Philosophy Quotes

“When I say that consciousness is an illusion I do not mean that consciousness does not exist. I mean that consciousness is not what it appears to be. If it seems to be a continuous stream of rich and detailed experiences, happening one after the other to a conscious person, this is the illusion.”
― Susan Blackmore

“The best reaction to a paradox is to invent a genuinely new and deep idea.”
― Ian Hacking, An Introduction to Probability and Inductive Logic

“When Coleridge tried to define beauty, he returned always to one deep thought; beauty, he said, is unity in variety! Science is nothing else than the search to discover unity in the wild variety of nature,—or, more exactly, in the variety of our experience. Poetry, painting, the arts are the same search, in Coleridge’s phrase, for unity in variety.”
― Bronowski

“If disaster, so be it, they said to themselves. There was nothing to be done except what could be done. The rest -- like the salt water around them, which swallowed the snow without effort, remaining what it was implacably -- was out of their hands, beyond.”
― David Guterson, Snow Falling on Cedars

“To establish that a rule is likely to be true, one must try to prove it false.”
― Stuart Sutherland, Irrationality

“It is evident as a matter of logic that, since they (world religions) disagree, not more than one of them can be true.”
― Betrand Russell

“An ordinary mirror is silvered at the back but the window of the night train has darkness behind the glass. My face and the faces of other travellers were now mirrored on this darkness in a succession of stillnesses. Consider this, said the darkness: any motion at any speed is a succession of stillnesses; any section through an action will show just such a plane of stillness as this dark window in which your seeking face is mirrored. And in each plane of stillness is the moment of clarity that makes you responsible for what you do.”
― Russell Hoban, The Medusa Frequency

“A farm regulated to production of raw commodities is not a farm at all. It is a temporary blip until the land is used up, the water polluted, the neighbors nauseated, and the air unbreathable. The farmhouse, the concrete, the machinery, and outbuildings become relics of a bygone vibrancy when another family farm moves to the city financial centers for relief.”
― Joel Salatin, Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal: War Stories from the Local Food Front

“When I was a boy, I would read those postcards and know exactly why my father was doing what he was doing: he was taking a stab at greatness, that is, if greatness is simply another word for doing something different from what you were already doing--or maybe greatness is the thing we want to have so that other people will want to have us, or maybe greatness is merely the grail for our unhappy, striving selves, the thing we think we need but don't and can't get anyway.”
― Brock Clarke, An Arsonist's Guide to Writers' Homes in New England

“There is only one religion - it is a way a man dies.”
― James Runcie, The Colour of Heaven

“Le spectacle est le mauvais rêve de la société moderne enchaînée, qui n'exprime finalement que son désir de dormir. Le spectacle est le gardien de ce sommeil.”
― Guy Debord

“Kein Philosoph würde ein dickes Buch schreiben, wenn er im Vornherein wüsste, auf welche Weise er später zitiert werden wird.”
― Juli Zeh, Spieltrieb

“Der Pragmatismus ersetzt uns alles, was früher die großen Ideen, die Ideologien und Religionen, der Glaube an Friede, Menschenrechte und Demokratie zu bieten hatten. Der Pragmatismus hält uns davon ab, zu Verbrechern zu werden, oder er macht uns zu solchen, wenn es nötig ist. Er legitimiert das Bestehen von Rechtssystem, Familie und Arbeit, er lässt uns nett sein und empfiehlt, sich ein angenehmes Äußeres zu erwerben. Nachdem wir uns aller Zwänge nach und nach erledigt haben, sorgt ein einziger Betreuer für uns: Pragmatismus.”
― Juli Zeh, Spieltrieb

“Das Spiel ist der Inbegriff demokratischer Lebensart. Es ist die letzt uns verbliebene Seinsform. Der Spieltrieb ersetzt die Religiosität, beherrscht die Börse, die Politik, die Gerichtssäle, die Pressewelt, und er ist es, der uns seit Gottes Tod mental am Leben hält.”
― Juli Zeh, Spieltrieb

“Certainty a strange Ferris wheel of a statement!”
― John Allen Paulos

“Une philosophie doit etre portative.”
― Paul Valéry, Cahiers/Notebooks 1

“In the most general terms, the Enlightenment goes back to Plato's belief that truth and beauty and goodness are connected; that truth and beauty, disseminated widely, will sooner or later lead to goodness. (While we're making at effort at truth and goodness, beauty reminds us what we're hold out for.)”
― Susan Neiman, Moral Clarity: A Guide for Grown-up Idealists

“What about you, Snipes?" Dunbar asked. "You think there to be mountain lions up here or is it just folks' imaginings?"

Snipes pondered the question a few moments before speaking.

They's many a man of science would claim there aint because you got no irredeemable evidence like panther scat or fur or tooth or tail. In other words, some part of the animal in questions. Or better yet having the actual critter itself, the whole think kit and caboodle head to tail, which all your men of science argue is the best proof of all a thing exists, whether it be a panther, or a bird, or even a dinosaur. "

To put it another way, if you was to stub your toe and tell the man of science what happened he'd not believe a word of it less he could see how it'd stoved up or was bleeding. But your philosophers and theologians and such say there’s things in the world that’s every bit as real even though you can’t see them.”

Like what?” Dunbar asked.

Well,” Snipes said. “They’s love, that’s one. And courage. You can’t see neither of them, but they’re real. And air, of course. That’s one of your most important examples. You wouldn’t be alive a minute if there wasn’t air, but nobody’s ever seen a single speck of it.”

…“All I’m saying is there is a lot more to this old world than meets the eye.”

…“And darkness. You can’t see it no more than you can see air, but when its all around you sure enough know it.” (Serena, 65-66)”
― Ron Rash

“It ain't no broken.”
― Scott Taylor

“For Christians... an unreflective faith is not possible if we take seriously the injunction to love God with the mind as well as the heart and soul.”
― Delwin Brown, What Does a Progressive Christian Believe?: A Guide for the Searching, the Open, and the Curious

“Rousseau identified reason as the disease for which it pretended to be the cure.”
― Robert Zaretsky

“Il est le soleil qui ne se couche jamais sur l'empire de la passivité moderne. Il recouvre toute la surface du monde et baigne indéfiniment dans sa propre gloire.”
― Guy Debord

“I am philosophical Christ; crucified on the cross of ignorance for the sake of
divine vanity.”
― Kedar Joshi

“You’re still a little shy, I see, the wizard noted. I think if you ignore evil, my friend, it tends to grow stronger. (Quinhelm, the wizard - from BRIGGEN)”
― Ann B. Keller

“Dont tout «avoir» effectif doit tirer son prestige immédiat et sa fonction dernière.”
― Guy Debord

“Il est ce qui échappe à l'activité des hommes, à la reconsidération et à la correction de leur œuvre.”
― Guy Debord

“Don't give room to oppression.
Life is meant to be simple.
Experience it to the best of your ability.”
― Zinny Ekechukwu

“To love is to be loved and to hate is to be hated.”
― Zinny Ekechukwu

“The tragedy—and maybe the humor—of modern life is that we’re all desperate for something real, something raw, something unscripted. But we’re too busy playing our parts to break character.”
― Jay Sreekumar

“Hate is just another word for love.”
― Ana Huang - Twisted Love