Oscar Wilde Quotes

… the third-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the majority, the second-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking with the minority, and the first-rate mind is only happy when it is thinking.

If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking.

A society made up of individuals who were all capable of original thought would probably be unendurable.

We forget that, although freedom of speech constitutes an important victory in the battle against old restraints, modern man is in a position where much of what "he" thinks and says are the things that everybody else thinks and says; that he has not acquired the ability to think originally - that is, for himself - which alone gives meaning to his claim that nobody can interfere with the expression of his thoughts.

I think people are looking for an alternative because in addition to there being sort of a myopic, lemming - like ants on a sugar cube mentality on this DNS attack story by many in the media, there's just this culture of sameness. Everybody sounds the same.

When everybody thinks alike, nobody thinks.

Let our tribute to the dead be a new resolve: to respect people for what they individually think, rather than respect groups for what they were collectively brought up to believe.

If you only read the books that everyone else is reading, you can only think what everyone else is thinking.

I hate to tell people what they should think 'cause I really have an aversion when people tell me what to think.

In a society that tries to standardize thinking, individuality is not highly prized.

If you read all the time what other people have done, you will the think the way they thought.

There's nothing worse than having everybody thinking alike, talking alike and having the same direction in mind. It gets stale that way.

The dissenter is every human being at those moments of his life when he resigns momentarily from the herd and thinks for himself.

A man who does not think for himself does not think at all.

Children who know how to think for themselves spoil the harmony of the collective society…

I'm used to being told what to say, but not what to think... that's usually left up to me.

I have a suspicion of lockstep and everyone looking in the same direction: that's a key character trait in me.

No doubt another may also think for me; but it is not therefore desirable that he should do so to the exclusion of my thinking for myself.

When we can't think for ourselves, we can always quote

The most contrarian thing of all is not to oppose the crowd but to think for yourself.

We wouldn't be successful if we didn't have independent thinkers who can argue and then resolve their arguments.

My guess is that well over eighty per cent. of the human race goes through life without having a single original thought.

He who thinks a great deal is not suited to be a party man: he thinks his way through the party and out the other side too soon.

Human beings never think for themselves. For the most part, members of our species simply repeat what they are told - and become upset if they are exposed to any different view. The characteristic human trait is not awareness but conformity. We are stubborn, self-destructive conformists. Any other view of our species is just a self-congratulatory delusion.

The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.