Delight at having understood a very abstract and obscure system leads most people to believe in the truth of what it demonstrates.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- Understanding complex systems can trick people into trusting false truths.
- In plain terms
- Feeling smart about hard ideas makes you believe they are right.
- What can you take from it?
- Don't trust a theory just because understanding it feels good.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- When did complexity convince you of a falsehood?
- Does clarity always mean correctness?
Another view
Delight in understanding often correlates with actual insight.
More from Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
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