Football strategy does not originate in a scrimmage: it is useless to expect solutions in a political campaign.
Walter LippmannRead
The tendency of the casual mind is to pick out or stumble upon a sample which supports or defies its prejudices, and then to make it the representative of a whole class.
Interpretation
What this quote means
People often selectively notice information that aligns with their existing beliefs and ignore contrasting views.
Walter Lippmann's quote highlights a cognitive bias that influences how individuals perceive information. It suggests that the casual or uncritical mind tends to latch onto examples that confirm its pre-existing prejudices, leading to a skewed understanding of the broader realities of the world. This phenomenon can result in misjudgments about entire groups or ideas based on isolated instances that fit one's biases.
Themes
PrejudiceBiasPerceptionCognitionMind
In practice
Example use cases
In a debate about climate change, one might quote Lippmann to discuss how certain views can overlook scientific evidence.
More from Walter Lippmann
All quotes →The simple opposition between the people and big business has disappeared because the people themselves have become so deeply involved in big business.
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The news and the truth are not the same thing.
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There is nothing so bad but it can masquerade as moral.
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The private citizen, beset by partisan appeals for the loan of his Public Opinion, will soon see, perhaps, that these appeals are not a compliment to his intelligence, but an imposition on his good nature and an insult to his sense of evidence.
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To create a minimum standard of life below which no human being can fall is the most elementary duty of the democratic state.
Walter LippmannRead
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