People invested in not knowing, not thinking about, certain things in order to have “the pleasure of sharing an attitude one knows is socially approved” will be ecstatic when their instinct for consensus is gratified—and wrathful when it is thwarted.

— Alan Jacobs, How to Think

Lack of money means discomfort, means squalid worries, means shortage of tobacco, means ever-present consciousness of failure—above all, it means loneliness.

— George Orwell, Keep the Aspidistra Flying

You need to get used to verifying for yourself whether what you are told is true or not, and for that, you need to read the original texts as early on as possible.

— Luc Ferry, A Brief History of Thought

It was absolutely amazing to me—though by no means surprising—that people could hold an opinion (and such a strong one at that) about a person whose work they never read, and based solely on information they received second-hand.

— Roman Gelperin, The Master Mind of the Self-Actualizing Person

If there was one high-level finding that stood out, it is that best projects get to be best based on fundamentals. All of us know the fundamentals for good software—the difference is that most projects don’t do them nearly so well and then get into trouble

— Steve McConnell, Rapid Development