that becomes such a given that we are blinded to its idiosyncrasies.”
― Harold Bloom, The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages

“One paper boasted that its subscription and advertising numbers proved that America did not need the social change it rival paper advocated.”
― Harold Holzer, Lincoln and the Power of the Press: The War for Public Opinion

“Newspaper accounts must not only be studied, but, occasionally refuted.”
― Harold Holzer, Lincoln and the Power of the Press: The War for Public Opinion

“Malignant phenomena do not come out of a golden age.”
― Barbara W. Tuchman, The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War, 1890-1914

“[Conventional wisdom] very heavily tends to reflect the preferences and the interests of the elite.”
― Paul Krugman

“He was a trifle embarrassed to be deserting his hard-won realism in order to follow what he thought was the dominant philosophical fashion.”
― Philip Zaleski, The Fellowship: The Literary Lives of the Inklings: J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, Owen Barfield, Charles Williams

“The English patrician bloomed in his natural climate.”
― Barbara W. Tuchman, The Proud Tower: A Portrait of the World Before the War, 1890-1914

“It was easier to come to maturity when there were more well-defined philosophical options.”
― David Brooks

“When I say "most people" I mean, of course, me after my first cocktail.”
― Bill Bryson, In a Sunburned Country

“A lot of people here some South in your mouth, and they automatically think you're dumb. They think if you talk funny, you are funny. – Lloyd Hand”
― David Pietrusza, 1960--LBJ vs. JFK vs. Nixon: The Epic Campaign That Forged Three Presidencies

“often finds a more interesting story behind the conventional one. Martin Luther's supposedly revolutionary resistance to indulgences took place in a German state where they were sold. Even more intriguing, they weren't sold because the ruling authorities there get a brisk business in holy relics – which Luther left alone.”
― Andrew Pettegree, Brand Luther: How an Unheralded Monk Turned His Small Town into a Center of Publishing, Made Himself the Most Famous Man in Europe—and Started the Protestant Reformation

“Harry S Truman despised settled conventions.”
― David Pietrusza, 1960--LBJ vs. JFK vs. Nixon: The Epic Campaign That Forged Three Presidencies

“I like uncovering the cultural prejudices I didn't even know.”
― A.J. Jacobs, The Know-It-All: One Man's Humble Quest to Become the Smartest Person in the World

“Why study what the world thinks? I believe this practice will actually make us more gracious and merciful. Engaged in interactions with worldlings, we are likely to see each person and each situation individually and to allow them to infuriate us. But, stepping back to see the world's pattern of thought rather than a particular instance in which we are wronged, we can gain perspective. By seeing this lost person's dealings as another example of blindness to Your Truth and of what Paul calls vain imaginations, we are more likely to turn our assertiveness to prayer rather than maneuvering for human advantage.”
― Brian Eshleman

“Don’t accept any knowledge or conventional wisdom without critically questioning it first.”
― Debasish Mridha

“The author says his young son, adopted from South Korea, occasionally burps and says thank you but otherwise is doing all right.”
― Jim Bouton, Ball Four

“Insight is the deep intuitive understanding of things, and it often breaks through the conventional wisdom.”
― Pearl Zhu, 100 Creativity Ingredients: Everyone's Playbook to Unlock Creativity

“You find the magic of the world in the margin for error.”
― Heart of Dixie

“I look at a Sensual Lifestyle like the entrepreneur's life. We are innovative, risk-taking, and constantly in conflict with convention. Ask me about my journey out of the religious system.”
― Lebo Grand