About this quote?

Question

I read this quote "A wise man learns by the mistakes of others,

a fool by his own." on a website and i don't understand how that's true, because iv'e always been told "The only way to learn, is from our mistakes"

Opinions?

Answer 1

You can learn by your own mistakes, and that doesn't make you a fool.  However, if you witness someone else making a mistake and don't learn from it...you might not be the smartest.

The quote just means that a wise person will be aware of what is going on around them, and will be observant enough to see the connections between the causes and consequences of actions, whether their own or someone else's.  

You could consider the 'our' in "The only way to learn is from our mistakes" to be an inclusive 'our'...so we learn as a group from the mistakes that members of our group make.