Louis Kahn Quotes

Never bring the problem solving stage into the decision making stage. Otherwise, you surrender yourself to the problem rather than the solution.

Thinking rationally is often different from "positive thinking," in that it is a realistic assessment of the situation, with a view towards rectifying the problem if possible.

Botvinnik tried to take the mystery out of Chess, always relating it to situations in ordinary life. He used to call chess a typical inexact problem similar to those which people are always having to solve in everyday life.

Reason and the ability to use it are two separate skills.

It is better to do the right problem the wrong way than the wrong problem the right way.

The 1st question the effective decision-maker asks is: 'Is this a generic situation or an exception?'

Rationality is the master lifehack which distinguishes which other lifehacks to use.

It is better to have a bad method than to have none.

Reason well from the beginning and then there will never be any need to look back with confusion and doubt.

The best place to solve a problem is on paper.

We have to make the right decisions.

We seem to have trouble with [critical thinking]. And our political system doesn't help.

I think it's important to reason from first principles rather than by analogy. The normal way we conduct our lives is we reason by analogy. [With analogy] we are doing this because it's like something else that was done, or it is like what other people are doing. [With first principles] you boil things down to the most fundamental truths…and then reason up from there.

Thought is essentially practical in the sense that but for thought no motion would be an action, no change a progress.

The mark of an educated man is the ability to make a reasoned guess on the basis of insufficient information.

When you need to make a decision, don't let your emotions vote.

Every good mathematician should also be a good chess player and vice versa.

I think the idea that in a riddle there are two answers or two doors and that you have to pick the right one is almost sort of delightful to kids who are making so many choices every day and who often don't know for a while if they've made the right one. It's not as if you make a choice and then *ding* you have some sense of "oh, this is perfect and I'm happy" - it's never that simple.

I learned how to order my thoughts, and most important, learned how to develop a plan. I discovered the power of a plan. If you can plan it out, and it seems logical to you, you can do it. And that was the secret to success.

Logic is a large drawer, containing some useful instruments, and many more that are superfluous. A wise man will look into it for two purposes, to avail himself of those instruments that are really useful, and to admire the ingenuity with which those that are not so, are assorted and arranged.

In mathematics, the art of asking questions is more valuable than solving problems.

He was a 'how' thinker, not an 'if' thinker.

Stupidity is no excuse of not thinking.

Intuition is the art, peculiar to the human mind, of working out the correct answer from data that is, in itself, incomplete or even, perhaps, misleading.

What people most need now is to apply their conversion skills to those things that are essential for their survival. They need to convert facts into logic, free will into purpose, conscience into decision. They need to convert historical experience into a design for a sane world.