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It is an unpopular but sound principle that you ought to know something about a subject before you earn the right to express an opinion about it.

— Harold Lewis Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

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Source and credibility

Wikiquote does not flag this quote as disputed or misattributed.

Source: Chapter 14, “Public Decisions” (pp. 104-105)
Work: Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions, 1997
Source quality: Precise citation Points to a specific work with a page, chapter, date or similar locator, so you can look it up.

More by Harold Lewis

The fact that self-interest can work against the common good is far-reaching, and no general solution is known.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

Money is a society’s effort to reduce everything to a common measure, and get us away from trading clamshells for pottery.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

Decision making by large groups can never lead to venturesome decisions.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

The better is the worst enemy of the plenty good enough.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

No one should be embarrassed at having to look things up in a book—it’s a great habit to develop.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

It is fashionable in modern America to sneer at mathematics, nowhere more so than in sports.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

Humans are not as different from other animals as we sometimes wish.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

It doesn’t matter what the winners do when elected—the promise gets them the job, memories are short, and incumbency leads to tenure.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

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More quotes by Harold Lewis

Despite the babbling of the creationists, evolution is inevitable in a competitive world, and it does work.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

Philosophy is the misuse of a terminology which was invented for just this purpose.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

People who claim there is no such thing as native intelligence are nuts.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

Someone once said that he had made many mistakes in life, but never because he knew too much.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

It is a fallacy of human perception to see patterns that aren’t there, and to see order where there is none.

Why Flip a Coin? The Art and Science of Good Decisions (1997)

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Harold Lewis (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.