Scott Adams Quotes: 40 Funny and Inspiring Words from the Dilbert Creator

Liputan6.com, Jakarta - On January 13, 2026, the world lost a creative mind. Scott Adams passed away at age 68 after fighting cancer. During moments of reflection like this, Scott Adams quotes offer a simple way to remember his thoughts and the legacy he left through his words.

For decades, his ideas reached offices, homes, and newspapers through simple drawings and short lines with strong meaning. Works like the Dilbert comic strip and books such as The Dilbert Principle shaped how people laugh at office culture and management habits. Scott Adams quotes often reflect daily work life, human behavior, and the strange logic of systems and power.

Today, Scott Adams quotes continue to attract readers who want short thoughts with strong impact. Some lines bring laughter, while others invite reflection about work, success, and personal growth.

To remember his legacy, we have gathered some of the most memorable Scott Adams quotes from various sources, Wednesday (14/1/2026). These words will help us understand his unique view of life and work. Let's check them out.

1. "You can never underestimate the stupidity of the general public."

2. "There's nothing more dangerous than a resourceful idiot."

3. "Normal people... believe that if it ain't broke, don't fix it. Engineers believe that if it ain't broke, it doesn't have enough features yet."

4. "If you spend all your time arguing with people who are nuts, you'll be exhausted and the nuts will still be nuts."

5. "There's nothing more dangerous than a resourceful idiot."

6. "If there are no stupid questions, then what kind of questions do stupid people ask? Do they get smart just in time to ask questions?"

7. “Give a man a fish, and you'll feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish, and he'll buy a funny hat. Talk to a hungry man about fish, and you're a consultant.”

8. “I have infinite capacity to do more work as long as you don't mind that my quality approaches zero.”

9. "I used to be stupid but I've turned that situation around 360 degrees."

10. “Nothing inspires forgiveness quite like revenge.”

11. "There's kind of a toll you have to pay with a cat; if you don't pet her for 10 minutes she'll bother you for six hours."

12. "One way to compensate for a tiny brain is to pretend to be dead."

13. "Consultants have credibility because they are not dumb enough to work at your company."

14. "If a job's worth doing, it's too hard."

15. “Your best work involves timing. If someone wrote the best hip hop song of all time in the Middle Ages, he had bad timing.”

1. "Creativity is allowing yourself to make mistakes. Art is knowing which ones to keep."

2. "Free will is an illusion. People always choose the perceived path of greatest pleasure."

3. "The world is like a reverse casino. In a casino, if you gamble long enough, you're certainly going to lose. But in the real world, where the only thing you're gambling is, say, your time or your embarrassment, then the more stuff you do, the more you give luck a chance to find you."

4. "Remember there's no such thing as a small act of kindness. Every act creates a ripple with no logical end."

5. “You can change only what people know, not what they do.”

6. “A goal is a specific objective that you either achieve or don't sometime in the future. A system is something you do on a regular basis that increases your odds of happiness in the long run. If you do something every day, its a system. If you're waiting to achieve it someday in the future, it's a goal."

7. "Systems people succeed every time they apply their systems, in the sense that they did what they intended to do. The goals people are fighting the feeling of discouragement at each turn. The systems people are feeling good everytime they apply their system. That's a big difference in terms of maintaining your personal energy in the right direction.”

8. “The best things in life are silly.”

9. "You don't have to be a 'person of influence' to be influential. In fact, the most influential people in my life are probably not even aware of the things they've taught me."

10. "Continuing to believe the same thing, even in the face of new evidence to the contrary, is the definition of insanity - except in politics where it's called leadership."

11. “If you want success, figure out the price, then pay it. It sounds trivial and obvious, but if you unpack the idea it has extraordinary power.”

12. “The human mind is a delusion generator, not a window to trurh.”

13. "Every skill you acquire doubles your odds of success."

14. "Happiness is nothing but good health and freedom, and money is the single best way you can buy your freedom."

15. "Nothing defines humans better than their willingness to do irrational things in the pursuit of phenomenally unlikely payoffs. This is the principle behind lotteries, dating, and religion."

16. "If you drill down on any success story, you always discover that luck was a huge part of it. You can't control luck, but you can move from a game with bad odds to one with better odds. You can make it easier for luck to find you. The most useful thing you can do is stay in the game."

17. "We must develop knowledge optimization initiatives to leverage our key learnings."

18. "I don't get embarrassed by the same things that other people do. I would say that probably the biggest thing that holds people back is, 'If I do this, I'm going to look like an idiot if it doesn't work out.'"

19. "Informed decision-making comes from a long tradition of guessing and then blaming others for inadequate results."

20. "Most success springs from an obstacle or failure. I became a cartoonist largely because I failed in my goal of becoming a successful executive."

21. "Good ideas have no value because the world already has too many of them. The market rewards execution, not ideas."

22. "Ideas are worthless. Execution is everything."

23. "Failure is where success likes to hide in plain sight."

24. "The ability to work hard and make sacrifices comes naturally to those who know exactly what they want."

25. “Avoid career traps such as pursuing jobs that require you to sell your limited supply of time while preparing you for nothing better.”