If 50 million people says something foolish, it is still foolish. what does "it" refer to? If 50 million people says something foolish, it is still foolish. this is a famous quote by W. Somerset Maugham. basically, it means that even the majority claimed sth. you should still give it a second thought to see if it's really true as people claimed it to be. the thing is, i can't get this meaning simply by this quote cos it's just one sentence so i wanna know what does "it" here refers to and why people render this sentence the explanation i just mentioned above. thx a lot!