Uncertainty And Doubt Quotes:

Uncertainty is the only certainty there is, and knowing how to live with insecurity is the only security

- John Allen Paulos

source: John Allen Paulos (2007). “A Mathematician Plays The Stock Market”, p.5, Basic Books

topic: Inspirational, Success, Knowing, Aging Gracefully, Uncertainty And Doubt

The trouble with the world is that the stupid are cocksure and the intelligent are full of doubt.

- Bertrand Russell

topic: Inspirational, Success, Educational, Being Stupid, Stupid Life

I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers which might be wrong. I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of uncertainty about different things, but I am not absolutely sure of anything and there are many things I don't know anything about, such as whether it means anything to ask why we're here. I don't have to know an answer. I don't feel frightened not knowing things, by being lost in a mysterious universe without any purpose, which is the way it really is as far as I can tell.

- Richard P. Feynman

topic: Mean, Humility, Acceptance, Knowing More, Knowing Things

Doubt is not a pleasant condition, but certainty is absurd.

- Voltaire

topic: Inspirational, Faith, Atheist, Flour, Doubted

In these matters the only certainty is that nothing is certain.

- Pliny the Elder

topic: Matter, Certain, Certainty, Uncertainty And Doubt

When a scientist doesn't know the answer to a problem, he is ignorant. When he has a hunch as to what the result is, he is uncertain. And when he is pretty darn sure of what the result is going to be, he is still in some doubt. We have found it of paramount importance that in order to progress we must recognize our ignorance and leave room for doubt. Scientific knowledge is a body of statements of varying degrees of certainty - some most unsure, some nearly sure, but none absolutely certain.

- Richard P. Feynman

source: "The Value of Science". Richard P. Feynman's public address at the National Academy of Sciences, Autumn 1955.

topic: Ignorance, Order, Ignorant, Paramount, Uncertainty And Doubt

The only thing that makes life possible is permanent, intolerable uncertainty; not knowing what comes next.

- Ursula K. Le Guin

topic: Life, Business, Future, Uncertainty And Doubt, Uncertainty Of Life

We demand rigidly defined areas of doubt and uncertainty!

- Douglas Adams

source: Douglas Adams (2010). “The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy”, p.158, Del Rey

topic: Humorous, Profound, Doubt, Risk Management, Uncertainty And Doubt

I don't feel frightened by not knowing things.

- Richard P. Feynman

source: "No Ordinary Genius". Book by Christopher Sykes (p. 239), 1994.

topic: Mysterious Universe, Knowing, Frightened, Knowing Things, Uncertainty And Doubt

If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.

- Rene Descartes

source: "Principles of Philosophy". Book by Rene Descartes, 1644.

topic: Life, Truth, Real, Spiritual Truth, Doubted

The quest for certainty blocks the search for meaning. Uncertainty is the very condition to impel man to unfold his powers.

- Erich Fromm

topic: Block, Power, Men, Superhuman Powers, Art Of Loving

You see, one thing is, I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of certainty about different things... It doesn't frighten me.

- Richard P. Feynman

topic: Ignorance, Knowing, Doubt, Progress In Science, Unsure

The beginning of knowledge is the discovery of something we do not understand.

- Frank Herbert

topic: Knowledge, Caring, Discovery, Infinite Knowledge, Knowledge And Learning

Doubts are the ants in the pants of faith. They keep it awake and moving.

- Frederick Buechner

topic: Religious, Moving, Doubt, Kidding Yourself, Doubted

Uncertainty will always be part of the taking charge process.

- Harold Geneen

topic: Business, Process, Taking Charge, Uncertainty And Doubt, Uncertainty Of Life

To have doubted one's own first principles is the mark of a civilized man.

- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

topic: Humility, Men, Firsts, Doubted, Doubt And Certainty

An educated man must have a "curiosity in exploring the unfamiliar and unexpected, an open-mindedness in entertaining opposing points of view, tolerance for the ambiguity that surrounds so many important issues, and a willingness to make the best decisions he can in the face of uncertainty and doubt".

- Derek Bok

topic: Men, Views, Issues, Uncertainty And Doubt, Important Issues

A hero is also someone who, in their day to day interactions with the world, despite all the pain, uncertainty and doubt that can plague us, is resiliently and unashamedly themselves. If you can wake up every day and be emotionally open and honest regardless of what you get back from the world then you can be the hero of your own story. Each and every person who can say that despite life’s various buffetings that they are proud to be the person they are is a hero.

- Daniel Radcliffe

topic: Pain, Hero, Doubt, Uncertainty And Doubt

I think my work is very American because I'm American. But I found that Europeans like uncertainty and doubt.

- Carl Andre

source: Source: www.interviewmagazine.com

topic: Thinking, Doubt, Found, Uncertainty And Doubt

For how shall we fill people with blind faith in the correctness of a doctrine, if we ourselves spread uncertainty and doubt by constant changes in its outward structure? ...Here, too, we can learn by the example of the Catholic Church. Though its doctrinal edifice, and in part quite superfluously, comes into collision with exact science and research, it is none the less unwilling to sacrifice so much as one little syllable of its dogmas... it is only such dogmas which lend to the whole body the character of a faith.

- Adolf Hitler

topic: Character, Sacrifice, People, Collision, Blind Faith

This is my prayer for all of us — 'Lord, increase our faith.' Increase our faith to bridge the chasms of uncertainty and doubt. Grant us faith to look beyond the problems of the moment to the miracles of the future. Give us faith to do what is right and let the consequence follow.

- Gordon B. Hinckley

source: "Lord, Increase Our Faith". Ensign magazine, pp. 52-53, November 1987.

topic: Prayer, Bridges, Giving, Chasms, Uncertainty And Doubt