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The survival value of intelligence is that it allows us to extinct a bad idea, before the idea extincts us.

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
Idea
Ideas
Extinct
Allows
Survival
Intelligence
Value
Values

More quotes by Karl Popper

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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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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.
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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.
Karl Popper
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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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What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.
Karl Popper
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no matter how many instances of white swans we may have observed, this does not justify the conclusion that all swans are white.
Karl Popper
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There is no history, only histories.
Karl Popper
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It is a myth that the success of science in our time is mainly due to the huge amounts of money that have been spent on big machines. What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.
Karl Popper
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A theory that explains everything, explains nothing
Karl Popper
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A theory is just a mathematical model to describe the observations.
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 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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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
Karl Popper
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The attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell.
Karl Popper
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There is no pure, disinterested, theory-free observation.
Karl Popper
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Science may be described as the art of systematic over-simplification.
Karl Popper
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We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
Karl Popper
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Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. . . .
Karl Popper
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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 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