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What really makes science grow is new ideas, including false ideas.

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
Including
Grow
Grows
Science
Makes
Ideas
Really
False

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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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Simple statements are to be prized more highly than less simple ones because they tell us more because their empirical content is greater and because they are better testable.
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We do not know. We can only guess.
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Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to falsify it, or to refute it.
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I remained a socialist for several years, even after my rejection of Marxism and if there could be such a thing as socialism combined with individual liberty, I would be a socialist still. For nothing could be better than living a modest, simple, and free life in an egalitarian society.
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We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.
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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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A theory that explains everything, explains nothing
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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.
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[To] interpret Parmenides as a Kant before Kant ... this is exactly what we must do.
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Better our hypotheses die for our errors than ourselves.
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A theory is just a mathematical model to describe the observations.
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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.
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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
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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 some of these theories are so bold that they can clash with reality: they are the testable theories of science. And when they clash, then we know that there is a reality something that can inform us that our ideas are mistaken.
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I may be wrong and you may be right, and by an effort, we may get nearer to the truth
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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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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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