False Notion Quotes & Sayings

What I am against is false optimism: the notion either that things have to go well, or else that they tend to, or else that the default condition of historical trajectories is characteristically beneficial in the long-run. — Tony Judt

[But if things continue the way they are] ... the society that I envision, if my dream is not just a false notion, this society will have to begin to create itself in the midst of fuss, noisiness and panic, and will have to face the prospects of both internal and external war ... — Ahad Ha'am

The very fact that we wish for liberation shows that freedom from all bondage is our real nature. It is not to be freshly acquired. All that is necessary is to get rid of the false notion that we are bound. — Ramana Maharshi

No compulsion is there in religion. Rectitude has become clear from error. (Q2:256) We can dub this the 'no compulsion' verse. It does not compromise the notion of absolute religious truth, but it strongly suggests that the true religion can nonetheless coexist with any and all forms of false religion. — Michael Alan Cook

Nothing is more false than the notion that the triumph of Communism is inevitable or that the Communists are steadily pushing the free world into a corner. — Robert Kennedy

We're starting to behave as if we've reached the end of human knowledge. And while that notion is undoubtedly false, the sensation of certitude it generates is paralyzing. — Chuck Klosterman

This kind of action is a prevalent error among oppressed peoples. It is based upon the false notion that there is only a limited and particular amount of freedom that must be divided up between us, with the largest and juiciest pieces of liberty going as spoils to the victor or the stronger. So instead of joining together to fight for more, we quarrel between ourselves for a larger slice of the one pie. Black women fight between ourselves over men, instead of pursuing and using who we are and our strengths for lasting change; Black women and men fight between ourselves over who has more of a right to freedom, instead of seeing each other's struggles as part of our own and vital to our common goals; Black and white women fight between ourselves over who is the more oppressed, instead of seeing those areas in which our causes are the same. (Of course, this last separation is worsened by the intransigent racism that white women too often fail to, or cannot, address in themselves.) — Audre Lorde

All religions, plainly and simply, cannot be true. Some beliefs are false, and we know them to be false. So it does no good to put a halo on the notion of tolerance as if everything could be equally true. To deem all beliefs equally true is sheer nonsense for the simple reason that to deny that statement would also, then, be true. But if the denial of the statement is also true, then all religions are not true. — Ravi Zacharias

The notion that we systematically adopt false beliefs to "protect the self" is illogical when you consider that whatever the mind is designed to do, it must be to get things done, not to make us happy. — Robert Kurzban

There's this notion out there - and it's a categorically false notion - that the only business model in the service industry is the minimum-wage business model. I say phooey to that. You go to a Costco store, and you see people there who've been working there for years and years. They're making $15, $20 an hour, plus health benefits. — Thomas Perez

The error of Socrates must be attributed to the false notion of unity from which he starts. Unity there should be, both of the family and of the state, but in some respects only. For there is a point at which a state may attain such a degree of unity as to be no longer a state, or at which, without actually ceasing to exist, it will become an inferior state, like harmony passing into unison, or rhythm which has been reduced to a single foot. The state, as I was saying, is a plurality which should be united and made into a community by education — Aristotle.

Even on the left, even in this age of exposed racial rifts, politicians still say with a straight face that this country was founded on principles of equality. Words mean things, we say again and again, but actions mean much more, and still as a nation, we worship the very slave owners who gave legal precedence to the notion of percentages of human beings. We scream equality and freedom while unabashedly modeling our action on the fathers of genocide. The only want to rationalize this most American of contradictions is to devalue the lives of the slaughtered, as was done then, so it must be now, and so apologists remind us that those were the times, and they didn't know better, and one and one. But if those lives matter now then they mattered then, and the clapback stretches through history, unraveling all the creation myths this country has always held most sacred, toppling our many false idols and cleaning out our profaned temples. — Daniel Jose Older

People buy into this false notion of reverse racism, where they believe that just because there's a group of people getting together to share something about their heritage that we're excluding white people. But that's not the reality. — Simon S. Tam

Control is perhaps the most dominant issue in our lives. No matter what we think we have to control, whether someone else's behavior, our own behavior or something else, our false self tends to latch on to this notion and won't let go. The result is often emotional pain, confusion and frustration. Ultimately, we cannot control life, so the more that we try to control it, the more out of control we feel because we are focusing so much attention on it. Frequently the person who feels out of control is obsessed with the need to be in control. — Charles L. Whitfield

The false notion of miracles comes of our vanity, which makes us believe we are important enough for the Supreme Being to upset nature on our behalf. — Baron De Montesquieu

Forgiveness feels most dramatic when some ancient pattern of self-punishment collapses in a torrent of tears. But it is just as effective when practiced daily in tiny doses - relinquishing a pointless worry, getting wise to a self-destructive habit, serving notice on a cruel notion about yourself that has previously seemed justified. The beginning of forgiveness is alertness to false ideas. — D. Patrick Miller

When we allow our children to become independent decision makers we give them a false idea of liberty and a mistaken notion about freedom. — Tedd Tripp

There's a crazy, false notion that audiences are not patient or will not watch a story, that you have to put in a scare every ten minutes. But I always thought that was insane. — Eli Roth

Without art, we should have no notion of the sacred; without science, we should always worship false gods. — W. H. Auden

Shows itself in the notion that what may be objectively true may in the mouth of certain people become false. — Soren Kierkegaard

The notion that somehow you're going to have freedom just kind of outbreak in Cuba, I think is false. — Jeb Bush

I can hardly regard her in the light of a rational creature, so obstinately has she persisted in forming a fabulous notion of my character and acting on the false impressions she cherished. — Emily Bronte

I don't believe in the deplorable notion of realism in the cinema: you can over-reach it, and it becomes as false as convention. — Peter Greenaway

When I give something I do not possess, I give a false and dangerous gift, a gift that looks like love but is, in reality, loveless - a gift given more from my need to prove myself than from the other's need to be cared for. That kind of giving is not only loveless but faithless, based on the arrogant and mistaken notion that God has no way of channeling love to the other except through me. Yes, we are created in and for community, to be there, in love, for one another. But community cuts both ways: when we reach the limits of our own capacity to love, community means trusting that someone else will be available to the person in need. — Parker J. Palmer

There's a false notion that success is a zero sum game. To win in our careers we have to give up family. To work hard we have to sacrifice sleep. To accomplish we must take (or borrow or steal) from somewhere else in our lives. It's just not the case. — Maynard Webb

The notion that 'it all somehow must make sense', or 'there is a best decision here', preserves from despair: the difficulty is how to entertain this consoling notion in a way which is not false. — Iris Murdoch

Anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that 'my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.' — Isaac Asimov

The ego prevents us from helping ourselves by presenting a false notion of what it really means to help ourselves. — Gelek Rimpoche

Because of this false idea, they devised an aesthetic belief in making the exterior of an object a reflection of the practical functions of the interior and of the constructive idea. Yet these analyses of utility and necessity that, according to their beliefs, should be the basis for the construction of any object created by humanity become immediately absurd once we analyze all the object being manufactured today. A fork or a bed cannot come to be considered necessary for humanity's life and health, and yet retain a relative value.
They are 'learned necessities.' Modern human beings are suffocating under necessities like televisions, refrigerators, etc. And in the process making it impossible to live their real lives. Obviously we are not against modern technology, but we are against any notion of the absolute necessity of objects, to the point even of doubting their real utility.'
Asger Jorn — Tom McDonough

What greater fetter to anchoring ourselves to the false notion of self could there be than a selfie? It is named after an illusion! — Chris Matakas

America today is in danger of drifting from its best traditions. We have allowed false prophets of selfishness to obscure our vision. We have grown numb to a creeping cynicism about progress and public life. We crave human connection yet hide behind walls. We worship the money chase yet decry the toll it exacts on us. We allow the market to dominate our lives, relationships, yearnings and aspirations. We indulge in nostalgia and irony and addictive entertainment, then purge from our hearts any true idealism or passion, any notion that being American should mean something more than "everyday low prices" or "every man for himself." In the midst of this dislocation and disorientation, so many Americans today yearn for higher purpose, for calling
for some assurance that life matters. We wish to believe there is more to our days than is revealed on our screens. Make no mistake: this is a spiritual crisis. — Eric Liu

We also have to give up the notion of a divine savior, which has nothing to do with what religion we belong to, but refers to the idea of someone or something who will save us without our having to go through any pain. In fact, giving up that kind of false hope is the first step. We have to be with ourselves. We have to be real people. There is no way of beating around the bush, hoping for the best. If you are really interested in working with yourself, you can't lead that kind of double life, adopting ideas, techniques, and concepts of all kinds, simply in order to get away from yourself. — Chogyam Trungpa

Those whose acquaintance with scientific research is derived chiefly from its practical results easily develop a completely false notion of the mentality of the men who, surrounded by a skeptical world, have shown the way to kindred spirits scattered wide through the world and through the centuries. Only one who has devoted his life to similar ends can have a vivid realization of what has inspired these men and given them the strength to remain true to their purpose in spite of countless failures. It is cosmic religious feeling that gives a man such strength. A contemporary has said, not unjustly, that in this materialistic age of ours the serious scientific workers are the only profoundly religious people. — Albert Einstein

People who are not fully enlightened have no business becoming parents. This contradicts the conventionally accepted notion that people have an inherent "right" to have children. They do not. People who have a compulsion to traumatize a child, even in the mildest forms, are breaking the child's human rights, though of course the parental compulsion to find false pleasure through procreation obliterates their awareness of these rights. But interestingly, many parents would agree that convicted pedophiles and child murderers have no right to procreate, because of the dynamics in which they are so likely to engage. — Daniel Mackler

The English novelist J. B. Priestley once said that if he were an American, he would make the final test of whatever men chose to do in art, business, or politics a comparison with the Grand Canyon. He believed that whatever was false and ephemeral would be exposed for what it was when set against that mass of geology and light. Priestley was British, but he had placed his finger on an abiding American truth: the notion that the canyon stands as one of our most important touchstones - a kind of roofless tabernacle whose significance is both natural and national. It is our cathedral in the desert, and the word our is key because although the canyon belongs to the entire world, we, as Americans, belong particularly to it. — Kevin Fedarko

And here, right at the start, one encounters a new difficulty. For the task of reestablishing the notion of God's authority is obstructed not only by the depreciation of authority itself, but also by a false, pre-established picture of God- found even within the church.
Certainly, the church has preserved the concept of a loving God, a merciful God, a compassionate God. But have Christians generally themselves any vivid sense of God's power and dominion? Do we, when we worship God, or when we reflect on His nature, catch a clear echo of His resounding and indomitable majesty? ... It cannot be denied that this is the God we are supposed to worship- not just a companionable God who is to be sidled up to and nestled against, but and awesome God before whom the worshipper prostrates himself, a wrathful God whose raised right arm can shake the universe. — Harry Blamires

Do not fear lest you should meditate too much upon Him and speak of Him in an unworthy way, providing you are led by faith. Do not fear lest you should entertain false opinions of Him so long as they are in conformity with the notion of the infinitely perfect Being. — Nicolas Malebranche

The longer I live, the more it grieves me to see man, who occupies his supreme place for the very purpose of imposing his will upon nature, and freeing himself and his from an outrageous necessity
to see him taken up with some false notion, and doing just the opposite of what he wants to do; and then, because the whole bent of his mind is spoilt, bungling miserably over everything. — Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe

To what a bad choice is many a worthy woman betrayed, by that false and inconsiderate notion, That a reformed rake makes the best husband! — Samuel Richardson

Some people, even in worship, seem to think that they must say their 'Amen' in a particular way, or must say it often. Thinking that this is a sign of spirituality, they make themselves a nuisance at times to others and so get into trouble about that. That is not commended in Scripture; it is a false notion of worship. — D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones

What doubts, what hypotheses, what labyrinths of amusement, what fields of disputation, what an ocean of false learning, may be avoided by that single notion of immaterialism! — George Berkeley

Every attempt, by whatever authority, to fix a maximum of productive labor by a given worker in a given time is an unjust restriction upon his freedom and a limitation of his right to make the most of himself in order that he may rise in the scale of the social and economic order in which he lives. The notion that all human beings born into this world enter at birth into a definite social and economic classification, in which classification they must remain permanently through life, is wholly false and fatal to a progressive civilization. — Nicholas Murray Butler

In fact, because of this deep desire for peace, the ruling class leaders of this land, from 1945 on, stepped up the hysteria and propaganda to drive into American minds the false notion that danger threatened them from the East. — Paul Robeson

Those who know in their hearts that they are not really necessary
and are entirely replaceable
must inevitably be tempted to misrepresent the nature of their work and build up a false notion of its importance. A further alienation from truth takes place, a further loss of contact with reality. And one thing we can be sure of is that self-deception, whether on the level of the wind and the rain or on that of spiritual reality, must always come up against the real sooner or later, and that its destruction is very painful. — Charles Le Gai Eaton