People should realize we're jerks just like them.

Only the human brain can deliberately change perceptions, change patterns, invent concepts and tolerate ambiguity.

The vertical thinker says: 'I know what I am looking for.' The lateral thinker says: 'I am looking but I won't know what I am looking for until I have found it.'

There is no doubt that creativity is the most important human resource of all. Without creativity, there would be no progress, and we would be forever repeating the same patterns.

(...) being right all the time acquires a huge importance in education, and there is this terror of being wrong. The ego is so tied to being right that later on in life you are reluctant to accept that you are ever wrong, because you are defending not the idea but your self-esteem. (...) this terror of being wrong means that people have enormous difficulties in changing ideas.

This new meta-system is very much in favor of the self, but a self that is based on a proper sense of dignity, not on an inflated ego. A person who dare not admit he is wrong inflates his ego but weakens his self.

Child mortality since 2000 is down by 2.65 million a year. That's a rate of 7,256 children's lives saved each day. ... It drives me nuts that most people don't seem to know this news.