If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them.
Interpretation
Knowledge can lead to challenges, and ignoring them won't offer resolutions.
Isaac Asimov's quote suggests that while knowledge can often present us with problems, simply remaining ignorant is not a solution. To address the complexities that knowledge brings, one must actively engage with and confront those issues rather than avoiding them. It emphasizes the importance of critical thinking and understanding in the face of challenges.
In practice
During a public seminar on decision-making, one might say this quote to emphasize the importance of confronting challenges head-on.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation. Human dignity cannot survive it. Convenience and decency cannot survive it. As you put more and more people into the world, the value of life not only declines, but it disappears. It doesn't matter if someone dies.
Science does not promise absolute truth, nor does it consider that such a thing necessarily exists. Science does not even promise that everything in the Universe is amenable to the scientific process.
Democracy cannot survive overpopulation.
Although the time of death is approaching me, I am not afraid of dying and going to Hell or (what would be considerably worse) going to the popularized version of Heaven. I expect death to be nothingness and, for removing me from all possible fears of death, I am thankful to atheism.
A subtle thought that is in error may yet give rise to fruitful inquiry that can establish truths of great value.
During the century after Newton, it was still possible for a man of unusual attainments to master all fields of scientific knowledge. But by 1800, this had become entirely impracticable.
The Buddhaβs principal message that day was that holding on to anything blocks wisdom. Any conclusion that we draw must be let go. The only way to fully understand the bodhichitta teachings, the only way to practice them fully, is to abide in the unconditional openness of the prajna, patiently cutting through all our tendencies to hang on.
He who is taught only by himself has a fool for a master.
The small wisdom is like water in a glass: clear, transparent, pure. The great wisdom is like the water in the sea: dark, mysterious, impenetrable.
Vocabularies are crossing circles and loops. We are defined by the lines we choose to cross or to be confined by.
All composite things pass away. Strive for your own liberation with diligence.
Whatever you would make habitual, practice it; and if you would not make a thing habitual, do not practice it, but accustom yourself to something else.
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