“A person who thinks that he knows everything is not well informed.” — Chinese Proverb
“As the island of knowledge grows, the surface that makes contact with mystery expands. When major theories are overturned, what we thought was certain knowledge gives way, and knowledge touches upon mystery differently. This newly uncovered mystery may be humbling and unsettling, but it is the cost of truth. Creative scientists, philosophers, and poets thrive at this shoreline.” — W. Mark Richardson, “A Skeptic’s Sense of Wonder”, Science, 1998
“As the Island of Knowledge grows, so do the shores of our ignorance — the boundary between the known and unknown. Learning more about the world doesn’t lead to a point closer to a final destination — whose existence is nothing but a hopeful assumption anyways — but to more questions and mysteries. The more we know, the more exposed we are to our ignorance, and the more we know to ask.” — Marcelo Gleiser, The Island of Knowledge: The Limits of Science and the Search for Meaning, 2014
Answers to questions only lead to more questions! 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
Indeed.
LikeLiked by 1 person
“A person who thinks he knows everything is not well informed.”
Hmmm. Who would possibly embody that today?
If you don’t know, you come in second that way.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Like the oft misquote Alexander Pope… A little learning is a dangerous thing, drink deep or taste not the pierian spring. I shall copy that Chinese one 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
That misquotation (A little knowledge…) is rather ironic.
I think an earlier edition of Bartlett’s helped spread this misquotation though the misquotation had appeared earlier than that.
Thanks for reading.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That’s what I found studying history at University was like: the more I learned the more I became aware of how little I knew.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Indeed.
LikeLike
Merry Xmas!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Likewise.
LikeLiked by 1 person