Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. . . .
It is wrong to ask who will rule. The ability to vote a bad government out of office is enough. That is democracy.
I have spoken to Einstein and he admitted to me that his theory was in fact no different from the one of Parmenides.
The history of science is everywhere speculative. It is a marvelous hiatory. It makes you proud to be a human being.
If you know that things are bound to happen whatever you do, then you may feel free to give up the fight against them.
I personally call the type of government which can be removed without violence 'democracy,' and the other, 'tyranny.'.
There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life.
Piecemeal social engineering resembles physical engineering in regarding the ends as beyond the province of technology.
I have come to the conclusion that Darwinism is not a testable scientific theory, but a metaphysical research programme.
Our belief in any particular natural law cannot have a safer basis than our unsuccessful critical attempts to refute it.
No book can ever be finished. While working on it we learn just enough to find it immature the moment we turn away from it
The quest for precision is analogous to the quest for certainty and both - precision and certainty are impossible to attain.
We must plan for freedom, and not only for security, if for no other reason than that only freedom can make security secure.
We must plan for freedom, and not only for security, if for no other reason than only freedom can make security more secure.
It is not possible to write clearly enough to avoid being misrepresented by people who are sufficiently determined to do so.
The history of science, like the history of all human ideas, is a history of irresponsible dreams, of obstinacy, and of error.
Whenever we propose a solution to a problem, we ought to try as hard as we can to overthrow our solution, rather than defend it.
no matter how many instances of white swans we may have observed, this does not justify the conclusion that all swans are white.
I have learned more from Hayek than from any other living thinker, except perhaps Alfred Tarski - but not even excepting Russell.
No number of sightings of white swans can prove the theory that all swans are white. The sighting of just one black one may disprove it.
The moral decisions of others should be treated with respect, as long as such decisions do not conflict with the principle of tolerance.
The question is not how to get good people to rule; THE QUESTION IS: HOW TO STOP THE POWERFUL from doing as much damage as they can to us.
In my view, aiming at simplicity and lucidity is a moral duty of all intellectuals: lack of clarity is a sin, and pretentiousness is a crime.
The initial stage, the act of conceiving or inventing a theory, seems to me neither to call for logical analysis nor to be susceptible of it.
It is not his possession of knowledge, of irrefutable truth, that makes the man of science, but his persistent and recklessly critical quest for truth.
Ignorance is not a simple lack of knowledge but an active aversion to knowledge, the refusal to know, issuing from cowardice, pride, or laziness of mind.
If we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.
In so far as a scientific statement speaks about reality, it must be falsifiable; and in so far as it is not falsifiable, it does not speak about reality.
A theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific. Irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory (as people often think) but a vice.
The open society is one in which men have learned to be to some extent critical of taboos, and to base decisions on the authority of their own intelligence.
The defence of democracy must consist in making anti-democratic experiences too costly for those who try them; much more costly than a democratic compromise
Serious rational criticism is so rare that it should be encouraged. Being too ready to defend oneself is more dangerous than being too ready to admit a mistake.
The influence (for good or ill) of Plato's work is immeasurable. Western thought, one might say, has been Platonic or anti-Platonic, but hardly ever non-Platonic.
Evolution is not a fact. Evolution doesn't even qualify as a theory or as a hypothesis. It is a metaphysical research program, and it is not really testable science.
I am opposed to looking upon logic as a kind of game. ... One might think that it is a matter of choice or convention which logic one adopts. I disagree with this view.
It is complete nihilism to propose laying down arms in a world where atom bombs are around. It is very simple: there is no way of achieving peace other than with weapons.
Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve.
Reason like science, grows by way of mutual criticism; the only possible way of planning its growth is to develop those institutions that safeguard. the freedom of thought
It is the rule which says that the other rules of scientific procedure must be designed in such a way that they do not protect any statement in science against falsification.
Simple statements are to be prized more highly than less simple ones because they tell us more; because their empirical content is greater; and because they are better testable.
The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance
The difference between the amoeba and Einstein is that, although both make use of the method of trial and error elimination, the amoeba dislikes erring while Einstein is intrigued by it.
It is wrong to think that belief in freedom always leads to victory; we must always be prepared for it to lead to defeat. If we choose freedom, then we must be prepared to perish along with it.
The best thing that can happen to a human being us to find a problem, to fall in love with that problem, and to live trying to solve that problem, unless another problem even more lovable appears.
The scientific tradition is distinguished from the pre-scientific tradition by having two layers. Like the latter, it passes on its theories; but it also passes on a critical attitude towards them.
There is no history of mankind, there are only many histories of all kinds of aspects of human life. And one of these is the history of political power. This is elevated into the history of the world.
We are social creatures to the inmost centre of our being. The notion that one can begin anything at all from scratch, free from the past, or unindebted to others, could not conceivably be more wrong.
I see now more clearly than ever before that even our greatest troubles spring from something that is [as] admirable and sound as it is dangerous – from our impatience to better the lot of our fellows.
It is a myth that the success of science in our time is mainly due to the huge amounts of money that have been spent on big machines. What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.
There will be well-testable theories, hardly testable theories, and non-testable theories. Those which are non-testable are of no interest to empirical scientists. They may be described as metaphysical.