Paul Wolfowitz Quotes

You have got to welcome and embrace complexity.

I don't believe you can reduce the world to a mathematical formula. I start with the world, assume it's complicated, and ask where can I get help from a whole range of disciplines.

There is an increasing awareness of the interrelatedness of things. We are becoming less prone to accept an immediate solution without questioning its larger implications.

Often, problems are knots with many strands, and looking at those strands can make a problem seem different.

The more we study the major problems of our time, the more we come to realise that they cannot be understood in isolation. They are systemic problems, which means that they are interconnected and interdependent.

We are generalists. You can't draw neat lines around planet-wide problems. Planetology is a cut-and-fit science.

What motivates me is the conviction that our problems are mainly a consequence of a lack of holistic understanding of the man-made system in which we are entwined.

The problems of puzzles are very near the problems of life.

The way most people approach business - and the way they mostly teach in business school - involves the analytical mind. It divides it up and looks at parts in isolation.

Early on, in discussions of financial oversight, people would say, 'Well, this is a very complicated problem, therefore it requires a complicated solution.' And at that step, I would say, 'Well, wait a minute. Just because it's a complicated problem doesn't mean the best course of action immediately is one that's complicated.'

Hard distinctions make bad philosophy.

We need to manage holistically, embracing all of our science and traditional knowledge - all sources of knowledge. We can do that from the household to government to international relations.

We need to have an understanding of what causes what to happen in the world, and why.

The why is what makes journalism an adult game. The why is what makes policy coherent and useful. The why is what transforms bureaucrats and foot soldiers and political leaders into viable instruments of rational and affirmative change. The why is everything and without it, the very suggestion of human progress becomes a cosmic joke.

What we do as a society is seek simple answers.

Simple solutions seldom are. It takes a very unusual mind to undertake analysis of the obvious.

I believe that our very survival depends upon us becoming better systems thinkers.

Scientists need to be prepared to engage, and the best people to engage with are students, ideally from primary school because there's no question that their capacity to work out complex things is extremely good.

It is important to have a President who not only understands, but enjoys complexity

I have yet to see any problem, however complicated, which, when you looked at it in the right way, did not become still more complicated.

It’s not very profitable to sit and think nowadays. So many problems, and they seem all to have such twists to them – nothing is straightforward.

The world is interconnected and causations run in many directions at once.

The only stupidities that are not easily solved are those created by very intelligent men.

I don't ascribe to myself any special competence in economic insight. I translate what I hear from highly intelligent people into political and philosophical propositions.

Some people are great at the pure mathematical things - like Bill Gates, he's great at math things. He loves to do puzzles. Me, I like to look at an overall landscape and try to figure out, how do you solve a problem?