“We look for medicine to be an orderly field of knowledge and procedure. But it is not. It is an imperfect science, an enterprise of constantly changing knowledge, uncertain information, fallible individuals, and at the same time lives on the line. There is science in what we do, yes, but also habit, intuition, and sometimes plain old guessing. The gap between what we know and what we aim for persists. And this gap complicates everything we do.”

Atul Gawande

Atul Gawande - “We look for medicine to be an orderly...” 1

Similar quotes

“To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.”

Henry David Thoreau
Read more

“To know that we know what we know, and to know that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.”

Nicolaus Copernicus
Read more

“We all would like to know more and, at the same time, to receive less information. In fact, the problem of a worker in today's knowledge industry is not the scarcity of information but its excess. The same holds for professionals: just think of a physician or an executive, constantly bombarded by information that is at best irrelevant. In order to learn anything we need time. And to make time we must use information filters allowing us to ignore most of the information aimed at us. We must ignore much to learn a little.”

Mario Augusto Bunge
Read more

“Confucius said, "To know that we know what we know, and that we do not know what we do not know, that is true knowledge.”

Henry David Thoreau
Read more

“Knowledge is the theoretical paradigm, the what to do and the why. Skill is the how to do. And desire is the motivation, the want to do. In order to make something a habit in our lives, we have to have all three”

Stephen R. Covey
Read more