Daniel Levitin Quotes

It is necessary to judge accurately the things that rest on opinion

Opinions should not be allowed to become conclusions

Being unbiased is a lot like being humble: as soon as you think you are, you aren’t. Neither are a finite state of being but a continuous struggle to not allow our perspectives poison our opinions.

Some people have facts; these can be proven. Some people have theories; these can be disproven. But people with opinions are mindless and have their minds made up about it.

I simply cannot accept that there are on every story two equal and logical sides to an argument.

Different people, in good faith, can look at the same fact and interpret it differently. But that's where an interesting conversation begins.

There are no facts, only interpretations.

I'm not being naive; I realise there's no such thing as a pure reading. But I'd rather keep myself as far out of it as I can.

Whenever we say a person's name, notice whether we have stated more than a fact. For example, the judgment, 'She's thoughtless' goes beyond the facts 'She said she'd call me and she didn't.'

Necessity is not an established fact, but an interpretation.

Most history is guessing, and the rest is prejudice.

Perfect objectivity is always impossible, no matter who writes a person's biography.

You can write about other people and their ideas and life without having lived it, but even your perception of that is going to be colored by what you know and what you experience. And this is undeniable.

Facts matter not at all. Perception is everything. It's certainty.

Values are faithfully applied to the facts before us, while ideology overrides whatever facts call theory into question.

Found your opinions on facts, not prejudices. We know too many things that are not true

There are three sides to every story: your side, my side, and the truth.

Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing. It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.

Facts matter, especially when they conflict with dogma and preconceived notions. Pretending otherwise has consequences.

People are going to assume whatever they want to assume.

When people write about someone else, you have to take it with a pinch of salt.

When you're getting your facts from people, consider the way that they are being given to you.

Do not engage to find things as you think they are.

For every expert there is an equal and opposite expert, but for every fact there is not necessarily an equal and opposite fact.

There are two sides to every question: my side and the wrong side.