Motivational Quotes

Ideas

The most important thing in science is not so much to obtain new facts as to discover new ways of thinking about them.

- Bragg, Sir William

Best Quotes about Ideas

To have a great idea, have a lot of them.

Edison, Thomas A.

In Texas, years ago, almost all of the oil came from surface operations. Then someone got the idea that there were greater sources of supply deeper down. A well was drilled five thousand feet deep. The result? A gusher. Too many of us operate on the surface. We never go deep enough to find supernatural resources. The result is, we never operate at our best. More time and investment is involved to go deep but a gusher will pay off.

Montapert, Alfred A.

A single idea, if it is right, saves us the labor of an infinity of experiences.

Maritain, Jacques

Some people entertain ideas; others put them to work.

An idea is a point of departure and no more. As soon as you elaborate it, it becomes transformed by thought.

Picasso, Pablo

There is no adequate defense, except stupidity, against the impact of a new idea.

Bridgman, P. W.

Ideas not coupled with action never become bigger than the brain cells they occupied.

Glasgow, Arnold H.

The ideas of a time are like the clothes of a season: they are as arbitrary, as much imposed by some superior will which is seldom explicit. They are utilitarian and political, the instruments of smooth-running government.

Lewis, Wyndham

Such as take lodgings in a head that's to be let unfurnished.

Butler, Samuel

10.

You have to hatch ideas -- and then hitch them.

Everson, Ray D.

11.

A crank is someone with a new idea -- until it catches on.

Twain, Mark

12.

Ideas control the world.

Garfield, James A.

13.

The ideas of economists and political philosophers, both when they are right and when they are wrong, are more powerful than is commonly understood. Indeed the world is ruled by little else. Practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, are usually the slaves of some defunct economist.

Keynes, John Maynard

14.

An idea is a feat of association, and the height of it is a good metaphor.

Frost, Robert

15.

An idea is a putting truth in check-mate.

Gasset, Jose Ortega Y

16.

Good ideas and innovations must be driven into existence by courageous patience.

Rickover, Hyman G.

17.

Whenever I hear people talking about liberal ideas, I am always astounded that men should love to fool themselves with empty sounds. An idea should never be liberal; it must be vigorous, positive, and without loose ends so that it may fulfill its divine mission and be productive. The proper place for liberality is in the realm of the emotions.

Goethe, Johann Wolfgang Von

18.

I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones.

John Cage

19.

A mind once stretched by a new idea never regains its original dimensions.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

20.

I said to myself, I have things in my head that are not like what anyone has taught me - shapes and ideas so near to me - so natural to my way of being and thinking that it hasn't occurred to me to put them down. I decided to start anew, to strip away what I had been taught.

Georgia O'Keeffe

21.

We like to test things... no matter how good an idea sounds, test it first.

Block, Henry

22.

Harold, like the rest of us, had many impressions which saved him the trouble of distinct ideas.

Eliot, George

23.

Lots of people know a good thing the minute the other fellow sees it first.

Hodges, Job E.

24.

People find ideas a bore because they do not distinguish between live ones and stuffed ones on a shelf.

Pound, Ezra

25.

Don't worry about people stealing an idea. If it's original, you will have to ram it down their throats.

Howard Aiken

26.

Getting an idea should be like sitting down on a pin. It should make you jump up and do something.

Simpson, E. L.

27.

Man's fear of ideas is probably the greatest dike holding back human knowledge and happiness.

Ernst, Morris L.

28.

Man's mind, stretched by a new idea, never goes back to its original dimensions.

Holmes, Oliver Wendell

29.

To love an idea is to love it a little more than one should.

Rostand, Jean

30.

It is ideas, not vested interests, which are dangerous for good or evil.

Keynes, John Maynard

31.

One of the greatest pains to human nature is the pain of a new idea.

Walter Bagehot

32.

But how shall I get ideas? Keep your wits open! Observe! Observe! Study! Study! But above all, Think! Think! And when a noble image is indelibly impressed upon the mind -- Act!

Marden, Orison Swett

33.

In every great time there is some one idea at work which is more powerful than any other, and which shapes the events of the time and determines their ultimate issues.

Bacon, Francis

34.

It is a lesson which all history teaches wise men, to put trust in ideas, and not in circumstances.

Emerson, Ralph Waldo

35.

Ideas... they have the power

Hill, Napoleon

36.

Ideas are powerful things, requiring not a studious contemplation but an action, even if it is only an inner action. Their acquisition obligates each man in some way to change his life, even if it is only his inner life. They demand to be stood for. They dictate where a man must concentrate his vision. They determine his moral and intellectual priorities. They provide him with allies and make him enemies. In short, ideas impose an interest in their ultimate fate which goes far beyond the realm of the merely reasonable.

Decter, Midge

37.

Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: (1) It's completely impossible. (2) It's possible, but it's not worth doing. (3) I said it was a good idea all along.

Clarke, Arthur C.

38.

An idea discovered is much better possessed.

Young

39.

Ideas won't work unless you do.

40.

All opening moves were the same, like in chess. You don't have to come up with anything new, there's no point, because you're both after the same thing anyway. The game soon finds its own way and it's only at that point that you need a strategy.

Paolo Giordano

41.

The idea is in my head to put it down is nothing.

Avery, Milton

42.

Think for thyself one good idea, but known to be thine own, is better than a thousand gleaned from fields by others sown.

Wilson, Alexander

43.

It's easy to come up with new ideas; the hard part is letting go of what worked for you two years ago, but will soon be out-of-date.

Oech, Roger Von

44.

It first appeared like a crazy idea. It turned out he had a great idea.

Munro, J. Richard

45.

Everyone is a genius at least once a year. The real geniuses simply have their bright ideas closer together.

Georg Christoph Lichtenberg

46.

So many new ideas are at first strange and horrible, though ultimately valuable that a very heavy responsibility rests upon those who would prevent their dissemination.

J. B. S. Haldane

47.

An idea is the only level which moves the world.

Corey, Arthur F.

48.

This is my answer to the gap between ideas and action - I will write it out.

Hortense Calisher

49.

Every new idea is an impossibility until it is born.

Brown, Ron

50.

Once I thought ideas were exceptions not the rule. That is not so. Ideas are so plentiful that they ride by on air. You've only to reach out and snatch one...

Mckeun, Rod