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Philosophy
see also Logic
- To ask the hard question is simple.1907–73 English poet: title of poem (1933)
- The Socratic manner is not a game at which two can play.1872–1956 English critic, essayist, and caricaturist: Zuleika Dobson (1911) ch. 15
- Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe upon instinct; but to find these reasons is no less an instinct.1846–1924 English philosopher: Appearance and Reality (1893) preface
- There is nothing so absurd but some philosopher has said it.(Marcus Tullius Cicero) 106–43 bc Roman orator and statesman: De Divinatione bk. 2, ch. 119
- I have tried too in my time to be a philosopher; but, I don't know how, cheerfulness was always breaking in.1711–91 English lawyer: James Boswell Life of Samuel Johnson (1791) 17 April 1778
- When philosophy paints its grey on grey, then has a shape of life grown old. By philosophy's grey on grey it cannot be rejuvenated but only understood. The owl of Minerva spreads its wings only with the falling of the dusk.1770–1831 German idealist philosopher: Philosophy of Right (1821, tr. T. M. Knox, 1952)
- I would trade all of my technology for an afternoon with Socrates.1955–2011 American computer executive: in Newsweek 22 October 2001
- The philosophers have only interpreted the world in various ways; the point is to change it.1818–83 German political philosopher: Theses on Feuerbach (written 1845, published 1888) no. 11
- No more things should be presumed to exist than are absolutely necessary.‘Occam's Razor’, an ancient philosophical principle often attributed to Occam but earlier in originc.1285–1349 English Franciscan friar and philosopher: not found in this form in his writings, although he frequently used similar expressions, e.g. ‘Plurality should not be assumed unnecessarily’; Quodlibeta (c.1324)
- Apart from the known and the unknown, what else is there?1930–2008 English dramatist: The Homecoming (1965) act 2, sc. 1
- The point of philosophy is to start with something so simple as not to seem worth stating, and to end with something so paradoxical that no one will believe it.1872–1970 British philosopher and mathematician: The Philosophy of Logical Atomism (1918)
- The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the cooperation or consent of his deliberate reason.1872–1970 British philosopher and mathematician: The Problems of Philosophy (1912) ch. 15
- The unexamined life is not worth living.469–399 bc Greek philosopher: Plato Apology 38a
- Superstition sets the whole world in flames; philosophy quenches them.1694–1778 French writer and philosopher: Dictionnaire philosophique (1764) ‘Superstition’
- The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.1861–1947 English philosopher and mathematician: Process and Reality (1929) pt. 2, ch. 1
- What is your aim in philosophy?—To show the fly the way out of the fly-bottle.1889–1951 Austrian-born philosopher: Philosophical Investigations (1953) pt. 1, sect. 309
- A philosopher who is not taking part in discussions is like a boxer who never goes into the ring. 1889–1951 Austrian-born philosopher: said in about 1930, M. O'C. Drury ‘Conversations with Wittgenstein’ in Rush Rhees (ed.) Ludwig Wittgenstein: Personal Recollections (1981)
