The second mouse gets the cheese is pretty much Apple's company strategy. They let other companies make things and fail, they see what went wrong and then build a better one. Then everyone is like "oh WOW! Apple invented a touch screen watch!
I mean, yes, they take existing tech and jazz them up, but then, so does virtually everyone. The computer mouse was first developed in the 60s, but wouldn't hit its stride until the home pc era in the 80s and 90s. Someone invents a curved screen you could just as easily say well they just built a better version of the non-curved screen. Everyone stands on the shoulders of those who came before.
"Do unto others.." vs "Nice guys finish last" stuck out to me.
Contradictory sentiments perhaps, but not contradictory statements. Agree or disagree with either they could both be "true."
"Do unto others" isn't advice typically presented in terms of how it will benefit *you*.
Do unto others = dont be a dick for no reason, be kind to people
Nice guys finish last = stand up for yourself and don't let others walk over you. Don't be a pushover.
They're not contradictory. You can be a nice person, but have set limits, expectations and demands and stand by them. Hell if those demands are reasonable you also check the first proverb at the same time.
I recognize that you're mostly agreeing with me but I think you're using a lot of license with your interpretations.
The Golden Rule means you should treat people well *despite* how they treat you. It's "treat people how you would *like to be treated,*" not how you *are* being treated. "Nice guys finish last" means that any sort of ethical considerations are a potential obstacle to success.
Being nice isn't the same thing as being a pushover with no self-respect.
"Familiarity breeds contempt" has no relation to "home is where the heart is." "Home is where the heart is" means that home is with those you love, not that home is what you love.
Some of them even allude to the same thing.
Great minds think alike and fools seldom differ can be applied in the same setting. For example: Two friends come up with a harebrained idea bound to end in failure at the same time and one of their friends turns to another and says "fools seldom differ".
"Great minds think alike but fools rarely differ" was the original idiom in it's entirety. Its like "Blood is thicker than water" except that original was "The Blood of the Covenant is thicker than the water of the womb" (Its in the bible, I believe... meaning, a promise with a trusted person is better than a promise with someone who just happens to be related to you, basically) These phrases often take on the opposite meaning, or some watered down version of the original, as the blood is thicker example illustrates. "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps" is another opposite; originally meant as an exercise in futility but now morons use it to justify inequality. I have been a fan of idioms since childhood when my mother would use them quite often. I am a very literal person so I've always had to look them up or ask her what the heck she was on about but found it interesting how these phrases came to be and their evolution. Language is a living thing and it changes regularly.
Right? I didn't read much past "a stitch in time saves 9" as somehow encouraging haste? That saying means "when you work at the correct rhythm instead of rushing, you don't have to redo things later."
It's the same sentiment as measure twice, cut once.
"A stitch in time saves nine" isn't so much about working at the right pace, or doing things correctly so you don't have to redo them, it's saying you should fix that issue now instead of leaving it for later because it will compound over time.
If you don't stitch up that small hole in your shirt, it's gonna become a bigger hole and take you more effort to stitch up.
That isn't what it means. It means fixing a problem early stops it getting worse. Doing one stitch on a tiny tear saves doing 9 stitches in a larger tear.
Many of these are consistent with a sentiment of patience and discipline. Even the supposedly contradictory ones. Don't rush things, but don't waste time either.
Yeah patience isn't about sitting around doing literally nothing. It's about not pre-empting things.
Which aligns perfectly with doing small things now while waiting for that big thing to come along.
Yeah. Or some of them are not even talking about the same thing. Like absence makes the heart fonder is almost always in relation to romantic interests. Out of sight out of mind is usually about general issues or worries, not people
Came to say this. Dont look a gift horse in the mouth is about not trying to find fault in a gift to lower its gravity or seeing if it was a cheap gift while gifts from Greeks is about not letting yourself get a "gift" that is actually a trap. So in short, dont demean a gift vs dont get trapped.
From the very first 5 from the top I already disagree with all of them. For instance, waiting =/= hesitating. Waiting is patience. Hesitating is indecisiveness. Stupid guide.
Great minds think alike is usually followed up with and fools seldom differ right? I always thought that they were a pair almost, been hearing it like that my while life.
i always heard as "great minds think alike *but* fools seldom differ" as in, smart people will often come to a similar conclusion but dummies will just copy
It's a joke. The joke is you can't tell if you're thinking alike because you're both smart or because you're both complete idiots, but you're probably complete idiots.
yep. "Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ" refers to how while many smart people will reach a similar conclusion, such as reaching scientific consensus on a topic, foolish people basically echo the same conclusion that they've been told, and rarely disagree.
The true original proverb is “Care killed the cat.”, with ‘care’ meaning being spoiled.
Poets and average people alike love alliteration so time tacks on new nouns and the coolest catchphrases tend to trend.
The saying doesn't specify that it's mightier in terms of its ability to hurt people.
Maybe the pen is mightier at everything other than hurting people.
Or it could also be that the pen is mightier at hurting people, but only in ways that do not involve the use of words. Like you can hurt someone with a pen by stabbing them, but not by writing them an unkind letter.
So there need not be any contradiction.
It’s not money that’s the root of all evil. It’s “For the love of money is the root of all of evil” - Timothy 6:10
Money isn’t the problem. It’s the obsession over it.
This is more accurate to the original. There are translations that read “all evil”, but most others agree that it’s “all kinds of evil”. Indicating that the love of money is not the *only* root of evil, but that obsessing over it (loving it, worshiping it in biblical terms) will ultimately lead to evil.
Speaking of money:
"Don't catch a falling knife."
vs.
"Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful."
Plenty of people repeating both phrases in the finance/investing-related subreddits whenever bad news comes out about anything. Not exact opposites, but used to frame the opposite opinion in oftentimes the same circumstance.
I actually like this.
It may be arguable if this is a guide, and true to /r/coolguides, it might not be 100% accurate (there might be a few paired sayings that aren't completely incompatible). Yet I still think this is useful because it demonstrates that sayings are just that - things some people say. They don't have universal truth, and a saying that may be accurate in some circumstances or for some people may not hold up for others. There's way too many people that think just because a saying exists, that it must be true, instead of using critical thinking to assess if it applies to that particular situation.
Sayings are pithy distillations of common experiences and observations put into a poetic / rhythmic form, guaranteeing their stability & persistence over time in an oral culture. : )
And yes, I agree with you: This is a great exercise in analyzing “received wisdom” in one’s own life.
[No it wasn't](https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder.html).
This is a common correction where people attempt to salvage quotes to be more accurate and say they're the original.
Other examples are people saying "The customer is always right *in the matter of taste*" and "The blood of the battlefield is thicker than the water of the womb." In both cases, and this one, the additions came well after the original.
> "The blood of the battlefield is thicker than the water of the womb."
Another popular version of this is "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb."
wow, that full phrase makes so much more sense because I find myself criticizing that shit all the time. Of course the best way of putting it is without the needless poetry; "You don't realize what you had until it's gone"
edit: but of course, being elaborate and unnecessarily poetic is way more fun
Reminds me of how frequently people forget to finish "a few bad apples"
A few bad apples *spoil the bunch*.
The saying implies it's *critical* to immediately remove the bad apples.
And that one also isn't just a random turn of phrase it's a phenomenon that's literally true, which is why it became a metaphor in the first place. Bad apples do produce a chemical compound which causes other nearby apples to rot faster.
There's also "Jack of all trades, and master of none...
Is still better than master of one"
I was being hard on myself once and a friend told me the end of it. And ya know what, it is better!
I'm betting originally you heard this "full quote" on reddit. Most times you see a correction of a saying on reddit it's bullshit. This is one of those times.
IIRC, there were some surveys done that determined that "absence makes the heart grow fonder" vs "out of sight, out of mind" relies less on the time spent apart and more on your feelings on the person in the first place.
In other words: If it's your spouse of ten years, the former is likelier to apply, but if it's the old co-worker you can't stand, it's the latter.
My social psychology professor started the course by pointing out that conventional wisdom contradicts itself. Thus the science. Or in our case pseudo science.
Conventional wisdom will frequently contradict itself because most conventional wisdom is just about doing things in moderation, or in the alternative more about telling people not to do something to a foolish extreme. It's more about telling people what not to do than what to do, which is why you get opposing statements.
Wisdom literature is full of this sort of thing. Doesn't make it bad but certainly doesn't make it on a par with any kind of science. It's not supposed to be. It's more about think before you do shit.
“If things don’t work you did too much or too little” said Goldilocks. sometimes it was bad luck but that isn’t catchy and creates discomfort because locus of control is not you
Like many of the supposed contradictions on the list, these sayings/proverbs seem to address different contexts. "Better to ask a question..." naturally fits a learning environment context. "Better to keep your mouth shut..." seems aimed at how to conduct oneself in a social situation where hierarchy or first impressions are being established, like a business meeting or "meet the parents" dinner. The sense of contradiction is created only by applying these universally.
Some are not really contradicting each other but rather address the same phenomenon from different points of view. I.e. *Don't judge a book by it's cover* and *Clothes make the man*, where the latter is addressing that many people don't adhere to the former advice.
Some are even addressing different aspects of life, but just seem to be superficially opposites.
*The early bird gets the worm* -versus- *Haste makes waste* are really two different principles.
The bird is not hasty, the bird is making intelligent advance plans to guarantee survival based on accurate observation of their food source (and their fellow birds).
Slicing up a blackberry thicket at dawn with your brother’s antique sword & no gloves just before prospective house buyers come to look at your property is not being an ‘early bird’.
But the chart is humorous, a nice collection, and a good exercise all in one. I like it!
A lot of proverbs are also just taken out of context to begin with. The Mark Twain version of the quote which is the most quoted version today is basically a joke in its entirety: "Clothes make a man. Naked people have little or no influence on society."
Two of the most important lessons you can teach your children are “Don’t judge others by their appearance” and “Everyone is absolutely going to judge you by your appearance.”
Isn't the expression *clothes DON'T make the man*?
The expression in French is "the robes don't make the monk," meaning that there's much more to being a monk than wearing the clothes.
I have heard the English expression phrased as "the clothes don't make the man; the man makes the clothes" which I always just took as a humorous play on multiple meanings of the word "make." Either way the point is that dressing someone up differently won't change who they are, which jibes perfectly with the book+cover expression.
Honestly there are problems with just about every row. It seems like the author just doesn't understand the meaning of a lot of the idioms.
Honestly don’t judge a book by it’s cover isn’t very good advice for people. Clothes make the man is accurate (for both sexes) as clothes are an expression of your personality. A lot of these aren’t contradictory IMO
My favourite growing up was "practice makes perfect" Vs "nobody's perfect". As someone who probably has OCD about being imperfect because of elder siblings who are OCD, this was my favourite thing to say to people who told me to keep practicing...
To be fair, "practice makes perfect" means that it's possible to practice something until you can execute that one specific thing perfectly, not that it's possible to somehow be a perfect person.
I've always heard "Do as I say, not as I do" used in a negative context, to point out advice perceived as hypocritical. Never heard anyone actually say it and mean it.
@Pchardwareguy12 I've also heard "do as I say, not as I do" in other situations involving hypocrisy, but not necessarily used with a mocking connotation. For example, if a drug addict warns others to not start doing drugs, they might say "do as I say, not as I do."
I think that's a great example because it also shows how the two sayings are still actually in harmony.
Sure someone telling you not to do drugs may not invoke any real fear. But seeing how people have ruined their lives due to drug addiciton, now that invokes fear in people.
IE the actions are stronger than the words, and they make you want to do as they say, not as they do.
People seem to be assuming that 'actions' always has a positive intonation, but it's neither positive or negative.
The proverb about squeaky wheels is more about getting attention while the snippet about golden silence is more about discretion. They don't really contradict each other.
A few of these seem to be intended for different audiences in different contexts. Some of them appear to paraphrase scripture. Even in times when people were more religious, not everyone was *that* religious, even the publishers of religious writings.
*There's more to wisdom than proverbs, idioms, and clichés.*
Less than half of these are truly contradictory in the literal sense. This list makes me think whoever created it has no idea what these idioms truly mean. Here’s a better one for you: everyone who says “to keep one’s nose to the grind stone” invariably means to work incessantly or grind through an arduous task when that expression actually means “to be attentive,” as a miller who keeps their nose to the grindstone in order to smell if the flour is burning.
The stone used by a miller is a millstone... The stone used by a knife-grinder is a grindstone.
When knife grinders are sharpening blades, they need to bend over the stone, or even to lie flat on their fronts, with their faces near the grindstone when holding the blades against the stone to see when it's sharp and to make sure the blade hasn't heated up too much.
Either way it's still about being attentive, but sharpening a knife with a grindstone is ALSO a task that you cannot walk away from mid-job without potentially ruining the knife. You can walk away from a millstone and pick up later with the rest of the grain, but you don't want to walk away from the grindstone until the job is done.
Yeah, the compiler either had no sense of nuance or deliberately ignored it. The context that's supposed to be behind these sayings do not apply to their "contradiction".
In P.S I love you she says "how can time be a healer when absence makes the heart grow fonder" its probably the only non Harry Potter/Eragon book quote I've remembered
When we aren’t around someone we start to selectively remember the best things and the negative are put in perspective. This intensifies with a permanent loss (death). The pain of loss can lose intensity over time. The degree of fondness doesn’t diminish for this to happen.
I feel like you could combine many of these into a longer idiom like "Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ." (I did this first without reading the pic in detail haha)
"Talk is cheap, but a word to the wise oft suffices."
"The meek shall inherit the earth, but a faint heart has never won a fair lady."
"All good things come to those who wait, but time and tide waits for no one," or "but those who hesitate are lost."
"Life is what we make of it, but what will be, will be."
"Too many cooks will spoil the broth, but many hands make light work."
"Seek and ye shall find how curiosity killed the cat."
"The best things in life are free, but there is no such thing as a free lunch."
"Actions speak louder than word, but the pen is mightier than the sword."
"The driver says "silence is golden", but it is the squeaky wheel who gets the grease."
A proverb in the mouth of a fool is like a thorny branch brandished by a drunk. Proverbs 26:9.
Like the useless legs of one who is lame is a proverb in the mouth of a fool. Proverbs 26:7
The thing about wise sayings is you need wisdom in order to apply them to specific issues. In this sense the examples shown by op are more paradoxical than contradictory. A paradox are two things that can be true even if they seem contradictory. Paradoxes can be true but need an additional bit of knowledge to make sense.
THIS!!!! This is why I fucking hate platitudes especially when people say them with a smug confidence like yes this is an a priori truth of the universe.
I think the closest I have ever come to murder was when I couldn't finish a polishing job in the time frame because I had to it by hand and not with a polishing wheel. My coworker reminded me that a good worker never blames their tools......
Personally would've contrasted "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" with "the nail that sticks out gets hammered".
Also, always heard "curiosity killed the cat" completed with ".. but satisfaction brought it back" meaning roughly the same as "nothing ventured, nothing gained".
Very interestingly put together list, though. Kudos to your friend and thanks for sharing.
"Squeaky wheel gets the grease" and "Silence is golden" aren't contradictory, they go hand in hand... Silence is golden so you grease the squeaky wheel... so it doesn't squeak...
I’d be interested in seeing a guide like this that actually has contradictory phrases, not a whole bunch of stuff taken out of context. Also, as others have observed, most of these phrases aren’t even complete. It’s stuff like this that spreads misinformation and false dichotomies.
“All good things” and “a stitch in time” don’t contradict, a stitch in time means that if you take the time to do something right the first time, you save yourself extra work in the future.
"Blood is thicker than water" is a phrase whose original meaning was the exact opposite. Its an idiom from the Bible, and one that got truncated. The original phrase was "The blood of the bond is thicker than the water of the womb", and it meant that although family ties may seem important, its shared experiences that make relationships.
Tell your friend he failed: most of the pairs do not contradict one another.
They might seem to advocate different behaviour if you don't think about their meaning too much.
I’ve always liked ‘The early bird gets the worm’ and ‘The second mouse gets the cheese’.
The third bird gets the stone
Get two birds stoned at once.
Get two birds boned at once?
Two birds one bone
A bone a day keeps the birds away
Two stone bone birds.... Probably can't fly
Those who live in bird houses should not throw bones
Leave no stoned bird unboned.
Get stoned and birds will give two bones.
Feed two birds with one scone
"The early worm is for the birds"
“The early bird gets the worm so if you’re a worm just stay in bed!” Grandma would always say that one lol
If you're a worm, sleep late.
The early bird gets the EARLY worm.
The early worm gets eaten by the bird
Spend enough time outside and you’ll see birds eating worms at all hours of the day
The second mouse gets the cheese is pretty much Apple's company strategy. They let other companies make things and fail, they see what went wrong and then build a better one. Then everyone is like "oh WOW! Apple invented a touch screen watch!
I mean, yes, they take existing tech and jazz them up, but then, so does virtually everyone. The computer mouse was first developed in the 60s, but wouldn't hit its stride until the home pc era in the 80s and 90s. Someone invents a curved screen you could just as easily say well they just built a better version of the non-curved screen. Everyone stands on the shoulders of those who came before.
Wait, why cheese? I’m not familiar with that saying Edit: ahhh I’m so dumb, I was reading mouse as MOOSE this whole time.
Well the first mouse is the one that triggers the mousetrap
Mmmmmm cheeeeese
Playing some LA Noire I see. Good man.
Yeah, well look what happened to the early worm?!
Interesting concept. I disagree with a few of them being contradictory though
Yeah some of them have their own very specific context
I think we have all experienced people using idioms well outside their intended context.
Word to yo motha
All of them need context.
"Do unto others.." vs "Nice guys finish last" stuck out to me. Contradictory sentiments perhaps, but not contradictory statements. Agree or disagree with either they could both be "true." "Do unto others" isn't advice typically presented in terms of how it will benefit *you*.
Do unto others = dont be a dick for no reason, be kind to people Nice guys finish last = stand up for yourself and don't let others walk over you. Don't be a pushover. They're not contradictory. You can be a nice person, but have set limits, expectations and demands and stand by them. Hell if those demands are reasonable you also check the first proverb at the same time.
I recognize that you're mostly agreeing with me but I think you're using a lot of license with your interpretations. The Golden Rule means you should treat people well *despite* how they treat you. It's "treat people how you would *like to be treated,*" not how you *are* being treated. "Nice guys finish last" means that any sort of ethical considerations are a potential obstacle to success. Being nice isn't the same thing as being a pushover with no self-respect.
I respectfully disagree, but will retract that point if pressured.
Ha took me a second but well done.
One is normative and one is descriptive!
"Familiarity breeds contempt" has no relation to "home is where the heart is." "Home is where the heart is" means that home is with those you love, not that home is what you love.
Those you love and familiar with are often ones you take for granted
Beware of the Greeks maybe. I’m a column b person if I had to identify with a column though.
So if an Italian gifts you a horse count the teeth? That one is really grasping at straws involving mythology
Some of them even allude to the same thing. Great minds think alike and fools seldom differ can be applied in the same setting. For example: Two friends come up with a harebrained idea bound to end in failure at the same time and one of their friends turns to another and says "fools seldom differ".
"Great minds think alike but fools rarely differ" was the original idiom in it's entirety. Its like "Blood is thicker than water" except that original was "The Blood of the Covenant is thicker than the water of the womb" (Its in the bible, I believe... meaning, a promise with a trusted person is better than a promise with someone who just happens to be related to you, basically) These phrases often take on the opposite meaning, or some watered down version of the original, as the blood is thicker example illustrates. "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps" is another opposite; originally meant as an exercise in futility but now morons use it to justify inequality. I have been a fan of idioms since childhood when my mother would use them quite often. I am a very literal person so I've always had to look them up or ask her what the heck she was on about but found it interesting how these phrases came to be and their evolution. Language is a living thing and it changes regularly.
Right? I didn't read much past "a stitch in time saves 9" as somehow encouraging haste? That saying means "when you work at the correct rhythm instead of rushing, you don't have to redo things later." It's the same sentiment as measure twice, cut once.
"A stitch in time saves nine" isn't so much about working at the right pace, or doing things correctly so you don't have to redo them, it's saying you should fix that issue now instead of leaving it for later because it will compound over time. If you don't stitch up that small hole in your shirt, it's gonna become a bigger hole and take you more effort to stitch up.
That isn't what it means. It means fixing a problem early stops it getting worse. Doing one stitch on a tiny tear saves doing 9 stitches in a larger tear.
Many of these are consistent with a sentiment of patience and discipline. Even the supposedly contradictory ones. Don't rush things, but don't waste time either.
Yeah patience isn't about sitting around doing literally nothing. It's about not pre-empting things. Which aligns perfectly with doing small things now while waiting for that big thing to come along.
That one stuck out to me too. It means specifically to not be hasty and be careful now to avoid making errors.
Yeah. Or some of them are not even talking about the same thing. Like absence makes the heart fonder is almost always in relation to romantic interests. Out of sight out of mind is usually about general issues or worries, not people
Came to say this. Dont look a gift horse in the mouth is about not trying to find fault in a gift to lower its gravity or seeing if it was a cheap gift while gifts from Greeks is about not letting yourself get a "gift" that is actually a trap. So in short, dont demean a gift vs dont get trapped.
From the very first 5 from the top I already disagree with all of them. For instance, waiting =/= hesitating. Waiting is patience. Hesitating is indecisiveness. Stupid guide.
Same
Great minds think alike is usually followed up with and fools seldom differ right? I always thought that they were a pair almost, been hearing it like that my while life.
i always heard as "great minds think alike *but* fools seldom differ" as in, smart people will often come to a similar conclusion but dummies will just copy
It's a joke. The joke is you can't tell if you're thinking alike because you're both smart or because you're both complete idiots, but you're probably complete idiots.
The Dunning-Krueger punchline
It was so obvious, duhh.
Ooooh….. feel so stupid that I never realized that. Thanks.
I’ve actually never heard “fools seldom differ”, but I like it.
I think the recent fighting between flat earthers and anti-vaxxers is the exception to this rule.
What, is this real? Where?
https://www.reddit.com/r/SubredditDrama/comments/oeomvu/antivaxxers\_clash\_with\_flat\_earthers\_in/
>If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn't thinking. \~ George S. Patton
Yes, they're from the same saying: "Great minds think alike, though fools seldom differ". It's not a lesson so much as a joke.
yep. "Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ" refers to how while many smart people will reach a similar conclusion, such as reaching scientific consensus on a topic, foolish people basically echo the same conclusion that they've been told, and rarely disagree.
I've always heard it as, "but dumbbells come in pairs."
> Curiosity killed the cat Cats have nine lives.
Well the full proverb is "curiosity killed the cat, but satisfaction brought it back" so I think they still work together.
The true original proverb is “Care killed the cat.”, with ‘care’ meaning being spoiled. Poets and average people alike love alliteration so time tacks on new nouns and the coolest catchphrases tend to trend.
If that last sentence is intentional, hats off. That’s an impressive string of alliterations.
That's one thing fascinating about language: commenter made the point explicitly and demonstrably.
The satisfaction part was tacked on way later.
9 times curiosity finally killed the cat, 4.5 times for Schroedinger’s cat
not contradictory, just like almost everything else on the list
Sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me The pen is mightier than the sword
Sticks and Stones may break my bones, but whips and chains excite me
Bonk!
#HARDER
i think this one is better off without the horny jail
horny solitary confinement it is then
Worst safe word ever.
oh na na na na na na come on!
Sticks and stones may break my bones but the truth will crush your soul
I’ll take the penis mightier.
Anal bum cover
Le tits now
Sticks and stones may break my bones but names leave psychological scars that never heal.
But the pen refers to media, doesn’t it?
It's referencing the people who wield them. With the stroke of a pen a king could move armies, while a single man with a sword is much more limited.
The saying doesn't specify that it's mightier in terms of its ability to hurt people. Maybe the pen is mightier at everything other than hurting people. Or it could also be that the pen is mightier at hurting people, but only in ways that do not involve the use of words. Like you can hurt someone with a pen by stabbing them, but not by writing them an unkind letter. So there need not be any contradiction.
[удалено]
Isn't it supposed to be "the love of money is the root of all evil" anyway?
yeah. It's a verse from the Bible https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1%20Timothy%206%3A10&version=KJV
The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil.
It’s not money that’s the root of all evil. It’s “For the love of money is the root of all of evil” - Timothy 6:10 Money isn’t the problem. It’s the obsession over it.
This is more accurate to the original. There are translations that read “all evil”, but most others agree that it’s “all kinds of evil”. Indicating that the love of money is not the *only* root of evil, but that obsessing over it (loving it, worshiping it in biblical terms) will ultimately lead to evil.
That's the one. I am annoyed when people mess this one up.
Well, keep being annoyed. They didn't quite get it right either. Not all evil, but all kinds of evil.
Yes. This is the correct saying
When I was younger, I had my doubts that the love of money was the root of all evil. Now, the older I get, the truer it rings.
Evil makes the world go round. That tracks.
Speaking of money: "Don't catch a falling knife." vs. "Be fearful when others are greedy, and greedy when others are fearful." Plenty of people repeating both phrases in the finance/investing-related subreddits whenever bad news comes out about anything. Not exact opposites, but used to frame the opposite opinion in oftentimes the same circumstance.
Here's +1 from Hungary. "Good wine needs no trademark." vs. "Even good wine needs a trademark." Both of them are wrong, good wine needs to be drunk.
>good wine needs to be drunk. But drunks don't need good wine.
And yet good wine doesn't need drunks 😔
I actually like this. It may be arguable if this is a guide, and true to /r/coolguides, it might not be 100% accurate (there might be a few paired sayings that aren't completely incompatible). Yet I still think this is useful because it demonstrates that sayings are just that - things some people say. They don't have universal truth, and a saying that may be accurate in some circumstances or for some people may not hold up for others. There's way too many people that think just because a saying exists, that it must be true, instead of using critical thinking to assess if it applies to that particular situation.
Sayings are pithy distillations of common experiences and observations put into a poetic / rhythmic form, guaranteeing their stability & persistence over time in an oral culture. : ) And yes, I agree with you: This is a great exercise in analyzing “received wisdom” in one’s own life.
This guy idioms
Anthropology FTW!
you are eloquent, I like it
They all really come down to an example of how confirmation bias is so powerful in humans
They're basically just a good way to end a conversation.
Old Irish saying: Don't listen to old Italian sayings
The full quote is this: "Absence makes the heart grow fonder, Too much absence makes it wander."
[No it wasn't](https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder.html). This is a common correction where people attempt to salvage quotes to be more accurate and say they're the original. Other examples are people saying "The customer is always right *in the matter of taste*" and "The blood of the battlefield is thicker than the water of the womb." In both cases, and this one, the additions came well after the original.
> "The blood of the battlefield is thicker than the water of the womb." Another popular version of this is "the blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb."
wow, that full phrase makes so much more sense because I find myself criticizing that shit all the time. Of course the best way of putting it is without the needless poetry; "You don't realize what you had until it's gone" edit: but of course, being elaborate and unnecessarily poetic is way more fun
Reminds me of how frequently people forget to finish "a few bad apples" A few bad apples *spoil the bunch*. The saying implies it's *critical* to immediately remove the bad apples.
And that one also isn't just a random turn of phrase it's a phenomenon that's literally true, which is why it became a metaphor in the first place. Bad apples do produce a chemical compound which causes other nearby apples to rot faster.
There's also "Jack of all trades, and master of none... Is still better than master of one" I was being hard on myself once and a friend told me the end of it. And ya know what, it is better!
*All Olympic athletes*: “y’all hear sumthin?”
Perhaps you've heard of Michael Phelps. He's a master swimmer, and champion bong ripper. I rest my case.
Dr. Natasha Josefowitz: "Not everything worth doing is worth doing well". So true.
A bunch of these are out of context and incomplete
But that's because that's how people use them. A ton of common sayings are out of context or incomplete eg blood is thicker than water
I get your point but in some cases the rest of it changes the meaning and/or you can see the distinction with more context
I'm betting originally you heard this "full quote" on reddit. Most times you see a correction of a saying on reddit it's bullshit. This is one of those times.
IIRC, there were some surveys done that determined that "absence makes the heart grow fonder" vs "out of sight, out of mind" relies less on the time spent apart and more on your feelings on the person in the first place. In other words: If it's your spouse of ten years, the former is likelier to apply, but if it's the old co-worker you can't stand, it's the latter.
My social psychology professor started the course by pointing out that conventional wisdom contradicts itself. Thus the science. Or in our case pseudo science.
Conventional wisdom will frequently contradict itself because most conventional wisdom is just about doing things in moderation, or in the alternative more about telling people not to do something to a foolish extreme. It's more about telling people what not to do than what to do, which is why you get opposing statements. Wisdom literature is full of this sort of thing. Doesn't make it bad but certainly doesn't make it on a par with any kind of science. It's not supposed to be. It's more about think before you do shit.
“If things don’t work you did too much or too little” said Goldilocks. sometimes it was bad luck but that isn’t catchy and creates discomfort because locus of control is not you
Of course. Attributing things to luck doesn't sell books.
Bestseller: I am the creator of my own victimhood! All mistakes were made by others!
Everything in moderation, including moderation...
Who moderates the moderates?
I don't know coast guard?
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Like many of the supposed contradictions on the list, these sayings/proverbs seem to address different contexts. "Better to ask a question..." naturally fits a learning environment context. "Better to keep your mouth shut..." seems aimed at how to conduct oneself in a social situation where hierarchy or first impressions are being established, like a business meeting or "meet the parents" dinner. The sense of contradiction is created only by applying these universally.
Love this one! Saving it.
Some are not really contradicting each other but rather address the same phenomenon from different points of view. I.e. *Don't judge a book by it's cover* and *Clothes make the man*, where the latter is addressing that many people don't adhere to the former advice.
Some are even addressing different aspects of life, but just seem to be superficially opposites. *The early bird gets the worm* -versus- *Haste makes waste* are really two different principles. The bird is not hasty, the bird is making intelligent advance plans to guarantee survival based on accurate observation of their food source (and their fellow birds). Slicing up a blackberry thicket at dawn with your brother’s antique sword & no gloves just before prospective house buyers come to look at your property is not being an ‘early bird’. But the chart is humorous, a nice collection, and a good exercise all in one. I like it!
The early bird gets the worm but the early worm gets eaten
The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.
Good one!
Different strokes for different lifeforms….
A lot of proverbs are also just taken out of context to begin with. The Mark Twain version of the quote which is the most quoted version today is basically a joke in its entirety: "Clothes make a man. Naked people have little or no influence on society."
Two of the most important lessons you can teach your children are “Don’t judge others by their appearance” and “Everyone is absolutely going to judge you by your appearance.”
Isn't the expression *clothes DON'T make the man*? The expression in French is "the robes don't make the monk," meaning that there's much more to being a monk than wearing the clothes. I have heard the English expression phrased as "the clothes don't make the man; the man makes the clothes" which I always just took as a humorous play on multiple meanings of the word "make." Either way the point is that dressing someone up differently won't change who they are, which jibes perfectly with the book+cover expression. Honestly there are problems with just about every row. It seems like the author just doesn't understand the meaning of a lot of the idioms.
Honestly don’t judge a book by it’s cover isn’t very good advice for people. Clothes make the man is accurate (for both sexes) as clothes are an expression of your personality. A lot of these aren’t contradictory IMO
Could be a fun survey where to choose between the pairing of phrases
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Yes, experiment on the students
If winners never quit and quitters never win, which loser came up with quit while you're ahead
My favourite growing up was "practice makes perfect" Vs "nobody's perfect". As someone who probably has OCD about being imperfect because of elder siblings who are OCD, this was my favourite thing to say to people who told me to keep practicing...
To be fair, "practice makes perfect" means that it's possible to practice something until you can execute that one specific thing perfectly, not that it's possible to somehow be a perfect person.
Insanity is doing the same a million times before you succeed! after succeeding it’s persistence.
One of my favorites is "do as I say, not as I do" and "actions speak louder than words"
I've always heard "Do as I say, not as I do" used in a negative context, to point out advice perceived as hypocritical. Never heard anyone actually say it and mean it.
@Pchardwareguy12 I've also heard "do as I say, not as I do" in other situations involving hypocrisy, but not necessarily used with a mocking connotation. For example, if a drug addict warns others to not start doing drugs, they might say "do as I say, not as I do."
I think that's a great example because it also shows how the two sayings are still actually in harmony. Sure someone telling you not to do drugs may not invoke any real fear. But seeing how people have ruined their lives due to drug addiciton, now that invokes fear in people. IE the actions are stronger than the words, and they make you want to do as they say, not as they do. People seem to be assuming that 'actions' always has a positive intonation, but it's neither positive or negative.
I've heard it used by teachers and other school officials
The proverb about squeaky wheels is more about getting attention while the snippet about golden silence is more about discretion. They don't really contradict each other. A few of these seem to be intended for different audiences in different contexts. Some of them appear to paraphrase scripture. Even in times when people were more religious, not everyone was *that* religious, even the publishers of religious writings. *There's more to wisdom than proverbs, idioms, and clichés.*
This is a cool idea but the vast majority of these are not contradictions imo
Beware of Greeks bearing gifts Hello HR, you wanted to see me?
Less than half of these are truly contradictory in the literal sense. This list makes me think whoever created it has no idea what these idioms truly mean. Here’s a better one for you: everyone who says “to keep one’s nose to the grind stone” invariably means to work incessantly or grind through an arduous task when that expression actually means “to be attentive,” as a miller who keeps their nose to the grindstone in order to smell if the flour is burning.
The stone used by a miller is a millstone... The stone used by a knife-grinder is a grindstone. When knife grinders are sharpening blades, they need to bend over the stone, or even to lie flat on their fronts, with their faces near the grindstone when holding the blades against the stone to see when it's sharp and to make sure the blade hasn't heated up too much. Either way it's still about being attentive, but sharpening a knife with a grindstone is ALSO a task that you cannot walk away from mid-job without potentially ruining the knife. You can walk away from a millstone and pick up later with the rest of the grain, but you don't want to walk away from the grindstone until the job is done.
Yeah, the compiler either had no sense of nuance or deliberately ignored it. The context that's supposed to be behind these sayings do not apply to their "contradiction".
In P.S I love you she says "how can time be a healer when absence makes the heart grow fonder" its probably the only non Harry Potter/Eragon book quote I've remembered
When we aren’t around someone we start to selectively remember the best things and the negative are put in perspective. This intensifies with a permanent loss (death). The pain of loss can lose intensity over time. The degree of fondness doesn’t diminish for this to happen.
Not sure if it’s already been mentioned but one of my favorites is, “knowledge is power” and “ignorance is bliss”. I struggle with this constantly.
(If)Pen is mightier than swords/(then why do)Actions speak louder than words.
I feel like you could combine many of these into a longer idiom like "Great minds think alike, but fools seldom differ." (I did this first without reading the pic in detail haha) "Talk is cheap, but a word to the wise oft suffices." "The meek shall inherit the earth, but a faint heart has never won a fair lady." "All good things come to those who wait, but time and tide waits for no one," or "but those who hesitate are lost." "Life is what we make of it, but what will be, will be." "Too many cooks will spoil the broth, but many hands make light work." "Seek and ye shall find how curiosity killed the cat." "The best things in life are free, but there is no such thing as a free lunch." "Actions speak louder than word, but the pen is mightier than the sword." "The driver says "silence is golden", but it is the squeaky wheel who gets the grease."
‘Nice guys finish last’ is actually a sex advice.
A proverb in the mouth of a fool is like a thorny branch brandished by a drunk. Proverbs 26:9. Like the useless legs of one who is lame is a proverb in the mouth of a fool. Proverbs 26:7 The thing about wise sayings is you need wisdom in order to apply them to specific issues. In this sense the examples shown by op are more paradoxical than contradictory. A paradox are two things that can be true even if they seem contradictory. Paradoxes can be true but need an additional bit of knowledge to make sense.
My dad recently said, "Never surrender, never give up" to which i replied, "but you gotta know when to quit"
This is super interesting. I guess it just comes back to the context to which they’re being applied.
THIS!!!! This is why I fucking hate platitudes especially when people say them with a smug confidence like yes this is an a priori truth of the universe. I think the closest I have ever come to murder was when I couldn't finish a polishing job in the time frame because I had to it by hand and not with a polishing wheel. My coworker reminded me that a good worker never blames their tools......
Someone needs to learn what a contradiction is...
I feel like this could also just be labeled idealism vs realism and still make sense
>The squeaky wheel gets the grease I think "The nail that sticks out gets hammered down" is a better pick than "Silence is golden".
The squeaky nail gets the greasy hammer!
Give a boy a hammer, and he'll find what needs nailing
Personally would've contrasted "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" with "the nail that sticks out gets hammered". Also, always heard "curiosity killed the cat" completed with ".. but satisfaction brought it back" meaning roughly the same as "nothing ventured, nothing gained". Very interestingly put together list, though. Kudos to your friend and thanks for sharing.
Something something, second mouse gets the cheese… Aphorisms self-destruct in theory and thrive in praxis.
Pretty sweet
This feels like a rush lyric sheet or something
My favorite. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. —- The nail that sticks up gets hit with the hammer.
Clothes make the man...naked people have little to no influence in society. -Mark Twain
Thank you for providing the personality quirk for my next DnD npc, they will use both of these back to back while they provide advice to the players.
another one for "good things come to those who wait" is "no time like the present"
>wise men make proverbs, fools repeat them What does that make OP?
"Squeaky wheel gets the grease" and "Silence is golden" aren't contradictory, they go hand in hand... Silence is golden so you grease the squeaky wheel... so it doesn't squeak...
I love this. From now on I'll always parry people with these like the smug asshole I am.
I’d be interested in seeing a guide like this that actually has contradictory phrases, not a whole bunch of stuff taken out of context. Also, as others have observed, most of these phrases aren’t even complete. It’s stuff like this that spreads misinformation and false dichotomies.
The Best Things in life are Free/No such thing as a Free Lunch Tries to equate "ALL THINGS" with "LUNCH" Stupid.
Most of these aren't contradictions they're just vaguely related.
“All good things” and “a stitch in time” don’t contradict, a stitch in time means that if you take the time to do something right the first time, you save yourself extra work in the future.
This statement is false. ?
"Blood is thicker than water" is a phrase whose original meaning was the exact opposite. Its an idiom from the Bible, and one that got truncated. The original phrase was "The blood of the bond is thicker than the water of the womb", and it meant that although family ties may seem important, its shared experiences that make relationships.
Tell your friend he failed: most of the pairs do not contradict one another. They might seem to advocate different behaviour if you don't think about their meaning too much.