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It is part of my thesis that all our knowledge grows only through the correcting of our mistakes.

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
Truth
Part
Thesis
Correcting
Mistakes
Mistake
Grows
Knowledge

More quotes by Karl Popper

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Some scientists find, or so it seems, that they get their best ideas when smoking others by drinking coffee or whisky. Thus there is no reason why I should not admit that some may get their ideas by observing, or by repeating observations.
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A theory is just a mathematical model to describe the observations.
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A theory which is not refutable by any conceivable event is non-scientific. Irrefutability is not a virtue of a theory (as people often think) but a vice.
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We do not choose political freedom because it promises us this or that. We choose it because it makes possible the only dignified form of human coexistence, the only form in which we can be fully responsible for ourselves. Whether we realize its possibilities depends on all kinds of things — and above all on ourselves.
Karl Popper
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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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I have spoken to Einstein and he admitted to me that his theory was in fact no different from the one of Parmenides.
Karl Popper
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We know a great deal, but our ignorance is sobering and boundless. With each step forward, with each problem which we solve, we not only discover new and unsolved problems, but we also discover that where we believed that we were standing on firm and safe ground, all things are, in truth, insecure and in a state of flux.
Karl Popper
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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.
Karl Popper
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No book can ever be finished. While working on it we learn just enough to find it immature the moment we turn away from it
Karl Popper
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The use of violence is justified only under a tyranny which makes reforms without violence impossible, and should have only one aim, that is, to bring about a state of affairs which makes reforms without violence possible.
Karl Popper
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Good tests kill flawed theories we remain alive to guess again.
Karl Popper
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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.
Karl Popper
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What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.
Karl Popper
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While differing widely in the various little bits we know, in our infinite ignorance we are all equal.
Karl Popper
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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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Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.
Karl Popper
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The genuine rationalist does not think that he or anyone else is in possession of the truth nor does he think that mere criticism as such helps us achieve new ideas. But he does think that, in the sphere of ideas, only critical discussion can help us sort the wheat from the chaff.
Karl Popper
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There is no history, only histories.
Karl Popper
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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
Karl Popper
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The question is not how to get good people to rule THE QUESTION IS: HOW TO STOP THE POWERFUL from doing as much damage as they can to us.
Karl Popper