Autodidactism Quotes

“My advice, as in everything, is to read widely and think for yourself We need more dissent and less dogma.”
― Camille Paglia

“The Old Soul is more inclined to be a lifelong learner, constantly feeding his thirst for insight through his own persistent efforts. His learning has not been forced into him through education or learned out of obligation, but has been absorbed out of curiosity and personal choice.”
― Aletheia Luna, Old Souls: The Sages and Mystics of Our World

“Not long ago, an English writer telephoned me from London, asking questions. One was "What's your alma mater?" I told him, "Books." You will never catch me with a free fifteen minutes in which I'm not studying something I feel might be able to help the black man.”
― Malcolm X

“For self-educated scientists and thinkers such as Charles Darwin, Srinivasa Ramanujan, Leonardo-da-Vinci, Michael Faraday, myself and many others, education is a relentless voyage of discovery. To us education is an everlasting quest for knowledge and wisdom.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Education Decree

“For those of you who may be homeschooled: high school is that four-year asylum where they put teenagers because we have no idea what else to do with them.”
― Anthony Esolen

“Watch movies. Read screenplays. Let them be your guide. […] Yes, McKee has been able to break down how the popular screenplay has worked. He has identified key qualities that many commercially successful screenplays share, he has codified a language that has been adopted by creative executives in both film and television. So there might be something of tangible value to be gained by interacting with his material, either in book form or at one of the seminars.

But for someone who wants to be an artist, a creator, an architect of an original vision, the best book to read on screenwriting is no book on screenwriting. The best seminar is no seminar at all.

To me, the writer wants to get as many outside voices OUT of his/her head as possible. Experts win by getting us to be dependent on their view of the world. They win when they get to frame the discussion, when they get to tell you there’s a right way and a wrong way to think about the game, whatever the game is. Because that makes you dependent on them. If they have the secret rules, then you need them if you want to
get ahead.

The truth is, you don’t.

If you love and want to make movies about issues of social import, get your hands on Paddy Chayefsky’s screenplay for Network. Read it. Then watch the movie. Then read it again.

If you love and want to make big blockbusters that also have great artistic merit, do the same thing with Lawrence Kasdan’s Raiders Of The Lost Ark screenplay and the movie made from it.

Think about how the screenplays made you feel. And how the movies built from these screenplays did or didn’t hit you the same way. […] This sounds basic, right? That’s because it is basic. And it’s true. All the information you need is the movies and screenplays you love. And in the books you’ve read and the relationships you’ve had and your ability to use those things.”
― Brian Koppelman

“Where there is no initiation, there is the autodidact. Anyone for whom knowledge is not wisdom transmitted through experience is enrolled in a university that is a correspondence course.”
― Roberto Calasso, The Ruin of Kasch

“This book is for the people who don't want to pick a single focus and abandon all their other interests. It's for the curious, or those who find delight in learning new things, creating and morphing between identities.”
― Emilie Wapnick, How to Be Everything

“There is nothing to be gained by pretending that academic involvement is necessary, or even always desirable, in the quest for truth and knowledge.”
― Christopher Langan

“When I started training myself in Neurobiology, Psychology and Theology, mostly on the streets of Calcutta, at the book kiosks on the sidewalk, for I had no money to buy the books, I had no academic background - no college degree - no potential for earning a decent living - I was a direction-less canoe in the open sea. I did not come from a rich or learned family, nor did I have rich friends, so, as far as everybody else was concerned, my life was doomed. I come from the humblest of origins - like did Ramanujan, like did Tesla, like did many more legendary thinkers of human history. I didn't know the rules of academia - I didn't know the laws and the norms of the scientific community - all I knew was that I had to understand the humans if I were to unite them. Other than that, I had no clue to my future. I learnt by failing - I learnt by making errors - I learnt by moving slowly but surely, and by never losing my sense of awe. And that's really what science is about - it's about naivety, curiosity and awe.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Mission Reality

“I Am My Teacher (Sonnet 1234)

I teach myself when I need to learn something,
I correct myself when I make mistakes.
No two year old shaped as 40, 50, 60 or 70,
Has the maturity to provide me moral guidance.

I taught myself electronics when I fell for it,
I taught myself music in my youthful high.
I taught myself languages in sheer obsession,
I taught myself aeronautics when I wanted to fly.

Critics mail, I should add "biggest ego" to my bio,
I thank them all for an astounding revelation.
If I actually behaved befitting my capacity,
Half your legends will lose their reputation.

You only see the tip of the ice-berg,
Fullness of the Himalayas you'll never see.
I chose to put many of my passions aside,
One path, one mission - one answer to calamity.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect

“He was careful to instruct him in such an affable, kind, and gentle way, that he easily prevailed with him to consider studying, not so much as a duty of obedience to his superiors, but as the way to purchase for himself a most delightsom and invaluable good. In effect, he soon created in Philaretus so strong a passion to acquire knowledge, that what time he could spare from a scholar's task, which his retentive memory made him not find uneasy, he would usually employ so greedily in reading, that his master would sometimes be necessitated to force him out to play, on which, and upon study, he looked, as if their natures were inverted.”
― Robert Boyle, Robert Boyle: By Himself and His Friends: With a Fragment of William Wotton's 'Lost Life of Boyle'

“Para los científicos y pensadores autodidactas como Charles Darwin, Srinivasa Ramanujan, Leonardo-da-Vinci, Michael Faraday, yo y muchos otros, la educación es un viaje incesante de descubrimiento.”
― Abhijit Naskar, The Education Decree

“Servant Scientist (The Sonnet)

No academician lent me a hand,
No industry gave an ounce of backup.
If I am what I am today, it's because,
I was too stubborn to give up.
Hence I can say without hesitation,
My legacy is built only by me,
Not an industry, not a benefactor,
And definitely not some university.
I come from the working class,
With neither education nor wealth.
Hence, my priority is always people,
Not comfort, nor intellect, nor gelt.
The name is Naskar, I'm a Servant Scientist,
Painkiller to people, pesticide to prejudice.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans

“Dropout Scientist (The Sonnet)

I am a scientist who doesn't have a degree,
I am a poet who has no control over words.
I am a philosopher who has no intellect whatsoever,
I am a monk with no idea, what it means to be religious.
If I am being honest, I have no clue what I am,
And I know quite well that you do not know either.
But believe you me my friend, one day in sheer awe,
Your descendants will come up with the rightful answer.
In my 30 years of life, I've traveled quite a distance,
Which will take the world at least a millennium to cover.
That's why archaic designations fall short to define life,
No designation is qualified to define a being beyond border.
My faith is humanity, my reason is humanity, my love is humanity.
I am but a glimpse of the future, without coldness and rigidity.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Amantes Assemble: 100 Sonnets of Servant Sultans

“Education Through Excellence (The Sonnet)

During my aimless years I once had an urge,
To learn about jet propulsion engine.
So I wrote content for tech support websites,
To buy a couple of books on aeronautics.
Education means catering to curiosity,
Study to gain excellence not a certificate.
If it doesn't open your eyes to social ascension,
Education only causes the world to dehydrate.
You can stuff entire encyclopedias into your head,
That still will not make you an educated being.
If education was the same thing as information,
Google would be the omniscient superbeing.
Certificate without humanity is a ticket to stoneage.
If it takes away your warmth, it is all decadence.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Corazon Calamidad: Obedient to None, Oppressive to None

“Abhijit The Useless (A Sonnet)

At school I didn't even know the term neuroscience,
Yet today I'm a symbol of neuroscience and psychology.
As a kid I never even dreamed of becoming a scientist,
I just wanted to observe the underpinnings of reality.

After high school I failed my medical entrance exam,
Yet to the world I am a vessel of ethics in medicine.
I chose CS Engineering instead but soon dropped out,
Yet today I am the epitome of responsible engineering.

Failure and success are eternally entangled,
Masses fear them while legends feast on failure.
I never felt the urge for academic validation,
Yet today I'm regularly cited in Springer.

I never studied science in the pursuit of grades,
I accidentally became a scientist by doing science.
Grades and degrees are shortcut to social validation,
But when you are a pioneer pushing the frontiers,
all mortal validation turns null and void.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“When you're picking a project to pursue, try not to think of it as some massive commitment. Can you think of it as an exploration, as something you're trying out? Approach your interest with a sense of curiosity and wonder, and remember to have fun!”
― Emilie Wapnick, How to Be Everything

“Assuming that the tendency to pivot between disciplines was unique to me, I felt totally alone. My peers certainly didn't have everything figured out, but they all seemed to be on a linear trajectory toward something. My path, on the other hand, was just a mess of zigzags: music, art, web design, filmmaking, law...”
― Emilie Wapnick, How to Be Everything

“You don't have to choose one thing.”
― Emilie Wapnick, How to Be Everything

“I taught myself electronics when I fell for it,
I taught myself music in my youthful high.
I taught myself languages in sheer obsession,
I taught myself aeronautics when I wanted to fly.

You only see the tip of the ice-berg,
Fullness of the Himalayas you'll never see.
I chose to put many of my passions aside,
One path, one mission - one answer to calamity.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Insan Himalayanoğlu: It's Time to Defect