Quotes from Alfred North Whitehead

Art attracts us only by what it reveals of our most secret self.

I would be a billionaire if I was looking to be a selfish boss. That's not me.

If a dog jumps into your lap, it is because he is fond of you; but if a cat does the same thing, it is because your lap is warmer.

The merely well-informed man is the most useless bore on God's earth.

Vigorous societies harbor a certain extravagance of objectives, so that men wander beyond the safe provision of personal gratifications.

Culture is activity of thought, and receptiveness to beauty and humane feeling. Scraps of information have nothing to do with it. A merely well informed man is the most useless bore on God's earth.

A great society is a society in which its men of business think greatly of their functions.

A man really writes for an audience of about ten persons. Of course if others like it, that is clear gain. But if those ten are satisfied, he is content.

The worst that happened to men of science was that Galileo suffered an honorable detention and a mild reproof, before dying peacefully in his bed.

When success turns a man's head he faces failure

From the very beginning of his education, the child should experience the joy of discovery.

Speech is human nature itself, with none of the artificiality of written language.

There is no nature in an instant.

It is impossible to meditate on time and the mystery of nature without an overwhelming emotion at the limitations of human intelligence.

Philosophy begins in wonder. And, at the end, when philosophic thought has done its best, the wonder remains.

The chief error in philosophy is overstatement.

Philosophy is the product of wonder.

Philosophy asks the simple question: What is it all about?

Philosophy is the product of wonder. The effort after the general characterization of the world around us is the romance of human thought.

Philosophy is the self-correction by consciousness of its own initial excess of subjectivity.

It takes a very unusual mind to undertake the analysis of the obvious.

You cannot evade quantity. You may fly to poetry and music, and quantity and number will face you in your rhythms and your octaves.

Shakespeare wrote better poetry for not knowing too much; Milton, I think, knew too much finally for the good of his poetry.

We think in generalities but we live in detail.