Quote

Historically speaking all - or very nearly all - scientific theories originate from myths.

Karl Popper

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

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
Theories
Nearly
Myth
Scientific
Speaking
Theory
Originate
Historically
Myths

More quotes by Karl Popper

Image
The old scientific ideal of episteme - of absolutely certain, demonstrable knowledge - has proved to be an idol. The demand for scientific objectivity makes it inevitable that every scientific statement must remain tentative for ever.
Karl Popper
Image
No particular theory may ever be regarded as absolutely certain.... No scientific theory is sacrosanct.
Karl Popper
Image
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.
Karl Popper
Image
Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. . . .
Karl Popper
Image
The best thing that can happen to a human being us to find a problem, to fall in love with that problem, and to live trying to solve that problem, unless another problem even more lovable appears.
Karl Popper
Image
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
Image
There is no pure, disinterested, theory-free observation.
Karl Popper
Image
We never know what we are talking about.
Karl Popper
Image
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
Image
We must plan for freedom, and not only for security, if for no other reason than only freedom can make security more secure.
Karl Popper
Image
Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, or to refute it.
Karl Popper
Image
Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
Karl Popper
Image
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
Image
Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell.
Karl Popper
Image
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.
Karl Popper
Image
We have the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should tolerate even them whenever we can do so without running a great risk but the risk may become so great that we cannot allow ourselves the luxury.
Karl Popper
Image
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
Image
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
Image
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
Image
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.
Karl Popper