General Education Quotes

These forays into the real world sharpened his view that scientists needed the widest possible education. He used to say, "How can you design for people if you don't know history and psychology? You can't. Because your mathematical formulas may be perfect, but the people will screw it up. And if that happens, it means you screwed it up." He peppered his lectures with quotations from Plato, Chaka Zulu, Emerson, and Chang-tzu.

But as a professor who was popular with his students - and who advocated general education - Thorne found himself swimming against the tide. The academic world was marching toward ever more specialized knowledge, expressed in ever more dense jargon. In this climate, being liked by your students was a sign of shallowness; and interest in real-world problems was proof of intellectual poverty and a distressing indifference to theory. ~ Michael Crichton

All this has been very formative in both my research and my teaching, so I value it enormously in my life. It's why I'm a strong proponent of general education
because I saw how it opened my eyes. ~ Paul Rozin

In school, many of us procrastinate and then successfully cram for tests. We get the grades and degrees we need to get the jobs we want, even if we fail to get a good general education. ~ Stephen Covey

Why has the medical profession not taken advantage of the help available from evolutionary biology, a well-developed branch of science with great potential for providing medical insights? One reason is surely the pervasive neglect of this branch of science at all educational levels. Religious and other sorts of opposition have minimized the impact in general education of Darwin's contributions to our understanding of ourselves and the world we live in. ~ Randolph M. Nesse

I started attending community college when I was 14 or 15, just doing general education stuff like history and mathematics. Then I went on to California State University Long Beach to pursue a degree in journalism. And then I ended up dropping out to found Oculus. ~ Palmer Luckey

I have indeed two great measures at heart, without which no republic can maintain itself in strength: 1. That of general education, to enable every man to judge for himself what will secure or endanger his freedom. 2. To divide every county into hundreds, of such size that all the children of each will be within reach of a central school in it ~ Thomas Jefferson

The intensity of a national culture should be represented by ... the general education level and ... the exceptional merit of a small elite of pioneers. ~ George Sarton

Despite the hours spent debating different models of general education, the choices faculties make rarely lead to any significant difference in the cognitive development of undergraduates. ~ Derek Bok

Education is the only way forward in Latin America and developing countries in general. ~ Shakira

A deep commitment to general education is impossible in a context in which faculty and students prize above all their ability to teach and study what they want. ~ Michael S. Roth

Modern man receives a large part of his knowledge and general education by way of pictorial impressions, illustrations, photographs, films. Daily newspapers bring more pictures from year to year. In addition, the advertising business operates with optical signals as well as representations. Exhibitions and museums are indeed offspring of this visual hustle. ~ Otto Neurath

It may well be that the chemist or physiologist is right when he decides that he will become a better chemist or physiologist if he concentrates on his subject at the expense of his general education. But in the study of society exclusive concentration on a speciality has a peculiarly baneful effect: it will not merely prevent us from being attractive company or good citizens but may impair our competence in our proper field - or at least for some of the most important tasks we have to perform. The physicist who is only a physicist can still be a first class physicist and a most valuable member of society. But nobody can be a great economist who is only an economist - and I am even tempted to add that the economist who is only an economist is likely to become a nuisance if not a positive danger. ~ Friedrich Hayek

General education is not, only the way to be educated. ~ Fakhru Uddin Ahammed

General education is the best preventive of the evils now most dreaded. In the civilized countries of the world, the question is how to distribute most generally and equally the property of the world. As a rule, where education is most general the distribution of property is most general ... As knowledge spreads, wealth spreads. To diffuse knowledge is to diffuse wealth. To give all an equal chance to acquire knowledge is the best and surest way to give all an equal chance to acquire property. ~ Rutherford B. Hayes

A sharp difference should exist between general education and specialized knowledge. As particularly today the latter threatens more and more to sink into the service of pure Mammon, general education, at least in its more ideal attitude, must be retained as a counterweight. ~ Adolf Hitler

We say arts education is good for general education, but that's not the point. The arts are what great nations are remembered for. They are a mirror. ~ Damian Woetzel

The education that prepared me was my general education classes, which I tried to avoid when I was a stupid undergraduate, but which gave me the foundation of general knowledge that makes a career as a writer possible. ~ Orson Scott Card

We are so fortunate that our work in connecting the world through Facebook has given us the ability to give back to our local community, our country and the world
and to work to improve education, health care and internet access for everyone, to serve our community in San Francisco, we can think of no better place to focus than The General. ~ Mark Zuckerberg

It is quite simple: put passion ahead of training. Feel out in any way you can what you most want to do in science, or technology, or some other science-related profession. Obey that passion as long as it lasts. Feed it with the knowledge the mind needs to grow. Sample other subjects, acquire a general education in science, and be smart enough to switch to a greater love if one appears. But don't just drift through courses in science hoping that love will come to you. Maybe it will, but don't take the chance. As in other big choices in your life, there is too much at stake. Decision and hard work based on enduring passion will never fail you. ~ Edward O. Wilson

Therefore, to teach them [women] at least an outline of economics and law is the first requirement after giving them a general education. Figuratively speaking, it will be like providing the women of civilized society with a pocket dagger for self-protection. ~ Fukuzawa Yukichi

For me, the reputation for teaching language in general, and East European languages most particularly, gave Glasgow University, and by reflection the country, a distinction. ~ Tom Stoppard

In general it may be said that demand is quite as necessary to the increase of capital as the increase of capital is to demand. ~ Thomas Malthus

Scholars are the world's pearls, sages are the universe's diamonds. ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

My dad didn't have a formal education, but he had a wonderful vocabulary. So in 'Harvest,' I wanted my main character to be an innately intelligent man who would have the vocabulary to say whatever he wanted in the same way as lots of working-class people can. ~ Jim Crace

When you see the sadness
spread the light of kindness. ~ Debasish Mridha

We thus begin to see that the institutionalized practice of citations and references in the sphere of learning is not a trivial matter. While many a general reader-that is, the lay reader located outside the domain of science and scholarship-may regard the lowly footnote or the remote endnote or the bibliographic parenthesis as a dispensable nuisance, it can be argued that these are in truth central to the incentive system and an underlying sense of distributive justice that do much to energize the advancement of knowledge. ~ Robert K. Merton

With self-confidence and self-commitment, you will realise your dream. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Women, in general, are not part of the corruption of the past, so they can give a new kind of leadership, a new image for mankind. ~ Coretta Scott King

For Jefferson, William and Mary was largely about what university life is supposed to be about: reading books, enjoying the company of like-minded, and savoring teachers who seemed to be ambassadors from other, richer, writer worlds. Jefferson believed Williamsburg the finest school of manners and morals that ever existed in America. ~ Jon Meacham

If you have enemies, forgive them. Forgiveness is always the best revenge and unforgettable punishment. ~ Debasish Mridha

A school is a place through which you have to pass before entering life, but where the teaching proper does not prepare you for life. ~ Ernest Dimnet

The only kind of appeal that wins any instinctive response in party politics is an appeal to hostile feeling; the men who perceive the need of cooperation are powerless. Until education has been directed for a generation into new channels, and the Press has abandoned incitements to hatred, only harmful policies have any chance of being adopted in practice by our present political methods. But there is no obvious means of altering education and the Press until our political system is altered. From this dilemma there is no issue by means of ordinary action, at any rate for a long time to come. The best that can be hoped, it seems to me, is that we should, as many of us as possible, become political skeptics, rigidly abstaining from belief in the various attractive party programmes that are put before us from time to time. ~ Bertrand Russell

Why send a daughter to school?" the men often say. "She doesn't need an education to run a house. ~ Malala Yousafzai

The idea that the majority of students attend a university for an education independent of the degree and grades is a hypocrisy everyone is happier not to expose. Occasionally some students do arrive for an education but rote and mechanical nature of the institution soon converts them to a less idealic attitude ~ Robert M. Pirsig

I am not trying to teach you anything but trying to ignite the fire of curiosity for knowledge and wisdom. ~ Debasish Mridha

Social Liberty: the nature and limits of the power which can be legitimately exercised by society over the individual. A question seldom stated, and hardly ever discussed, in general terms, but which profoundly influences the practical controversies of the age by its latent presence, and is likely soon to make itself recognised as the vital question of the future. ~ John Stuart Mill

The liberally educated person is one who is able to resist the easy and preferred answers, not because he is obstinate but because he knows others worthy of consideration. ~ Allan Bloom

The government can access these funds but only following approval by the parliament to support our budget requirements and investments in infrastructure development, education, public health, and so on. ~ Jose Ramos-Horta

Fortunately, because of the spread of smart devices, people take games for granted now. It's a good thing for us, because we do not have to worry about making games something that are relevant to general people's daily lives. ~ Shigeru Miyamoto

in the midst of general prosperity a gentleman with an ignoble, or rather with a reactionary and ironical, countenance were to arise and, putting his arms akimbo, say to us all: "I say, gentleman, hadn't we better kick over the whole show and scatter rationalism to the winds, simply to send these logarithms to the devil, and to enable us to live once more at our own sweet foolish will!" That again would not matter, but what is annoying is that he would be sure to find followers--such is the nature of man. ~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky

It's not how much you spend, it's how you spend it. We have been putting a lot of money into education in the state of Nevada, and it's gotten us to 50th in the country in graduation rates. We needed more accountability in our system. ~ Brian Sandoval

John Adams commented after one disastrous defeat, In general, our Generals were outgeneralled. ~ Anonymous

Now that virtually every career is an option for ambitious girls, it can no longer be considered regressive or reactionary to reintroduce discussion of marriage and motherhood to primary education. We certainly do not want to return to the simplistic duality of home economics classes for girls and wood shop for boys. ~ Camille Paglia

Then let us not think that this Law is a special Law for the Jews; but let us understand that God intended to deliver us a general rule, to which we must yield ourselves. Since, it is so, it is to be concluded, not only that it is lawful for all kings and magistrates, to punish heretics and such as have perverted the pure truth; but also that they be bound to do it, and that they misbehave themselves towards God, if they suffer errors to rest without redress, and employ not their whole power to shew greater zeal in their behalf than in all other things. ~ John Calvin

Man would have been too happy, if, limiting himself to the visible objects which interested him, he had employed, to perfect his real sciences, his laws, his morals, his education, one-half the efforts he has put into his researches on the Divinity. ~ Percy Bysshe Shelley

Identity politics instructs people to define their politics not by reference to general moral principles of justice and rights, but some shared experience of oppression. It divides people into myriad oppressed groups, each jockeying for power to secure its own interests against others - not put in place neutral rules that work for everyone (because such rules, in their thinking, only serve to entrench "existing power relations" and "structural marginalization"). ~ Shikha Dalmia

The faces of your young people in general are not interesting - I don't mean the children, but the young men and women - and they are awkward and clownish in their manners, without the quaintness of the elder generation, who are the funniest old dears in the world." "They will all be quaint enough as they get older. You must remember the sort of life they lead. They get their notions very slowly, and they must have notions in their heads before they can show them on their faces. ~ Thomas Hughes

I was born in Cincinnati, Ohio. My family was not nationally known as being a literary family, though my mother and my mother's side of the family in general were interested in literature. ~ Kenneth Koch

Simplicity itself is the key. Education in ballet, dance, martial arts, etc., is done through poses, or to be more precise, through a countless series of poses. Perfection of movement is achieved through the flow of perfectly rehearsed poses. ~ Nicholas Romanov

Concepts like edX and online learning will transform education. This will completely change the world. I believe that people will move to online learning, both on campuses and worldwide. We have a real opportunity to be able to bring people around the world into our fold. ~ Anant Agarwal

I strongly believe that the best economic policy
for any administration is the one that seeks to produce more entrepreneurs,
not just more minimally educated college graduates with
nowhere to go. Nothing against recent college graduates, but many
of today's best universities are no longer providing the basics of a
classical liberal education.
That is why the single most important economic issue of our
time - and one that impacts the poor and middle class alike - will be
how we treat the entrepreneurs and wealth creators among us, from
both the government and the private-sector viewpoints. ~ Ziad K. Abdelnour