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The attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell.

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
Produce
Hell
Heaven
Earth
Make
Invariably
Produces
Attempt

More quotes by Karl Popper

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With regards to political enemies Plato had a kill-and-banish principle. ... In interpreting it , modern-day Platonists are clearly disturbed by it, even as they make elaborate attempts to defend Plato.
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I see now more clearly than ever before that even our greatest troubles spring from something that is [as] admirable and sound as it is dangerous – from our impatience to better the lot of our fellows.
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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 war of ideas is a Greek invention. It is one of the most important inventions ever made. Indeed, the possibility of fighting with with words and ideas instead of fighting with swords is the very basis of our civilization, and especially of all its legal and parliamentary institutions.
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The future is always present, as a promise, a lure and a temptation.
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Our knowledge can only be finite, while our ignorance must necessarily be infinite.
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It is wrong and dangerous to extol freedom by telling people that they will certainly be all right once they are free. The most we can say of democracy or freedom is that they give our personal abilities a little more influence on our well-being.
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In my view, aiming at simplicity and lucidity is a moral duty of all intellectuals: lack of clarity is a sin, and pretentiousness is a crime.
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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
Karl Popper
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We must plan for freedom, and not only for security, if for no other reason than only freedom can make security more secure.
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The conspiracy theory of society... comes from abandoning god and then asking: Who is in his place
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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
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To give a causal explanation of an event means to deduce a statement which describes it, using as premises of the deduction one or more universal laws, together with certain singular statements, the initial conditions ... We have thus two different kinds of statement, both of which are necessary ingredients of a complete causal explanation.
Karl Popper
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It is not intuitive ease I am after, but rather a point of view which is sufficiently definite to clear up some difficulties, and to be criticized in rational terms. (Bohr's complementarity cannot be so criticized, I fear it can only be accepted or denounced - perhaps as being ad hoc, or as being irrational, or as being hopelessly vague.)
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.
Karl Popper
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It is not his possession of knowledge, of irrefutable truth, that makes the man of science, but his persistent and recklessly critical quest for truth.
Karl Popper
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There is no pure, disinterested, theory-free observation.
Karl Popper
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We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
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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.
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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