Life Quote by Karl R. Popper

“It is not the consciousness of man that determines his existence—rather, it is his social existence that determines his consciousness.” quote by Karl R. Popper — Download Open image

““It is not the consciousness of man that determines his existence—rather, it is his social existence that determines his consciousness.””

Karl R. Popper

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Life Philosophy of Mind

More by Karl R. Popper

“Most of us, it seems, have a strong inclination to accept the peculiarities of our social environment as if they were ‘natural’.”

Karl R. Popper

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“The empirical basis of objective science has thus nothing ‘absolute’ about it.4 Science does not rest upon solid bedrock. The bold structure of its theories rises, as it were, above a swamp. It is like a building erected on piles. The piles are driven down from above into the swamp, but not down to any natural or ‘given’ base; and…

Karl R. Popper

“Should you ever intend to dull the wits of a young man and to incapacitate his brains for any kind of thought whatever, then you cannot do better than give him Hegel to read. For these monstrous accumulations of words that annul and contradict one another drive the mind into tormenting itself with vain attempts to think anything whatever in…

Karl R. Popper

“Historically, all ethics undoubtedly begin with religion; but I do not now deal with historical questions. I do not ask who was the first lawgiver. I only maintain that it is we, and we alone, who are responsible for adopting or rejecting some suggested moral laws; it is we who must distinguish between the true prophets and the false prophets.…

Karl R. Popper

“Society and the individual are thus interdependent. The one owes its existence to the other. Society owes its existence to human nature, and especially…

Karl R. Popper

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“All political ideals, that of making the people happy is perhaps the most dangerous one. It leads invariably to the attempt to impose our scale of ‘higher’ values upon others, in order to make them realize what seems to us of greatest importance for their happiness; in order, as it were, to save their souls. It leads to Utopianism and…

Karl R. Popper

“There is only one further use of violence in political quarrels which I should consider justified. I mean the resistance, once democracy has been attained, to any attack (whether from within or without the state) against the democratic constitution and the use of democratic methods. Any such attack, especially if it comes from the government in power, or if it…

Karl R. Popper

“The fascist appeal to ‘human nature’ is to our passions, to our collectivist mystical needs, to ‘man the unknown’. Adopting Hegel’s words just quoted, this appeal may be called the cunning of the revolt against reason. But the height of this cunning is reached by Hegel in this boldest dialectical twist of his. While paying lip-service to rationalism, while talking…

Karl R. Popper

“Instead of the greatest happiness for the greatest number, one should demand, more modestly, the least amount of avoidable suffering for all; and further,…

Karl R. Popper

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“According to this conception, the ultimate causes of all social changes and political revolutions are not increasing insight into justice; they are to be sought not in the philosophy but in the economics of the epoch concerned. The growing realization that existing social institutions are irrational and unjust is only a symptom …’ It is the theory of which a…

Karl R. Popper

“(a) Nationalism, in the form of the historicist idea that the state is the incarnation of the Spirit (or now, of the Blood) of the state-creating nation (or race); one chosen nation (now, the chosen race) is destined for world domination. (b) The state as the natural enemy of all other states must assert its existence in war. (c) The…

Karl R. Popper

“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 kind intention of saving souls from the eternal fire of hell. Only if we give up our authoritarian attitude in the realm of opinion, only if we establish the attitude of give and take, of…

Karl R. Popper

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What sets worlds in motion is the interplay of differences, their attractions and repulsions. Life is plurality, death is uniformity. By suppressing differences and pecularities, by eliminating different civilizations and cultures, progress weakens life and favors death. The ideal of a single civilization for everyone, implicit in the cult of progress and technique, impoverishes and mutilates us. Every view of…

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