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Man, some modern philosophers tell us, is alienated from his world: he is a stranger and afraid in a world he never made. Perhaps he is yet so are animals, and even plants. They too were born, long ago, into a physico-chemical world, a world they never made.

Karl Popper

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Karl Popper
Age: 92 †
Born: 1902
Born: July 28
Died: 1994
Died: September 17
Philosopher
Philosopher Of Science
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
Vienna
Austria
Karl Raimund Popper Sir
Karl Raimund
Sir Popper
Sir Karl Raimund Popper
Men
Modern
Plants
World
Animal
Philosopher
Born
Stranger
Tell
Plant
Even
Animals
Alienated
Made
Birth
Chemical
Long
Afraid
Philosophers
Never
Perhaps
Chemicals

More quotes by Karl Popper

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The open society is one in which men have learned to be to some extent critical of taboos, and to base decisions on the authority of their own intelligence.
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Criticism of my alleged views was widespread and highly successful. I have yet to meet a criticism of my views.
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The history of science is everywhere speculative. It is a marvelous hiatory. It makes you proud to be a human being.
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But it is certainly not possible to insist on one hand that the formalism is complete and to insist on the other hand that its application to 'the actual' actually demands a step which cannot be derived from it.
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Historically speaking all - or very nearly all - scientific theories originate from myths.
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Ignorance is not a simple lack of knowledge but an active aversion to knowledge, the refusal to know, issuing from cowardice, pride, or laziness of mind.
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We do not know. We can only guess.
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There is no pure, disinterested, theory-free observation.
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A theory that explains everything, explains nothing
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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
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Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, or to refute it.
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The game of science is, in principle, without end. He who decides one day that scientific statements do not call for any further test, and that they can be regarded as finally verified, retires from the game.
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Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. . . .
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The fundamental thing about human languages is that they can and should be used to describe something and this something is, somehow, the world. To be constantly and almost exclusively interested in the medium - in spectacle-cleaning - is a result of a philosophical mistake.
Karl Popper
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The more we learn about the world, and the deeper our learning, the more conscious, specific, and articulate will be our knowledge of what we do not know, our knowledge of our ignorance
Karl Popper
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I have insisted that we must be tolerant. But I also believe that this tolerance has its limits. We must not trust those anti-humanitarian religions which not only preach destruction but act accordingly. For if we tolerate them, then we become ourselves responsible for for their deeds.
Karl Popper
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Thus science must begin with myths, and with the criticism of myths neither with the collection of observations, nor with the invention of experiments, but with the critical discussion of myths, and of magical techniques and practices.
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The defence of democracy must consist in making anti-democratic experiences too costly for those who try them much more costly than a democratic compromise
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If you can't say it simply and clearly, keep quiet, and keep working on it till you can.
Karl Popper
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A system is empirical or scientific only if it is capable of being tested by experience. These considerations suggest that not the verifiability but the falsifiability of a system is to be taken as a criterion of demarcation... It must be possible for an empirical or scientific system to be refuted by experience.
Karl Popper