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One can discern a few very general myths that facilitate the birth of further myths: that everything is possible that whatever we have failed to explain in normal and earthly terms must have paranormal or supernatural explanations and that science, being rational, cannot explain the irrational, such as taste and love.

Mario Bunge

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Mario Bunge
Age: 100 †
Born: 1919
Born: September 21
Died: 2020
Died: February 25
Essayist
Geneticist
Philosopher
Physicist
Sociologist
University Teacher
Writer
Mario Augusto Bunge
Explanations
Term
Explain
Myths
Whatever
Rational
Supernatural
Science
Terms
Cannot
General
Earthly
Everything
Birth
Irrational
Paranormal
Must
Taste
Failed
Discern
Love
Normal
Explanation
Facilitate
Possible
Myth

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All the electronic devices are weakening the social bonds. Sociologists and psychologists should study this serious threat instead of repeating that communication is the cement of society.
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The motto of science is not just Pauca but rather Plurima ex paucissimis - the most out of the least.
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The fact is that all the important political philosophers and scientists from the great Aristotle on, with the exception of those of the French Enlightenment and Mill, have sided with the powers that be.
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In the scientific community you find competent teachers and original researchers, just as in the musical community you find many good performers but very few good composers.
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All genuine philosophy transcends national boundaries. Patriotic philosophies are just nationalist ideologies.
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I pity the babies whose mothers are busy texting trivialities instead of playing with their children I pity the children who are tethered to their cell phones instead of playing ball I pity the adolescents who are wasting their best years holding one of those artefacts instead of the hand of another young person.
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To me, work is not a burden but my main hobby. This is why I always take work with me when I go on holidays. Moreover, that's when new projects occur to me: while contemplating beautiful landscapes or seascapes.
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There is a continuum between science and philosophy. As Fichte said (but did not practice), philosophy should be the science of sciences.
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In any event, I don't believe in instant philosophy, because interesting problems take a long time to understand and work out. Just think of the problems of truth and justice.
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From a historical viewpoint, religion is just a kind of superstition, and from a political viewpoint it is a tool of social control.
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All philosophers can do is to abstain from helping the aggressors and to enjoin social scientists to tell the truth instead of joining the choir of liars and hypocrites.
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Philosophy can help laymen spot and reject the numerous pseudoscientific beliefs that survive in the media, such as the fantasies of psychoanalysts, evolutionary psychologists, and economic equilibrium theorists.
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Of course you cannot free yourself from the laws of nature but the laws of nervous systems are not the same as the physical laws.
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Under theocracies and other authoritarian regimes, the rulers are the moral authorities. Under genuine democracy some basic values are entrenched in the legal system, which is expected to be under democratic vigilance, and others are left to the person or the group, which ideally debate moral problems in a rational, free and cooperative manner.
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I believe that modern science supports free will, in showing that the brain can act spontaneously, not only in response to external stimuli.
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Even philosophies who have denounced pseudosciences like psychoanalysis, have condoned pseudoscientific economic theories like neoclassical microeconomics. It is far safer and easier to criticize Freud and Jung than to criticize Milton Friedman and Friedrich Hayek, because the latter are backed by political movements whereas the former are not.
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Most contemporary philosophers are conservative and eager to keep their jobs.
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Communication accompanies social transactions and can instruct or stultify, mobilize or intimidate, but it is no substitute for production, collaboration and fight.
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Whereas science elicits changes in order to know, technology knows in order to elicit changes.
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Science is morally neutral, but social science shows us that some moral codes are better than others.
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