To stand on one leg and prove God’s existence is a very different thing from going on one’s knees and thanking Him.
—Søren Kierkegaard
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Category Archives: Philosophy
Quote of the Day
You will certainly not doubt the necessity of studying astronomy and physics, if you are desirous of comprehending the relation between the world and Providence as it is in reality, and not according to imagination.
—Maimonides
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I would trade all of my technology for an afternoon with Socrates.
—Steve Jobs
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We consider it a good principle to explain the phenomena by the simplest hypothesis possible.
—Ptolemy
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Deus, dona hominibus videre in parvo communes notitias rerum parvarum atque magnarum. God, grant us men to see in a small thing principles which are common things both small and great.
—Augustine of Hippo
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Douter de tout ou tout croire, ce sont deux solutions également commodes, qui l’une et l’autre nous dispensent de réfléchir. To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.
—Henri Poincaré
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Our freedom to doubt was born out of a struggle against authority in the early days of science. It was a very deep and strong struggle: permit us to question—to doubt—to not be sure. I think that it is important that we do not forget this struggle and thus perhaps lose what we have gained.
—Richard Feynman
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veritas norma sui et falsi est Truth is a standard both of itself and of falsity.
—Baruch Spinoza
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Logic is the most useful tool of all the arts. Without it no science can be fully known.
—William of Ockham
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We are all ready to be savage in some cause. The difference between a good man and a bad one is the choice of the cause.
—William James
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A new scientific truth does not generally triumph by persuading its opponents and getting them to admit their errors, but rather by its opponents gradually dying out and giving way to a new generation that is raised on it.
—Max Planck
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I mean by intellectual integrity the habit of deciding vexed questions in accordance with the evidence, or of leaving them undecided where the evidence is inconclusive.
—Bertrand Russell
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I do not know what meaning classical studies could have for our time if they were not untimely—that is to say, acting counter to our time and thereby acting on our time and, let us hope, for the benefit of a time to come.
—Friedrich Nietzsche
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Ethical man accords his profession to his beliefs, instead of according his beliefs to his profession.
—Nassim Nicholas Taleb
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The greatest deception men suffer is from their own opinions.
—Leonardo da Vinci
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Logic and truth are two very different things, but they often look the same to the mind that’s performing the logic.
—Theodore Sturgeon
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The tragedy of modern man is not that he knows less and less about the meaning of his own life, but that it bothers him less and less.
—Václav Havel
You Keep Using That Word
Marie Solis has a post over at Jezebel (H/T, Memeornadum) titled Republicans Are Trying To Make Abortions Dangerous. Her article decries Gov. Kristi Noem’s executive order restricting prescribing and delivery of abortion pills. Here are a couple of quotes from the post.
As a result, Noem has banned one of the safest, easiest forms of abortion.
Studies have shown that mifepristone and misoprostol are overwhelmingly safe and effective, even when administered outside of a traditional clinic setting.
Safe? One or more (twins) of the people “treated” with these pills winds up dead as a result. Of course, what Ms. Solis and other pro-abortion folks want “safe” to mean is not causing harm to a woman whose pregnancy is being terminated (“pregnancy is being terminated” being a euphemism for “baby is being killed”). This sort of thinking requires viewing children in utero as parasites rather than human beings. But such children are human beings, innocent and deserving of protection.
Safe—I do not think it means what she think it means.
Quote of the Day
For a truth, once established by proof, does neither gain force nor certainty by the consent of all scholars, nor lose by the general dissent.
—Maimonides
Quote of the Day
Douter de tout ou tout croire, ce sont deux solutions également commodes, qui l’une et l’autre nous dispensent de réfléchir. To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.
—Henri Poincare
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Is it not better to be in ignorance than to believe falsely?
—Robert Heinlein
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Considerate la vostra semenza:
fatti non foste a viver come bruti,
ma per seguir virtute e canoscenza.
Consider your origin;
you were not born to live like brutes,
but to follow virtue and knowledge.
—Dante Alighieri
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Ahh. You seek meaning. Then listen to the music, not the song.
—Kosh
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If the meanings of true and false were switched, this sentence wouldn’t be false.
—Douglas Hofstadter
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We are all ready to be savage in some cause. The difference between a good man and a bad one is the choice of the cause.
—William James