Stupidity, outrage, vanity, cruelty, iniquity, bad faith, falsehood - we fail to see the whole array when it is facing in the same direction as we.
Interpretation
The quote emphasizes that our biases can blind us to the full scope of negative qualities that may be present when we align ourselves with harmful ideas.
Jean Rostand's quote highlights the dangers of confirmation bias and the tendency to overlook negative traits in our beliefs or those we agree with. When we are in favor of something, we often fail to see its flaws or the potential for harm it may cause. This quote serves as a reminder to remain critical and aware, even of our own prejudices and the way we align with certain ideas or groups.
In practice
This quote can be shared during discussions about political biases and the importance of critical thinking.
If a given scientist had not made a given discovery, someone else would have done so a little later. Johann Mendel dies unknown after having discovered the laws of heredity: thirty-five years later, three men rediscover them. But the book that is not written will never be written. The premature death of a great scientist delays humanity; that of a great writer deprives it.
Certain brief sentences are peerless in their ability to give one the feeling that nothing remains to be said.
My pessimism extends to the point of even suspecting the sincerity of other pessimists.
We spend our time envying people whom we wouldn't wish to be.
When a scientist is ahead of his times, it is often through misunderstanding of current, rather than intuition of future truth. In science there is never any error so gross that it won't one day, from some perspective, appear prophetic.
A few great minds are enough to endow humanity with monstrous power, but a few great hearts are not enough to make us worthy of using it.
I wanted to lie hour after hour on a couch, pouring out the dark, secret places of my heart--do this feeling that over my shoulder sat humanity and wisdom and generosity, a munificent heart--do this until that incredibly lovely day when the great man would say to me, his voice grave and dramatic with discovery: "This is you, Exley. Rise and go back into the world a whole man.
We prematurely write off people as failures. We are too much in awe of those who succeed and far too dismissive of those who fail.
If you're going to lick the icing off somebody else's cake you won't be nourished and it won't do you any good,--or you might find the cake had caraway seeds and you hate them.
Imagination without knowledge may create beautiful things, knowledge without imagination can create only perfect ones.
Don’t romanticise your ‘vocation’. You can either write good sentences or you can’t. There is no ‘writer’s lifestyle’. All that matters is what you leave on the page.
Integrity means there is not a real-life you and an internet you. The two are one and the same. If you're not kind on the Internet, you're not kind.
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