Historical Ignorance Quotes & Sayings

Historical knowledge is a technique of the first order to preserve and continue a civilisation already advanced. Not that it affords positive solutions to the new aspect of vital conditions- life is always different from what it was- but that it prevents us committing the ingenuous mistakes of other times. But if, in addition to being old and, therefore, beginning to find life difficult, you have lost the memory of the past, and do not profit by experience, then everything turns to disadvantage. Well, it is my belief that this is the situation of Europe. The most "cultured" people to-day are suffering from incredible ignorance of history. — Ortega Y Gasset

George Bernard Shaw once said: "Capitalism has destroyed our
belief in any effective power but that of self interest backed by force."
When liberals make the argument that capitalism is the cause of all
of our problems, they are either speaking out of abject ignorance
or being totally disingenuous to protect their own political interests.
We have not had true free-market capitalism in this country on any
wide scale. Where we have had economic successes in this nation's
history, it has been those times when people have done something
outside of the government's involvement. Every single time the federal
government has been involved, it has created chaos, waste, and
corruption. The historical record is overwhelmingly one of gross
incompetence. — Ziad K. Abdelnour

Work-life balance was a mistake from the start. Because we don't really want balance. We want satisfaction. — Matthew Kelly

A recurrent theme in Kissinger's early writing is the historical ignorance of the typical American decision-maker. Lawyers, he remarked in 1968, are the "single most important group in Government, but they do have this drawback - a deficiency in history." For Kissinger, history was doubly important: as a source of illuminating analogies and as the defining factor in national self-understanding. Americans might doubt history's importance, but, as Kissinger wrote, "Europeans, living on a continent covered with ruins testifying to the fallibility of human foresight, feel in their bones that history is more complicated than systems analysis."
-Foreign Affairs, The Meaning of Kissinger: A Realist Reconsidered, By Niall Ferguson — Niall Ferguson

We always have to go backward to move forward. Whether it's to face our own missteps or reach the end of our lives with a final mistake... We always have to go back to pull ourselves out of ignorance or cast ourselves deeper into revenge. — Amy Rachiele

The ultimate proof of total forgiveness takes place when we sincerely petition the Father to let those who have hurt us off the hook - even if they have hurt not only us, but also those close to us. — R.T. Kendall

Only talent interests me in paintings and books. Not general ideas, but the individual contribution. — Vladimir Nabokov

I can honestly say that there are many forms of atheism that I find far more admirable than many forms of Christianity or of religion in general. But atheism that consists entirely in vacuous arguments afloat on oceans of historical ignorance, made turbulent by storms of strident self-righteousness, is as contemptible as any other form of dreary fundamentalism. And it is sometimes difficult, frankly, to be perfectly generous in one's response to the sort of invective currently fashionable among the devoutly undevout, or to the sort of historical misrepresentations it typically involves. — David Bentley Hart

And of course, I had to see you today, on your birthday." "You remembered?" He turned to her, expression earnest. "I remember everything about you, Miss Macy. Every moment between us - the good and the bad. — Julie Klassen

Americans by the very nature of the soft fat they collected around their brains along with all of their comforts, their total ignorance of historical meanings, their delusion that anarchists were either comic little men plotting nothings in a dark cellar or misunderstood cranks--how could Americans be taken seriously in a world of real politics? — Helen MacInnes

Perhaps I had better inform my Protestant readers that the famous Dogma of Papal Infallibility is by far the most modest pretension of the kind in existence. Compared with our infallible democracies, our infallible medical councils, our infallible astronomers, our infallible judges, and our infallible parliaments, the Pope is on his knees in the dust confessing his ignorance before the throne of God, asking only that as to certain historical matters on which he has clearly more sources of information open to him than anyone else his decision shall be taken as final. — George Bernard Shaw

When we can't see ourselves in our history, we begin to think that we are disconnected and suffering alone. Historical ignorance always precedes cultural imbalances and individual despair. — Aurin Squire

It wasn't getting easier because it isn't supposed to get easier. Midlife was a bitch, and my educated guess was that the climb only got steeper from here. Carl Jung put it perfectly: "Thoroughly unprepared we take the step into the afternoon of life," he wrote. "Worse still, we take this step with the false assumption that our truths and ideals will serve us as hitherto. But we cannot live the afternoon of life according to the program of life's morning; for what was great in the morning will be little at evening, and what in the morning was true will by evening have become a lie."
... I was writing a new program for the afternoon of life. The scales tipped away from suffering and toward openheartedness and love. [p. 182] — Dani Shapiro

I suspect people would be in for a real shock if they knew the depths of [Obama's] historical ignorance. — Charles Foster Johnson

... she never had what she wanted till she had given up hoping for,' said Mrs. Meg. — Louisa May Alcott

Many people today think that the Tea Act - which led to the Boston Tea Party - was simply an increase in the taxes on tea paid by the American colonists. That's where the whole "Taxation Without Representation" meme came from.

Instead, the purpose of the Tea Act was to give the East India Company full and unlimited access to the American tea trade and to exempt the company from having to pay taxes to Britain on tea exported to the American colonies. It even gave the company a tax refund on millions of pounds of tea that it was unable to sell and holding in inventory.

In other words, the Tea Act was the largest corporate tax break in the history of the world. — Thom Hartmann

I tend to be a bit of a workaholic, but I also can't function without some sort of domesticity as well. — Jenny Slate

I can't play anything until I find something that connects to my life, something I can carry as my secret map or code for the character. — Will Patton

There is a profound hypocrisy - and deep historical ignorance - when Europeans complain about the problems posed by the ethnic and religious minorities in their midst, for that is exactly what European colonial rule meant for peoples around the world. — Martin Jacques

No." Ilya lifted his mouth from hers, his fingers reluctantly releasing her. "Not like this. When you give yourself to me, it's all the way and forever. This is too easy."

Joley flung her head back, glaring at him. "You're saying no to me?"

"We're not doing this, not like this. You want to get off, you can come home with me and get into my bed where you belong. — Christine Feehan

I think that's the core of black aesthetics: the ability to improvise. That is what has enabled our [black people's] survival. — August Wilson

She put her arms around his waist and looked up at his face. "I did? What did I take?"
He bent down to kiss her. She stood to meet
him halfway. His lips softly touched her lips and her neck as his hands became tangled in her hair.
"I believe it was my heart. — Aleatha Romig

Backward is just not a natural direction for Americans to look - historical ignorance remains a national characteristic. — Larry McMurtry

What blinds us, or what makes historical progress very difficult, is our lack of awareness of our ignorance. — Terence McKenna

Romeo and Juliet"

The world is full of girls! Of all different kinds and shapes and sizes. They're all big question marks, incognito and unknown. They're a page in a book that's never been written or perhaps yet read. They're a title that's never been chosen, a language that's never been understood. Yet perhaps a treasure that hasn't been discovered.

Will any of this ever be revealed? That is even a bigger question mark. Yet, adventurous men, the brave and the naive ones, still pursue their endeavor toward their unknown dreams.

Will there ever be another Romeo and Juliet?
Or are we all Romeos and Juliets at the end? — Mauro Lannini

The woman serving me was wearing a white sports bra that looked like it had been mauled by tigers
desert isle chic. — Dave Eggers

There is a moment in your 20s when you know what it means to love rightly, but not how to do it, and then you begin to learn. — Melissa Febos

Women's liberation is one thing, but the permeation of anti-male sentiment in post-modern popular culture - from our mocking sitcom plots to degrading commercial story lines - stands testament to the ignorance of society. Fair or not, as the lead gender that never requested such a role, the historical male reputation is quite balanced.
For all of their perceived wrongs, over centuries they've moved entire civilizations forward, nurtured the human quest for discovery and industry, and led humankind from inconvenient darkness to convenient modernity. Navigating the chessboard that is human existence is quite a feat, yet one rarely acknowledged in modern academia or media. And yet for those monumental achievements, I love and admire the balanced creation that is man for all his strengths and weaknesses, his gifts and his curses. I would venture to say that most wise women do. — Tiffany Madison