Making the Same Mistake Over and Over Again and Expecting a Different Outcome
Albert Einstein? Al-Anon? Narcotics Bearding? Max Nordau? George Bernard Shaw? Samuel Beckett? George A. Kelly? Rita Mae Brown? John Larroquette? Jessie Potter? Werner Erhard?
Dear Quote Investigator: It's foolish to repeat ineffective actions. I popular formulation presents this point harshly:
The definition of insanity is doing the aforementioned affair over and once more and expecting a different issue.
These words are usually credited to the acclaimed genius Albert Einstein. What do you recall?
Quote Investigator: There is no noun show that Einstein wrote or spoke the statement above. Information technology is listed within a section chosen "Misattributed to Einstein" in the comprehensive reference "The Ultimate Quotable Einstein" from Princeton University Printing. [1] 2010, The Ultimate Quotable Einstein, Edited past Alice Calaprice, Department: Misattributed to Einstein, Quote Page 474, Princeton University Printing, Princeton, New Jersey. (Verified on paper)
The earliest potent match known to QI appeared in October 1981 within a Knoxville, Tennessee newspaper article describing a coming together of Al-Anon, an organization designed to help the families of alcoholics. The journalist described the "Twelve Steps" of Al-Anon which are based on like steps employed in Alcoholics Anonymous. The newspaper began with these two steps: [ii] 1981 October 11, The Knoxville News-Sentinel Al-Betimes Helps Family, Friends to Orderly Lives by Betsy Pickle (Living Today Staff Writer), Quote Page F17, Column two, Knoxville, Tennessee. (GenealogyBank)
Step 1: Nosotros admitted nosotros were powerless over alcohol – that our lives had become unmanageable.
Step 2: Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore united states to sanity
1 of the attendees at the meeting hesitated to accept the accurateness of 2nd step. Emphasis added to excerpts by QI:
Not all the women are willing to admit they needed to be "restored to sanity." In fact, one of them adamantly maintains that she had never reached a indicate of insanity. But another remarks, "Insanity is doing the aforementioned thing over and over once again and expecting different results."
The second earliest strong match known to QI appeared in a pamphlet printed by the Narcotics Anonymous arrangement in November 1981: [3] 1981, Narcotics Bearding Pamphlet, (Basic Text Approval Grade, Unpublished Literary Work), Affiliate Four: How It Works, Footstep Two, Folio eleven, Printed November 1981, Copyright 1981, W.S.C.-Literature … Continue reading
The price may seem higher for the aficionado who prostitutes for a fix than information technology is for the addict who merely lies to a physician, only ultimately both pay with their lives. Insanity is repeating the same mistakes and expecting different results.
QI acquired a PDF of the certificate with the quotation above on the website amonymifoundation.org back in February 2011. The document stated that is was printed in November 1981, and it had a 1981 copyright notice. The website was subsequently reorganized, simply the document remains available via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine database.
Below are boosted selected citations in chronological order.
The linkage between insanity and repetition has a long history. The controversial book "Degeneration" past Max Nordau was published in German language in 1892 and translated into English past 1895. Nordau examined the works of a variety of artists and savagely attacked those that contained repetition which he believed evinced a mental defect in the creator. For example, he criticized Maurice Maeterlinck's "La Princesse Maleine": [4] 1895 Copyright, Degeneration by Max Nordau (Max Simon Nordau) (Translated from the 2d Edition of the German Work), Quote Page 238, D. Appleton and Visitor. (Google Books Full View) link
Has anyone anywhere in the verse of the two worlds ever seen such consummate idiocy? These 'Ahs' and 'Ohs,' this desire of comprehension of the simplest remarks, this repetition iv or v times of the same imbecile expressions, gives the truest believable clinical picture of incurable cretinism. These parts are precisely those virtually extolled by Maeterlinck's admirers.
When George Bernard Shaw reviewed Nordau's opus he turned the criticism of repetition back upon the author and suggested that Nordau might diagnose himself equally mentally unsound: [v] 1895 July 27, Liberty, Volume 11, Number 6, A Degenerate's View of Nordau by Bernard Shaw, Quote Page 2, Column one, Published by Benj. R Tucker, New York. (Reprint in 1970 by Greenwood Reprint … Continue reading
I take read Max Nordau's "Degeneration" at your request,—two hundred and sixty chiliad mortal words, maxim the aforementioned affair over and once again. That, equally you know, is the fashion to drive a matter into the mind of the world, though Nordau considers it a symptom of insane "obsession" on the part of writers who practise non share his ain opinions. His message to the world is that all our characteristically modernistic works of art are symptoms of disease in the artists, and that these diseased artists are themselves symptoms of the nervous exhaustion of the race by overwork.
The 1955 book "The Psychology of Personal Constructs" by George A. Kelly included a definition that corresponded to the saying under investigation although information technology employed a different vocabulary: [6] 1955, The Psychology of Personal Constructs past George A. Kelly, Volume 2: Clinical Diagnosis and Psychotherapy, Quote Page 831, Published by W. West. Norton & Visitor, New York. (Verified on newspaper)
From the standpoint of the psychology of personal constructs we may define a disorder as whatsoever personal construction which is used repeatedly in spite of consistent invalidation. This is an unusual definition, as psychological thinking ordinarily goes.
In October 1981 an educator and counselor on family unit relationships delivered a voice communication containing a thematically related adage: [seven] 1981 October 24, The Milwaukee Sentinel, Search For Quality Called Cardinal To Life past Tom Ahern, Quote Page five, Column five, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. (Google News Archive)
"If you e'er do what you've e'er done, you always get what you've always gotten." That was the advice of Jessie Potter, the featured speaker at Friday's opening of the 7th almanac Woman to Woman briefing.
More data about the quotation above is available here.
In Oct 1981 the saying was spoken by an attendee of an Al-Anon meeting as noted previously:
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting dissimilar results.
In November 1981 a pamphlet from Narcotics Anonymous contained a shut match every bit noted previously:
Insanity is repeating the aforementioned mistakes and expecting different results.
The 1983 novel "Sudden Death" by Rita Mae Brownish included an instance credited to Jane Fulton who was a graphic symbol inside the book: [eight] 1983, Sudden Expiry by Rita Mae Chocolate-brown, Chapter four, Quote Page 68, Published past Runted Books, New York. (Verified with scans)
The trouble with Susan was that she made the same mistakes repeatedly. She'd fall in love with a woman and consume her. Susan thought that her mere presence was enough. What more than was in that location to give? When she tired, normally after a year or and then, she'd find another woman.
Unfortunately, Susan didn't remember what Jane Fulton once said. "Insanity is doing the same matter over and over again, but expecting different results."
A June 1983 volume review of "Sudden Death" in "The Clarion-Ledger" of Jackson, Mississippi reprinted the saying: [9] 1983 June 19, The Blaring-Ledger, "Sudden Death" a complex metaphor by Stephen L. Silberman, (Book review of "Sudden Death" by Rita Mae Brown), Quote Page 7H, Column 2, … Continue reading
Women'due south tennis gets a thorough dissecting in this story. Jane Fulton is the critical sports writer who contends "Modern professional person sports rewards players for function instead of character. Responsibility is normally defined every bit doing a job improve than anyone else." She looks askance at professional tennis and says "Win and become a god. Lose and be forgotten." Finally subsequently post-obit the lives and careers of the players, and the game itself, she concludes, "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over once more, but expecting different results."
Also in 1983 Samuel Beckett, winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, offered a counterpoint perspective in his work "Worstward Ho": [10] 1983, Worstward Ho by Samuel Beckett, Quote Page 7, Grove Printing Inc., New York. (Verified with scans)
All of old. Zippo else always. Ever tried. Always failed. No matter. Try once again. Fail over again. Fail better.
In January 1986 the Emmy-winning actor John Larroquette who was a star in the television comedy series "Nighttime Court" shared the definition during a newspaper interview: [11] 1986 January 5, The Sydney Morning Herald, Television with Jacqueline Lee Lewes: From drugs, beverage to… Dark Court: 'Confessions of an Emmy Star, Quote Page 31, Column 3, Sydney, New … Continue reading
He pops in a definition of insanity – "It'south the repetition of the same action expecting different results. Like jumping out of a 40-storey building, breaking every bone, spending half-dozen months in hospital, going back to the same building, up to the 39th flooring, jumping and expecting it to exist different. It is NEVER different."
In April 1986 an opinion slice past Baltazar A. Acevedo Jr in "The Dallas Morning News" of Texas included the saying: [12] 1986 April 25, The Dallas Morning News, Leadership Beyond Ethnicity Should Be Goal of Dallasites by Baltazar A. Acevedo Jr., Dallas, Texas. (NewsBank Access World News)
I once heard insanity defined every bit a process by which an individual or a system does something over and over over again in the aforementioned style while yet expecting different results. To continue to evaluate and accost problems in our community strictly along ethnic, instead of human, considerations is insane if only for one reason: It will lead to the polarization that is the standard of paranoid societies.
The 1988 book "Raising Self-Reliant Children in a Self-Indulgent World" included an instance: [13] 1988 Copyright, Raising Self-Reliant Children in a Self-Indulgent World: 7 Edifice Blocks for Developing Capable Immature People by H. Stephen Glenn and Jane Nelsen, Quote Page 174, Published by … Continue reading
Flexibility is the ability to curve when we find ourselves in unworkable positions. A universal characteristic of insanity is inflexibly doing the same thing over and over while hoping for different results. Flexibility in the confront of changing circumstances, by dissimilarity, is a hallmark of mental health.
By 1990 the maxim was being attributed to Einstein. For example, the "Austin American-Statesman" of Austin, Texas published the following remark fabricated by Travis County District Chaser Ronnie Earle: [xiv] 1990 November 19, Austin American-Statesman, Section: News, Prison Puzzle – Threat of cost explosion poses difficult choices past Mike Ward, Quote Page A1, Austin, Texas. (NewsBank Access World … Continue reading
Einstein once said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a unlike consequence.
In 1991 "The Seattle Times" printed the thoughts of an Indiana guess who ascribed another version of the maxim to Einstein: [15] 1991 July 4, The Seattle Times, Section: Editorial, Getting Out of the Liberty Business past Don Williamson, Quote Page A8, Seattle, Washington. (NewsBank Admission World News)
The jurist from the Hoosier State subscribes to Albert Einstein's definition of insanity: "doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome."
In 2000 a columnist working for the Knight Ridder News Service ascribed a version of the maxim to the influential lecturer and trainer Werner Erhard although the name was misspelled as "Erhart": [16] 2000 July xxx, The Indianapolis Star, Get a program to overcome trouble spots by Tim O'Brien (Knight Ridder News Service), Quote Folio J3, Cavalcade 1, Indianapolis, Indiana. (Newspapers_com)
Werner Erhart described insanity as 'repeating identical behavior and expecting a unlike result.' If we repeatedly have difficulties in an area of life, doesn't it brand sense that our behaviors cause the bug?
In 2016 the webcomic "xkcd" depicted two characters conversing; the first mentioned the now well-known definition of insanity, and the second replied with a remark that implicitly and cleverly practical the logic of the definition to his companion: [17] Website: xkcd Comic, Comic title: Insanity, Comic author: Randall Munroe, Date on website: March 18, 2016, Website clarification: A webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and linguistic communication. (Accessed xkcd.com … Proceed reading
You've been quoting that platitude for years. Has it convinced anyone to change their mind all the same?
In conclusion, based on current evidence the saying originated in one of the twelve-step communities. Anonymity is greatly valued in these communities, and no specific author has been identified by the many researchers who take explored the provenance of this adage. The linkage to Albert Einstein occurred many years afterward his decease and is unsupported.
Image Notes: 2 arrows pointing at 1 another from OpenClipart-Vectors at Pixabay. Portrait of Albert Einstein circa 1921 past Ferdinand Schmutzer accessed via Wikimedia Eatables. Images take been retouched, cropped and resized.
(Smashing thanks to MJ Redman, Kevin Ashton, Melinda Denson, Linda Sternhill Davis, The Muser, Mededitor, Santanu Vasant, Simon Lancaster, Michael Cochran, David Meadows, J Carson, Guilherme Simões, Ed Darrell, Lee Winkelman, and Fabius Maximus (Ed.) whose inquiries led QI to formulate this question and perform this exploration. Special thanks to the volunteer researchers Quora and Wikiquote who mentioned the Narcotics Anonymous citation. As well, thanks to the valuable research conducted by Barry Popik, Ben Zimmer, and Daniel Gackle. Many thank you to Bill Mullins who located the important October 11, 1981 citation.)
Update History: On July 31, 2019 the October 11, 1981 citation was added to the article.
Source: https://quoteinvestigator.com/2017/03/23/same/
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