George J. Mitchell Quotes

It's really important, whether you're a conservative or a liberal, to always challenge the conventional wisdom, which is what I've tried to do in all my work.

People should think things out fresh and not just accept conventional terms and the conventional way of doing things.

Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it. It is our business to puncture gas bags and discover the seeds of truth.

I've always shied away from conventional wisdom, though I know the power of it.

I always grew up with, 'Question authority.'

To me, unconventional thinking is approaching a problem and asking, 'Why not? Why can't something be done?' If someone can't give me a good reason why you can't do something, I find a way to do it.

Swim upstream. Go the other way. Ignore the conventional wisdom.

I can see there's a connection between not following normal thinking and doing creative thinking. I wouldn't have had good scientific ideas if I had thought more normally.

To be a contrarian, you've got to be a contrarian against your own people.

Conventional wisdom is not always the best wisdom.

We need the disruption of categories that lead us to abandon the difficult, the disagreeable, and the least likely to go very far.

I've always enjoyed doing challenging things and also challenging common wisdom.

A heretic is a man who sees with his own eyes.

The biggest handicap in research is an ability to think outside the box. The handicap is being encumbered by all the conventional wisdom in a given field.

Be not astonished at new ideas; for it is well known to you that a thing does not therefore cease to be true because it is not accepted by many.

Never accept ultimatums, conventional wisdom, or absolutes.

Think for yourself and question authority.

When you're used to being prepared to reject conventional wisdom, it leaves you open to learn more.

An understandable prejudice of intellectual life leads us to view tilters at orthodoxy as courageous front-line innovators.

I reject most conventional wisdom.

The people that were most interesting were always questioning the status quo.

A man who doesn't think differently from his time and environment can't grow beyond his time and environment.

It’s actually pretty easy to be contrarian. It’s hard to be contrarian and right.

I try to encourage people to think for themselves, to question standard assumptions... Don't take assumptions for granted. Begin by taking a skeptical attitude toward anything that is conventional wisdom. Make it justify itself. It usually can't. Be willing to ask questions about what is taken for granted. Try to think things through for yourself.

It is always the task of the intellectual to "think otherwise." This is not just a perverse idiosyncrasy. It is an absolutely essential feature of a society.