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Language is the biggest barrier to human progress because language is an encyclopedia of ignorance. Old perceptions are frozen into language and force us to look at the world in an old fashioned way.

Edward de Bono

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Edward de Bono
Age: 88 †
Born: 1933
Born: May 19
Died: 2021
Died: June 9
Philosopher
Physician
Psychologist
University Teacher
Republic of Malta
Edward Charles Francis Publius de Bono
Force
Fashioned
Language
Frozen
Look
Barriers
Human
Biggest
Humans
Perception
Looks
Communication
Encyclopedia
Way
Ignorance
Barrier
World
Progress
Perceptions

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We need creativity in order to break free from the temporary structures that have been set up by a particular sequence of experience.
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Simplicity before understanding is simplistic simplicity after understanding is simple.
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Complexity creates confusion, simplicity focus.
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The effective thinker treats arrogance as the major sin of thinking.
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Creative thinking - in terms of idea creativity - is not a mystical talent. It is a skill that can be practised and nurtured.
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America is not just a country, it's an idea.
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Don't criticise a hypothesis, come up with a better one.
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It wouldn't cost too much to change the rules of trade so that poor countries can work their way out of poverty. But the world's leaders won't act unless they hear enough people telling them. And every day they fail to act, thousands of people die because they can't afford the basics of survival.
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A person who knows all the answers, has an opinion on everything, has a certainty backed up by rational argument, has very little possibility of further progress. Such a person is unlikely to walk away from a discussion with anything more than a reaffirmation of how right he or she has been all along.
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Our existing thinking habits are excellent, just as the rear wheels of a motor car are excellent, but not enough.
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There's a danger in the internet and social media. The notion that information is enough, that more and more information is enough, that you don't have to think, you just have to get more information - gets very dangerous.
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There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all.
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You cannot dig a hole in a different place by digging the same hole deeper
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Explaining belief has alwayas been difficult. How do you explain a love and a logic at the heart of the universe when the world is so out of whack? Explaining faith is impossible - vision over visibility - instinct over intellect - a songwriter plays a chore with the faith that he will hear the next one in his head.
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The vertical thinker says: 'I know what I am looking for.' The lateral thinker says: 'I am looking but I won't know what I am looking for until I have found it.'
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If you wait for opportunities to occur, you will be one of the crowd.
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If you do not design the future, someone or something else will design it for you.
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In a sense, words are encyclopedias of ignorance because they freeze perceptions at one moment in history and then insist we continue to use these frozen perceptions when we should be doing better.
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This new meta-system is very much in favor of the self, but a self that is based on a proper sense of dignity, not on an inflated ego. A person who dare not admit he is wrong inflates his ego but weakens his self.
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