Philosopher Quotes - Page 28

• The traditional disputes of philosophers are, for the most part, as unwarranted as they are unfruitful. The surest way to end them is to establish beyond question what should be the purpose and method of a philosophical enquiry. And this is by no means so difficult a task as the history of philosophy would lead one to suppose. For if there are any questions which science leaves it to philosophy to answer, a straightforward process of elimination must lead to their discovery.

  A.J. Ayer

  Truth, Philosophy, Philosophical

  "Language, Truth, and Logic" by A.J. Ayer, (Ch. 1), 1936.

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• On foundations we believe in the reality of mathematics, but of course, when philosophers attack us with their paradoxes, we rush to hide behind formalism and say 'mathematics is just a combination of meaningless symbols,'... Finally we are left in peace to go back to our mathematics and do it as we have always done, with the feeling each mathematician has that he is working with something real. The sensation is probably an illusion, but it is very convenient.

  Jean Dieudonne

  Real, Believe, Feelings

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• The traditional disputes of philosophers are, for the most part, as unwarranted as they are unfruitful.

  A.J. Ayer

  Philosophical, Disputes, Traditional

  "Language, Truth, and Logic" by A.J. Ayer, (Ch. 1), 1936.

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• A heathen philosopher once asked a Christian, 'Where is God'? The Christian answered, 'Let me first ask you, Where is He not?'

  Aaron Arrowsmith

  Christian, Religion, Atheism

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• We are so far from knowing all the forces of nature and their various modes of action that it would be unworthy of the philosopher to deny phenomena simply because they are inexplicable at the present state of our knowledge. The more difficult it is to acknowledge their existence, the greater the care with which we must study these phenomena.

  Pierre-Simon Laplace

  Philosophical, Knowing, Would Be

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• I would welcome the passing of the idea of philosophy as defined by a method of conceptual analysis. But that is not the passing of philosophy, and it leaves the philosopher with the task of grasping natures or essences (among other things).

  Robert Adams

  Philosophy, Philosophical, Essence

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• The philosopher is like a man fasting in the midst of universal intoxication. He alone perceives the illusion of which all creatures are the willing playthings; he is less duped than his neighbor by his own nature. He judges more sanely, he sees things as they are. It is in this that his liberty consists - in the ability to see clearly and soberly, in the power of mental record.

  Henri Frederic Amiel

  Philosophy, Philosophical, Men

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• Real philosophy seeks rather to solve than to deny.

  Edward Bulwer-Lytton, 1st Baron Lytton

  Philosophy, Real, Philosophical

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• Tell me what gives a man or woman their greatest pleasure and I'll tell you their philosophy of life.

  Dale Carnegie

  Philosophy, Philosophical, Men

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• You ask a philosopher a question and after he or she has talked for a bit, you don't understand your question any more.

  Philippa Foot

  Philosophical, Bits, Asks

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• One can defend common sense against the attacks of philosophers only by solving their puzzles, i.e., by curing them of the temptation to attack common sense.

  Ludwig Wittgenstein

  Philosophical, Common Sense, Temptation

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• Some philosophers are drawn to the subject [of philosophy] via their interest in the nature and structure of the world external to us. Others are drawn to it by an interest in the capacities that make humans distinctive in the world. I am a philosopher of the latter sort. My work thus far has been clustered around the nexus of knowledge, communication, and human action.

  Jason Stanley

  Philosophy, Communication, Philosophical

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• Now I do not myself share that superstitious reverence for the beliefs of common sense which many contemporary philosophers profess. But I think that we must start from them, and that we ought to depart from them only when we find good reason to do so.

  C. D. Broad

  Philosophical, Thinking, Common Sense

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• Jesus, as a philosopher is wonderful. There's no greater role model, in my view, than Jesus Christ. It's just a shame that most of the people who follow him and call themselves Christians act nothing like him.

  Bill Maher

  Christian, Jesus, Views

  "Did CBS Censor Bill Maher?". "The O'Reilly Factor" with Bill O'Reilly, www.foxnews.com. September 26, 2006.

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• Aristotle, in spite of his reputation, is full of absurdities. He says that children should be conceived in the Winter, when the wind is in the North, and that if people marry too young the children will be female. He tells us that the blood of females is blacker than that of males; that the pig is the only animal liable to measles; that an elephant suffering from insomnia should have its shoulders rubbed with salt, olive-oil, and warm water; that women have fewer teeth than men, and so on. Nevertheless, he is considered by the great majority of philosophers a paragon of wisdom.

  Bertrand Russell

  Wisdom, Children, Winter

  Bertrand Russell (1943). “An Outline of Intellectual Rubbish: A Hilarious Catalogue of Organized and Individual Stupidity”

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• To me, a philosopher who says that the distinction between human and nonhuman depends on whether you have a white or a black skin, and a philosopher who says that the distinction between human and nonhuman depends on whether or not you know the difference between a subject and a predicate, are more alike than they are unlike.

  J. M. Coetzee

  Animal, White, Differences

  J M Coetzee (2015). “Elizabeth Costello”, p.111, Random House

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• The adoption of the required attitude of mind towards ideas that seem to emerge "of their own free will" and the abandonment of the critical function that is normally in operation against them seem to be hard of achievement for some people. The "involuntary thoughts" are liable to release a most violent resistance, which seeks to prevent their emergence. If we may trust that great poet and philosopher Friedrich Schiller, however, poetic creation must demand an exactly similar attitude.

  Sigmund Freud

  Attitude, Ideas, People

  Sigmund Freud, Angela Richards (1953). “The Standard Edition of the Complete Psychological Works of Sigmund Freud”

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• Englishmen are babes in philosophy and so prefer faction-fighting to the labour of its unfamiliar thought.

  William Butler Yeats

  Philosophy, Fighting, Babe

  "The Letters of W.B. Yeats".

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• No matter what the cause, even though it be to conquer with tanks and planes and modern artillery some defenseless black population, there will be no lack of poets and preachers and essayists and philosophers to invent the necessary reasons and gild the infamy with righteousness. To this righteousness there is, of course, never an adequate reply. Thus a war to end poverty becomes an unanswerable enterprise. For who can decently be for poverty? To even debate whether the war will end poverty becomes an exhibition of ugly pragmatism and the sign of an ignoble mind.

  John T. Flynn

  War, Black, Mind

  John Thomas Flynn (1944). “As We Go Marching”, p.122, Ludwig von Mises Institute

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• I think you must remember that a writer is a simple-minded person to begin with and go on that basis. He's not a great mind, he's not a great thinker, he's not a great philosopher, he's a story-teller.

  Erskine Caldwell

  Writing, Thinking, Simple

  Erskine Caldwell (1988). “Conversations with Erskine Caldwell”, p.51, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• Poor Capablanca! Thou wert a brilliant technician, but no philosopher. Thou wert not capable of believing that in chess, another style could be victorious than the absolutely correct one.

  Max Euwe

  Believe, Style, Chess

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• The true wisdom of the philosopher ought to insist in enjoying everything. Yet we apply ourselves to dissecting and destroying everything that is good in itself, that has virtue, albeit the virtue there is in mere illusions. Nature gives us this life like a toy to a weak child. We want to see how it all works; we break everything. There remains in our hands, and before our eyes, stupid and opened too late, the sterile wreckage, fragments that will not again make a whole. The good is so simple.

  Eugene Delacroix

  Nature, Children, Stupid

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• I have held and hold souls to be immortal.... Speaking as a Catholic, they do not pass from body to body, but go to paradise, purgatory or hell. But I have reasoned deeply, and, speaking as a philosopher, since the soul is not found without body and yet is not body, it may be in one body or in another, and pass from body to body.

  Giordano Bruno

  Soul, Catholic, Body

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• It is a logical absurdity to equate democracy with freedom in the way that mainstream political philosophers and commentators typically do. A system where individuals and minorities are at the mercy of unconstrained majorities hardly constitutes freedom in any meaningful sense.

  Keith Preston

  Meaningful, Political, Democracy

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• Since the time of the ancient Greeks a democracy has depended on its philosophers and creative artists. It can only flourish by continuous probing, prodding, and questioning of the social conditions under which man exists and tries to better himself. One of the first moves of a dictatorship is to stifle the artists and thinkers who have the ability to stir up dissent from any prescribed dogma which might enslave them. Because the artist can arouse the curiosity and conscience of his community, he becomes a threat to those who have taken power.

  Uta Hagen

  Women, Moving, Taken

  Uta Hagen (1991). “Challenge For The Actor”, p.3, Simon and Schuster

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