Quite a contrast from the quote about civilization advancing in proportion to the size and scope of things it can achieve automatically.
Dug it up. Alfred Whitehead:
It is a profoundly erroneous truism, repeated by all copy books and by eminent people when they are making speeches, that we should cultivate the habit of thinking of what we are doing. The precise opposite is the case. Civilization advances by extending the number of important operations which we can perform without thinking about them.