Niall Ferguson Quotes

Niall Ferguson
Niall Ferguson
British Historian
Born: Apr 18, 1964
About Freedom Me People Time You
Related authors: A. J. P. Taylor Antony Beevor Arnold J. Toynbee Arthur Helps C. Northcote Parkinson Linda Colley Norman Davies Simon Schama
Civilisation is partly about restraining the male of the species from engaging in the violence of the hunter-gatherer period. But it doesn't take an awful lot to unleash it. Niall Ferguson
Unleash About Restraining Civilisation Take Period Partly Male Lot Engaging Species Awful Awful Lot Violence
There aren't many people who really put their life on the line for human freedom. Niall Ferguson
Life Freedom People Put Line Human Human Freedom Really Who Many
It's all very well for us to sit here in the West with our high incomes and cushy lives, and say it's immoral to violate the sovereignty of another state. But if the effect of that is to bring people in that country economic and political freedom, to raise their standard of living, to increase their life expectancy, then don't rule it out. Niall Ferguson
Life Freedom People Political Country Sit Living Increase State Our Rule Say Out High Immoral Life Expectancy Economic Well Another West Political Freedom Effect Very Expectancy Sovereignty Then Us Standard Incomes Lives Violate Bring Here Raise
It's great to see countries like China and India lifting hundreds of millions of people out of poverty by essentially copying Western ways of doing things. Niall Ferguson
Great People Poverty Hundreds Ways Out India See Lifting Countries Like Doing Western Essentially China China And India Things Copying Millions Millions Of People
The great thing about behavioural psychology and economics is that they help us to see that there are actually pretty good reasons why human beings swing from greed to fear, and why we're not really calculating machines or utility-maximisers. Niall Ferguson
Good Great Fear Economics Greed Machines See Pretty Pretty Good About Calculating Great Thing Behavioural Human Human Beings Psychology Us Really Help Reasons Beings Swing Why Actually Thing
The British press has an insatiable appetite for making public things that should be private. It's a prurience that I've never understood. Niall Ferguson
British Press Press Insatiable Never Making Understood Private Public Should Appetite Things British
The whole point about historians is that we are really communing with the dead. It's very restful - because you read. There's some sociopathic problem that makes me prefer it to human interaction. Niall Ferguson
Me You Problem Restful Some About Point Dead Read Because Makes Historians Very Human Interaction Prefer Really Whole
Through pure accident of birth, I've managed to stay relatively youthful. Niall Ferguson
Pure Accident Birth Relatively Stay Through Youthful
The real point of me isn't that I'm good looking. It's that I'm clever. I've got a brain! I would rather be called a highly intelligent historian than a gorgeous pouting one. Niall Ferguson
Good Me Gorgeous Looking Clever Would Rather Point Good-Looking Highly Got Real Brain Historian Intelligent Than
The debate that I'm interested in having is with seriously smart people about how we design institutions in the 21st century that will genuinely address problems of poverty and educational underachievement. Niall Ferguson
People Smart Debate Problems Seriously Will Poverty Design Address About Having Smart People Institutions Genuinely How Educational Interested Century
Ask me not, 'Are you rightwing,' but ask me 'Are you a committed believer in individual freedom, the values of the enlightenment?' Then, yeah, if being rightwing means believing Adam Smith was right, both in the 'Wealth of Nations' and the 'Theory of Moral Sentiments,' then I'm rightwing. Niall Ferguson
Freedom Me You Wealth Values Moral Both Individual Individual Freedom Smith Yeah Committed Nations Being Ask Then Sentiments Means Theory Believer Believing Right Adam Enlightenment
If being rightwing is thinking that Karl Marx's doctrine was a catastrophe for humanity, then I'm rightwing. Niall Ferguson
Humanity Thinking Marx Catastrophe Doctrine Being Then Karl
As a teacher, my strategy is to encourage questioning. I'm the least authoritarian professor you'll ever meet. Niall Ferguson
Teacher You Strategy Meet Least Encourage Questioning Authoritarian Ever Professor
I was never a very convincing social conservative, and always avoided associating myself with that part of the broader conservative movement. Niall Ferguson
Myself Conservative Broader Never Part Always Very Movement Social Convincing Avoided
Risk models are a substitute for historical knowledge, because they tend to work with just three years' worth of data. But three years is not a long time in financial history. Niall Ferguson
Work Time Knowledge History Financial Worth Three Long Long Time Data Risk Tend Because Years Historical Models Just Substitute
Only in England would 'professor gets divorced and remarried' be a story. Niall Ferguson
Would Only Divorced Gets Story England Professor
When I first came to Oxford, I struggled to feel comfortable in an Anglican, public school-dominated institution. Niall Ferguson
First Anglican Struggled Feel Institution Comfortable Came Oxford Public
We historians are increasingly using experimental psychology to understand the way we act. It is becoming very clear that our ability to evaluate risk is hedged by all sorts of cognitive biases. It's a miracle that we get anything right. Niall Ferguson
Increasingly Our Way Ability Miracle Risk Clear Biases Sort Understand Becoming Historians Very Get Anything Experimental Psychology Act Evaluate Using Right Cognitive
It's not surprising so many people end up with credit-card debts. Saving for your retirement and buying a house are difficult things, and we don't educate people about them at all. Niall Ferguson
People Difficult Saving About Retirement House Educate Surprising End Up Debts So Many People Them Your Many Things Buying Difficult Things
Oral history is a recipe for complete misrepresentation because almost no one tells the truth, even when they intend to. Niall Ferguson
Truth History Recipe Complete Tells No-One Almost Because Intend Oral Even

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