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Quotes from Knowledge and Decisions — Thomas Sowell

born 1930 United States

← All quotes by Thomas Sowell

9 quotes

Freedom has cost too much blood and agony to be relinquished at the cheap price of rhetoric.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Ideas are everywhere, but knowledge is rare.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Knowledge may be enjoyed as a speculative diversion, but it is needed for decision making.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Civilization is an enormous device for economizing on knowledge.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Ideas, as the raw material from which knowledge is produced, exist in superabundance, but that makes the production of knowledge more difficult rather than easier.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Key indicators require some specified time span during which they are to be tabulated for purposes of reward or penalty. The time span can vary enormously according to the process and the indicator.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

While decisions are constrained by the kinds of organizations and the kinds of knowledge involved, the Impetus for decisions comes from the internal preferences and external incentives facing those who actually make the decisions.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Before attempting to determine the effect of institutions, it is necessary to consider the inherent circumstances, constraints, and impelling forces at work in the environment within which the institutional mechanisms function.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

The cavemen had the same natural resources at their disposal as we have today, and the difference between their standard of living and ours is a difference between the knowledge they could bring to bear on those resources and the knowledge used today.

Knowledge and Decisions (1980)

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Thomas Sowell (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.