37 Quotes About Irrationality

Human motivation surrounds the universal truth of human irrationality. This motivates us in our behavior and life. Here is a look at some of the best quotes about irrationality to get you inspired about this basic human trait.

“A rational man never distorts or corrupts his own standards and judgment in order to appeal to the irrationality, stupidity, or dishonesty of others.”

“All the knowledge I possess everyone else can acquire, but my heart is all my own.”

“Appeasers will always try to get the least dangerous person to bend to the most dangerous person. This is one of the main problems in dysfunctional relationships.”

“At no time have I ever said that people should be stripped of their right to the insanity of belief in God. If they want to practice this kind of irrationality, that’s their business.”

“Because history is only an aggregate of personal hostilities, personal prejudices, personal blindness and irrationality, there are times when we have to live against it.”

“Difference of opinion has never been sufficiently appreciated. It is the unexpected, the unknowable, the divine irrationality of life that saves us.”

“Even the most analytical thinkers are predictably irrational; the really smart ones acknowledge and address their irrationalities.”

“Faith is, at one and the same time, absolutely necessary and altogether impossible.”

“Human beings act in a great variety of irrational ways, but all of them seem to be capable, if given a fair chance, of making a reasonable choice in the light of available evidence.”

“I have lived lies. I have done it again and again. I live lies because I cannot endure the weakness of anger, and I cannot admit the irrationality of love.”

“I start off with the obvious, that it makes no sense either to believe or to disbelieve in God until a substantial and intelligent definition or concept should be offered.”

“I suppose if you look back to your early childhood you accept everything people tell you, and that includes a heavy dose of irrationality – you’re told about tooth fairies and Father Christmas and things.”

“If the world is irrational, we can never know it — either it or its irrationality.”

“In fact, violence as a symbol of our growing irrationality has had an increasing role in activity for its own sake, when no possible justification could be made that the activity was seeking to resolve a problem.”

“In this world laws are written for the lofty aim of”the common good” and then acted out in life on the basis of the common greed.”

“Indeed, my wish is quite simple: if we could learn to recognise and evade the biggest errors in our thinking – in our private lives, at work or in government – we might experience a leap in prosperity.”

“Interestingly, human irrationality is a hot topic in economics at the moment. Behavioural economics it’s called, on the cusp of economics and psychology.”

“Madness was only a handicap only if you couldn’t control its irrationalities.”

“Most specifically, irrationality means that rational systems are unreasonable systems. By that I mean that they deny the basic humanity, the human reason, of the people who work within or are served by them.”

“Nationalism does nothing but teach you to hate people you never met, and to take pride in accomplishments you had no part in.”

“Neither a man nor a crowd nor a nation can be trusted to act humanely or to think sanely under the influence of a great fear.”

“One might equate growing up with a mistrust of words. A mature person trusts his eyes more than his ears. Irrationality often manifests itself in upholding the word against the evidence of the eyes.”

“Our truest response to the irrationality of the world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do we find truth.”

“Our world is integrated to an unprecedented degree, while the global political awakening is injecting into interstate relations an intense amount of tension, emotion, even irrationality.”

“Reality is, you know, the tip of an iceberg of irrationality that we’ve managed to drag ourselves up onto for a few panting moments before we slip back into the sea of the unreal.”

“The darkening of the world makes the irrationality of art rational: radically darkened art.”

“The experience of the irrationality of the world has been the driving force of all religious revolution.”

“The mystery lies in the irrationality by which you make appearance – if it is not irrational, you make illustration.”

“The only factor that poses a genuine challenge to the current order is the willingness of human beings to reject the injustice and irrationality of this economy, and stand up for something better. Capitalism will not fall-rather, it must be pushed.”

“The point is that religion puts a value on irrationality, which makes it the perfect tool for promoting irrational beliefs like misogyny.”

“The truly and deliberately evil men are a very small minority; it is the appeaser who unleashes them on mankind; it is the appeaser’s intellectual abdication that invites them to take over.”

“There is not a more disgusting spectacle under the sun than our subserviency to British criticism. It is disgusting, first, because it is truckling, servile, pusillanimous–secondly, because of its gross irrationality.”

“To advocate irrationality is to advocate that which is destructive to human life.”

“To enlighten people by reminding them the irrationality of their beliefs is an act more honest and more important than the act of praising and respecting people’s beliefs!”

“We need to laugh at the irrationality of evil, for in doing so we deny evil’s power over us, diminish its influence in the world, and tarnish the allure it has for some people.”

“What a mathematical proof actually does is show that certain conclusions, such as the irrationality of , follow from certain premises, such as the principle of mathematical induction.”

“Writing is in fact an entirely outworn, decayed and corrupt convention whose chief & most conspicuous character is its monumental witness to the conservatism, laziness and irrationality of men and women.”

The roots of human irrationality go back to the beginning of our existence. As humans, we are uniquely irrational about the choices we make.