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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.

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
Modern
Plato
Enemy
Defend
Political
Enemies
Banish
Even
Clearly
Elaborate
Make
Principle
Interpreting
Regard
Regards
Kill
Disturbed
Principles
Attempts

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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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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.
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My thesis is that what we call 'science' is differentiated from the older myths not by being something distinct from a myth, but by being accompanied by a second-order tradition-that of critically discussing the myth. ... In a certain sense, science is myth-making just as religion is.
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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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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.
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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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[The aim of science is] to explain what so far has taken to be an explicans, such as a law of nature. The task of empirical science constantly renews itself. We may go on forever, proceeding to explanations of a higher and higher universality.
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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 conspiracy theory of society... comes from abandoning god and then asking: Who is in his place
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We do not know. We can only guess.
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Better our hypotheses die for our errors than ourselves.
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[To] interpret Parmenides as a Kant before Kant ... this is exactly what we must do.
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Science may be described as the art of systematic over-simplification.
Karl Popper
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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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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.
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True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge, but the refusal to acquire it.
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Propose theories which can be criticized. Think about possible decisive falsifying experiments-crucial experiments. But do not give up your theories too easily-not, at any rate, before you have critically examined your criticism.
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We have become makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets.
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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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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