Famous Quotes & Sayings

Edward De Bono Quotes & Sayings

Enjoy the top 100 famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Edward De Bono.

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Famous Quotes By Edward De Bono

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People should realize we're jerks just like them. — Edward De Bono

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The effective thinker treats arrogance as the major sin of thinking. — Edward De Bono

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Maybe the social value of truth is as a destination - so long as we do not assume we have arrived there. — Edward De Bono

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It is well known that "problem avoidance" is an important part of problem solving. Instead of solving the problem you go upstream and alter the system so that the problem does not occur in the first place. — Edward De Bono

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America is an idea, but it's an idea that brings with it some baggage, like power brings responsibility. It's an idea that brings with it equality, but equality even though it's the highest calling, is the hardest to reach. The idea that anything is possible, that's one of the reasons why I'm a fan of America. It's like hey, look there's the moon up there, let's take a walk on it, bring back a piece of it. That's the kind of America that I'm a fan of. — Edward De Bono

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A myth is a fixed way of looking at the world which cannot be destroyed because, looked at through the myth, all evidence supports the myth. — Edward De Bono

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You can analyse the past, but you need to design the future. That is the difference between suffering the future and enjoying it. — Edward De Bono

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Although feelings are not supposed to intrude on business discussions, they do anyway - we just disguise them as logic. — Edward De Bono

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Analysis is simplifying, breaking down things into parts, picking out strands and elements. Analysis is comparing unknown things with things that are known. Analysis also involves picking out relationships and putting them back together as a whole. — Edward De Bono

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I'm in love with this country called "America." I'm a huge fan of America. I'm one of those annoying fans - you know, the ones that read the cd notes and follow you into bathrooms and ask you all kinds of annoying questions about why you didn't live up to that. I'm that kind of fan. I've read the Declaration of Independence, and I've read the Constitution of the United States, and they are some liner notes, dude. — Edward De Bono

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Instead of waiting for our attention to be pulled towards something unusual, we can set out frameworks for 'directing' our attention in a conscious manner. — Edward De Bono

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Thinking is the ultimate human resource. Yet we can never be satisfied with our most important skill. No matter how good we become, we should always want to be better — Edward De Bono

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Traditional thinking is all about "what is" Future thinking will also need to be about what can be. — Edward De Bono

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An idea that is developed and put into action is more important than an idea that exists only as an idea. — Edward De Bono

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Lateral thinking ... is the process of using information to bring about creativity and insight restructuring. Lateral thinking can be learned, practised and used. It is possible to acquire skill in it just as it is possible to acquire skill in mathematics. — Edward De Bono

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In real-life situations apparently logical lines of argument are often (not always) based on an inability to see alternative possibilities.
In a similar way the ability to think of an alternative explanation is by far the best way of destroying the arrogance of an apparently logical line of argument. — Edward De Bono

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We may have a perfectly adequate way of doing something, but that does not mean there cannot be a better way. So we set out to find an alternative way. This is the basis of any improvement that is not fault correction or problem solving. — Edward De Bono

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The weapons of the positive revolution are not bullets and bombs but simple human perceptions. Bullets and bombs may offer physical power but eventually will only work if they change perceptions and values. Why not go the direct route and work with perceptions and values? — Edward De Bono

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The need to be right all the time is the biggest bar to new ideas. — Edward De Bono

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Unhappiness is best defined as the difference between our talents and our expectations. — Edward De Bono

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On trade, our hypocrisy is at its most appalling. Trade reform isn't about charity, it's about justice, and this campaign, Trade Justice is an unstoppable idea. — Edward De Bono

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It is historical continuity that maintains most assumptions,
not repeated assessment of their validity. — Edward De Bono

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I think there is a danger with young people of being dependent in the sense that they don't acquire any identity or self-image of themselves as thinkers. — Edward De Bono

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This is not about charity, it's about justice ... The war against terror is bound up in the war against poverty - I didn't say that, Colin Powell said that ... In these disturbing and distressing times, surely it's cheaper, and smarter, to make friends out of potential enemies than it is to defend yourself against them..Justice is the surest way to get peace. — Edward De Bono

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Companies that solely focus on competition will ultimately die. Those that focus on value creation will thrive. — Edward De Bono

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Our existing thinking habits are excellent, just as the rear wheels of a motor car are excellent, but not enough ... — Edward De Bono

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A person who knows all the answers, has an opinion on everything, has a certainty backed up by rational argument, has very little possibility of further progress. Such a person is unlikely to walk away from a discussion with anything more than a reaffirmation of how right he or she has been all along. — Edward De Bono

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Complexity means distracted effort. Simplicity means focused effort. — Edward De Bono

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If you do not design the future, someone or something else will design it for you. — Edward De Bono

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We need both information and thinking. Information is no substitute for thinking and thinking is no substitute for information. — Edward De Bono

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In the art world, creativity involves aesthetic sensibility, emotional resonance and a gift for expression. — Edward De Bono

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Asking a question is the simplest way of focusing thinking ... asking the right question may be the most important part of thinking. — Edward De Bono

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To develop thinking as a skill, it should be deliberate, focused, confident, and enjoyable. — Edward De Bono

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Language is the biggest barrier to human progress because language is an encyclopedia of ignorance. Old perceptions are frozen into language and force us to look at the world in an old fashioned way. — Edward De Bono

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Once a new idea springs into existence, it cannot be unthought. There is a sense of immortality in a new idea. — Edward De Bono

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It's not enough to rage against the lie.. you've got to replace it with the truth. — Edward De Bono

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Dealing with complexity is an inefficient and unnecessary waste of time, attention and mental energy. There is never any justification for things being complex when they could be simple. — Edward De Bono

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Most executives, many scientists, and almost all business school graduates believe that if you analyze data, this will give you new ideas. Unfortunately, this belief is totally wrong. The mind can only see what it is prepared to see. — Edward De Bono

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If you wait for opportunities to occur, you will be one of the crowd. — Edward De Bono

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What is urgent will always take precedence over what is important. — Edward De Bono

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Humor is by far the most significant activity of the human brain. — Edward De Bono

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I know it aches, how your heart it breaks. You can only take so much. Walk on. — Edward De Bono

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With vertical thinking one may look for different approaches until one finds a promising one. With lateral thinking one goes on generating as many approaches as one can even after one has found a promising one. With vertical thinking one is trying to select the best approach but with lateral thinking one is generating different approaches for the sake of generating them. — Edward De Bono

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There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns. — Edward De Bono

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Only the human brain can deliberately change perceptions, change patterns, invent concepts and tolerate ambiguity. — Edward De Bono

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Studies have shown that 90% of error in thinking is due to error in perception. If you can change your perception, you can change your emotion and this can lead to new ideas. — Edward De Bono

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I think school is a place where thinking should be taught. — Edward De Bono

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Some people are aware of another sort of thinking which ... leads to those simple ideas that are obvious only after they have been thought of ... the term 'lateral thinking' has been coined to describe this orther sort of thinking; 'vertical thinking' is used to denote the conventional logical process. — Edward De Bono

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There's a danger in the internet and social media. The notion that information is enough, that more and more information is enough, that you don't have to think, you just have to get more information - gets very dangerous. — Edward De Bono

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( ... ) being right all the time acquires a huge importance in education, and there is this terror of being wrong. The ego is so tied to being right that later on in life you are reluctant to accept that you are ever wrong, because you are defending not the idea but your self-esteem. ( ... ) this terror of being wrong means that people have enormous difficulties in changing ideas. — Edward De Bono

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Real life, however, is very different from school sums. There is usually more than one answer. Some answers are much better than others: they cost less, are more reliable or are more easy to implement. There is no reason at all for supposing that the first answer has to be the best one. — Edward De Bono

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To me, a faith in Jesus Christ that is not aligned with the poor ... it's nothing. — Edward De Bono

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Most of the mistakes in thinking are inadequacies of perception rather than mistakes of logic. — Edward De Bono

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Mock the devil, and he will flee from thee. — Edward De Bono

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Creativity can be learned like basketball, which does not mean we will all be NBA stars. — Edward De Bono

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In 80% of Socrates' dialogues there was no constructive outcome. He saw his role as simply pointing out what was wrong. — Edward De Bono

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Being right is not too difficult. Your choose your perception. You select your information. You leave out what does not suit you. You drag in some general-purpose value words. You throw in a sneer or two about the opposition, and you are a fine fellow who made a fine speech. — Edward De Bono

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To cultivate a pleasure in being wrong sounds perverse, yet losing an argument means escaping from an old idea and the acquisition of a new way of looking at things. — Edward De Bono

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When the positive revolution takes hold it will no longer be enough for politicians to gain points through attack or being negative. Politicians will be expected to be constructive. — Edward De Bono

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I'm tired of dreaming. I'm into doing at the moment. It's, like, let's only have goals that we can go after. — Edward De Bono

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Child mortality [since 2000 is] down by 2.65 million a year. That's a rate of 7,256 children's lives saved each day ... It drives me nuts that most people don't seem to know this news. — Edward De Bono

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We need creativity in order to break free from the temporary structures that have been set up by a particular sequence of experience. — Edward De Bono

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Don't criticise a hypothesis, come up with a better one. — Edward De Bono

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A painter may be looking at the world in a way which is very different from everyone else. If he's a craftsman, he can get other people to see the world through his eyes, and so he enlarges our vision, perception, and there's great value in that. — Edward De Bono

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This new meta-system is very much in favor of the self, but a self that is based on a proper sense of dignity, not on an inflated ego. A person who dare not admit he is wrong inflates his ego but weakens his self. — Edward De Bono

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Most people ... are put off science because maths is the gateway and they can't handle it. What we should be teaching is operational maths because, in general, the maths we need to carry out science is pretty straightforward. — Edward De Bono

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Many highly intelligent people are poor thinkers. Many people of average intelligence are skilled thinkers. The power of the car is separate from the way the car is driven. — Edward De Bono

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Man owes his success to his creativity. No one doubts the need for it. It is most useful in good times and essential in bad. — Edward De Bono

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When the story of these times gets written, we want it to say that we did all we could, and it was more than anyone could have imagined. — Edward De Bono

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I used to think that one day I'd be able to resolve the different drives I have in different directions, the tensions between the different people I am. Now I realize that is who I am. I do feel I'm getting closer to the song in my head. I wasn't looking for grace. But luckily grace was looking for me. — Edward De Bono

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You cannot dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper — Edward De Bono

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You can analyse the past, but you have to design the future — Edward De Bono

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The winner is the chef who takes the same ingredients as everyone else and produces the best results. — Edward De Bono

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Every valuable creative idea must always be logical in hindsight. If it were not, we would never be able to see its value. — Edward De Bono

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Lateral thinking is concerned not with playing with the existing pieces but with seeking to change those very pieces. It is concerned with the perception part of thinking. This is where we organise the external world into the pieces we can then 'process'. — Edward De Bono

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I do a great deal of work with young children, and if you give a child a problem, he may come up with a highly original solution, because he doesn't have the established route to it. — Edward De Bono

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A memory is what is left when something happens and does not completely unhappen. — Edward De Bono

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Humor is probably the most significant characteristics of the human mind. Far more significant than reason. In fact, reason is actually a very cheap commodity. — Edward De Bono

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I'm a very loyal and unreliable friend. — Edward De Bono

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It's always amazed me how little attention philosophers, psychologists, or anyone else actually has paid to humor. — Edward De Bono

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A problem is simply the difference between what one has and what one wants. — Edward De Bono

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The solid wealth of insurance companies and the success of those who organsie gambling are some indication of the profits to be derived from the efficient use of chance. — Edward De Bono

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You do not go out into the street in your underwear, although usually you are wearing underwear. The underwear is not visible but it is there all the time. It is the same with concepts. They are there. They underlie practical things we do- even when we are not conscious of them. — Edward De Bono

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One can think of a secretary actively operating a filing system, of a librarian actively cataloguing books, of a computer actively sorting out information. The mind however does not actively sort out information. The information sorts itself out and organises itself into patterns. The mind is passive. The mind only provides an opportunity for the information to behave in this way. The mind provides a special environment in which information can become self-organising. This special environment is a memory surface with special characteristics. — Edward De Bono

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Argument is meant to reveal the truth, not to create it. — Edward De Bono

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Creativity gives hope that there can be a worthwhile idea. — Edward De Bono

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Everyone has the right to doubt everything as often as he pleases and the duty to do it at least once. No way of looking at things is too sacred to be reconsidered. No way of doing things is beyond improvement. — Edward De Bono

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What the joke displays is a switch in perception. This is important in changing the way we think. — Edward De Bono

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Creativity and lateral thinking have exactly the same basis as humour. — Edward De Bono

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Creativity is a great motivator because it makes people interested in what they are doing. Creativity gives hope that there can be a worthwhile idea. Creativity gives the possibility of some sort of achievement to everyone. Creativity makes life more fun and more interesting. — Edward De Bono

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Democracy is an excellent way of ensuring that nothing much gets done. There are always interests that might get trampled upon [and no elected politician would wish to make permanent enemies by trampling upon others' interests]. — Edward De Bono

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In a sense, words are encyclopedias of ignorance because they freeze perceptions at one moment in history and then insist we continue to use these frozen perceptions when we should be doing better. — Edward De Bono

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The purpose of science is not to analyze or describe but to make useful models of the world. A model is useful if it allows us to get use out of it. — Edward De Bono

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It has always surprised me how little attention philosophers have paid to humor, since it is a more significant process of mind than reason. Reason can only sort out perceptions, but the humor process is involved in changing them. — Edward De Bono

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The quality of our thinking will determine the quality of our future — Edward De Bono

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The music that really turns me on is either running toward God or away from God. Both recognize the pivot, that God is at the center of the jaunt. — Edward De Bono

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The analysis of data will not by itself produce new ideas ... — Edward De Bono

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Possibilities play a much bigger role in thinking than most people believe. Without possibilities you cannot make progress. — Edward De Bono

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Creative thinking - in terms of idea creativity - is not a mystical talent. It is a skill that can be practised and nurtured. — Edward De Bono

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Complacency with our traditional judgement based thinking methods is not enough. Our existing thinking habits are excellent just as the rear wheel of a motor car is excellent but not enough. We need to put far more emphasis on creative and design thinking. Judgement and analysis are not enough. — Edward De Bono