Barry Lopez:

How is one to live a moral and compassionate existence when one is fully aware of the blood, the horror inherent in life, when one finds darkness not only in one's culture but within oneself? If there is a stage at which an individual life becomes truly adult, it must be when one grasps the irony in its unfolding and accepts responsibility for a life lived in the midst of such paradox. One must live in the middle of contradiction, because if all contradiction were eliminated at once life would collapse. There are simply no answers to some of the great pressing questions. You continue to live them out, making your life a worthy expression of leaning into the light.

Arctic Dreams

Chinese proverb:

One who asks a question is a fool for five minutes; one who does not ask a question remains a fool forever.

George Bernard Shaw:

New opinions often appear first as jokes and fancies, then as blasphemies and treason, then as questions open to discussion, and finally as established truths.

George Bernard Shaw:

Some men see things as they are and say, "Why?" I dream of things that never were and say, "Why not?"

frequently attributed to Robert F. (Bobby) Kennedy, who used it in a speech which his brother, Edward F. (Teddy) Kennedy quoted at RFK's funeral.

John J. Plomp:

You know children are growing up when they start asking questions that have answers.

Pablo Picasso:

Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.

Paul Tillich:

Being religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt.

Saturday Evening Post, June 14, 1958

Rainer Maria Rilke:

Have patience with everything that remains unsolved in your heart. Try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books written in a foreign language. Do not now look for the answers. They cannot now be given to you because you could not live them. It is a question of experiencing everything. At present you need to live the question. Perhaps you will gradually, without even noticing it, find yourself experiencing the answer, some distant day.

Letters to a Young Poet

Sam Keen:

To be on a quest is nothing more or less than to become an asker of questions.

Sigmund Freud:

Despite my thirty years of research into the feminine soul, I have not been able to answer... the great question that has never been answered: what does a woman want?

Soren Kierkegaard:

Where am I? Who am I?
How did I come to be here?
What is this thing called the world?
How did I come into the world?
Why was I not consulted?
And If I am compelled to take part in it,
Where is the director?
I want to see him.

Thomas Jefferson:

Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blind-folded fear.

Thornton Wilder:

My advice to you is not to inquire why or whither, but just enjoy your ice cream while it's on your plate -- that's my philosophy.

The Skin of Our Teeth, 1942

Unknown:

Some children's answers to church school questions - from the Church of England:

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Voltaire:

Judge others by their questions rather than by their answers.