« All All Quotes · Karl Popper's Page
All Quotes by Karl Popper
- The history of science, like the history of all human ideas, is a history of irresponsible dreams, of obstinacy, and of error. But science is…
- 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…
- We all remember how many religious wars were fought for a religion of love and gentleness; how many bodies were burned alive with the genuinely…
- It is often asserted that discussion is only possible between people who have a common language and accept common basic assumptions. I think that this…
- The war of ideas is a Greek invention. It is one of the most important inventions ever made. Indeed, the possibility of fighting with with…
- I don't know whether God exists or not. ... Some forms of atheism are arrogant and ignorant and should be rejected, but agnosticism—to admit that…
- The true Enlightenment thinker, the true rationalist, never wants to talk anyone into anything. No, he does not even want to convince; all the time…
- 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…
- The belief in a political Utopia is especially dangerous. This is possibly connected with the fact that the search for a better world, like the…
- The Conspiracy Theory of Society... [is] a typical result of the secularization of a religious superstition. The belief in the Homeric gods whose conspiracies explain…
- It is wrong and dangerous to extol freedom by telling people that they will certainly be all right once they are free. ... The most…
- Why do I think that we, the intellectuals, are able to help? Simply because we, the intellectuals, have done the most terrible harm for thousands…
- It is part of my thesis that all our knowledge grows only through the correcting of our mistakes.
- The history of science, like the history of all human ideas, is a history of irresponsible dreams, of obstinacy, and of error.
- 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…
- Philosophy is a necessary activity because we, all of us, take a great number of things for granted, and many of these assumptions are of…
- All life is problem solving
- We should realize that, if [Socrates] demanded that the wisest men should rule, he clearly stressed that he did not mean the learned men; in…
- 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…
- While differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal.
- We do not choose political freedom because it promises us this or that. We choose it because it makes possible the only dignified form of…
- There is no history of mankind, there is only an indefinite number of histories of all kinds of aspects of human life.
- All we can do is search for the falsity content in our best theory.
- Science is the century-old endeavour to bring together by means of systematic thought the perceptible phenomena of this world into as thorough-going an association as…
- The metaphysical doctrine of determinism simply asserts that all events in this world are fixed, or unalterable, or predetermined. It does not assert that they…
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- Total loyalty is possible only when fidelity is emptied of all concrete content, from which changes of mind might naturally arise. — Hannah Arendt
- No cause is left but the most ancient of all, the one, in fact, that from the beginning of our history has… — Hannah Arendt
- The ultimate end of human acts is eudaimonia, happiness in the sense of living well, which all men desire; all acts are… — Hannah Arendt
- The new always happens against the overwhelming odds of statistical laws and their probability, which for all practical, everyday purposes amounts to… — Hannah Arendt
- Where all are guilty, no one is; confessions of collective guilt are the best possible safeguard against the discovery of culprits, and… — Hannah Arendt
- We have almost succeeded in leveling all human activities to the common denominator of securing the necessities of life and providing for… — Hannah Arendt
- I keep my friends as misers do their treasure, because, of all the things granted us by wisdom, none is greater or… — Pietro Aretino
- We must all make peace so that we can all live in peace. — Jean-Bertrand Aristide
- The spirit of Ubuntu, that once led Haiti to emerge as the first independent black nation in 1804, helped Venezuela, Colombia and… — Jean-Bertrand Aristide
- As we all know, many people remain buried under tons of rubble and debris, waiting to be rescued. When we think of… — Jean-Bertrand Aristide
- Wise people, even though all laws were abolished, would still lead the same life. — Aristophanes
- A friend to all is a friend to none. — Aristotle