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My favourite quote like this is "great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people" which is usually attributed to Eleanor Roo
by jkldotio 11y ago
My favourite quote like this is "great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people" which is usually attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt, but this is disputed. However the nature of the quote highlights that squabbling over the provenance of quotes is not a great minded thing to do.
- dang 11y agoThere's a good page on that one: http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/11/18/great-minds/ http://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/11/18/great-minds/ But it isn't squabbling. It's scholarly passion!
- olavk 11y agoIf you are interested in the history of ideas, it makes a big difference if a quote is by the real Da Vinci or some 20th century novelist.
- golergka 11y agoEvery time I hear this quote, I remember that this quote is about people, so the author, whoever he was, defined himself as small.
- minot 11y agoNo, the quote talks about ideas and trends, not individual persons. It is not talking about persons. You could even say it is almost prescriptive in that it is meant to urge you to do something or not do something. It is disguised as descriptive but the facade is quite obvious.
- voxic11 11y agoThat's not what the quote means by people. It means specific people, like celebrity or water cooler gossip, not ideas about people in general like psychology.
- cbd1984 11y ago> "great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people" My favorite part of the quote is that it's talking about people.