Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
All life is problem solving
We do not know. We can only guess.
There is no history, only histories.
We never know what we are talking about.
A theory that explains everything, explains nothing
All things living are in search of a better world .
Better our hypotheses die for our errors than ourselves.
There is no pure, disinterested, theory-free observation.
Every solution of a problem raises new unsolved problems.
The growth of knowledge depends entirely upon disagreement.
The attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell.
Definitions.... are never really needed, and rarely of any use
Science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths.
Good tests kill flawed theories; we remain alive to guess again.
What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.
All we can do is search for the falsity content in our best theory.
A theory is just a mathematical model to describe the observations.
The future is always present, as a promise, a lure and a temptation.
Science may be described as the art of systematic over-simplification.
Every discovery contains an irrational element or a creative intuition.
It must be possible for an empirical system to be refuted by experience.
It can't happen here is always wrong: a dictatorship can happen anywhere.
It is impossible to speak in such a way that you cannot be misunderstood.
Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.
Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, or to refute it.
We have become makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets.
True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.
[To] interpret Parmenides as a Kant before Kant ... this is exactly what we must do.
Plato felt that a complete reconstruction of society's political program was needed.
I may be wrong and you may be right, and by an effort, we may get nearer to the truth
If you can't say it simply and clearly, keep quiet, and keep working on it till you can.
Historically speaking all - or very nearly all - scientific theories originate from myths.
Contrary to the outstanding work of art, outstanding theory is susceptible to improvements.
The only way to test a hypothesis is to look for all the information that disagrees with it.
We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
Our aim must be to make our successive mistakes as quickly as possible. To speed up evolution.
If we wish our civilization to survive we must break with the habit of deference to great men.
It is part of my thesis that all our knowledge grows only through the correcting of our mistakes.
The conspiracy theory of society... comes from abandoning god and then asking: "Who is in his place"
You cannot have a rational discussion with a man who prefers shooting you to being convinced by you.
Genuine philosophical problems are always rooted outside philosophy and they die if these roots decay.
We hate the very idea that our own ideas may be mistaken, so we cling dogmatically to our conjectures.
While differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal.
No particular theory may ever be regarded as absolutely certain.... No scientific theory is sacrosanct.
No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude.
. . . it seems to me certain that more people are killed out of righteous stupidity than out of wickedness.
The survival value of intelligence is that it allows us to extinct a bad idea, before the idea extincts us.
Criticism of my alleged views was widespread and highly successful. I have yet to meet a criticism of my views.
Science is perhaps the only human activity in which errors are systematically criticized and, in time, corrected.