Science does not give us absolute and final certainty. It only gives us assurance within the limits of our mental read more

Science does not give us absolute and final certainty. It only gives us assurance within the limits of our mental abilities and the prevailing state of scientific thought.

Thinking to get at once all the gold the Goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to read more

Thinking to get at once all the gold the Goose could give, he killed it and opened it only to find,- nothing.

Only the individual who has come to terms with his self can have a dispassionate attitude toward the world.

Only the individual who has come to terms with his self can have a dispassionate attitude toward the world.

You've got to watch your mind all the time or you'll awaken and find a strange picture on your press.

You've got to watch your mind all the time or you'll awaken and find a strange picture on your press.

The ruthlessness born of self-seeking is ineffectual compared with the ruthlessness sustained by dedication to a holy cause. "God wishes," read more

The ruthlessness born of self-seeking is ineffectual compared with the ruthlessness sustained by dedication to a holy cause. "God wishes," said Calvin, "that one should put aside all humanity when it is a question of striving for His glory.".

The first step in freeing yourself from social restrictions is the realization that there is no such thing as a read more

The first step in freeing yourself from social restrictions is the realization that there is no such thing as a "safe" code of conduct - one that would earn everyone's approval. Your actions can always be condemned by someone - for being too bold or too apathetic, for being too conformist or too nonconformist, for being too liberal or too conservative. So it's necessary to decide whose approval is important to you.

The more adaptability exists for a given kind of decision, the less risky it is to make plans for the read more

The more adaptability exists for a given kind of decision, the less risky it is to make plans for the future, and therefore the more likely it is that more people will make more plans in such areas.

...the conviction persists - though history has shown it to be a hallucination - that all the questions that the read more

...the conviction persists - though history has shown it to be a hallucination - that all the questions that the human mind has asked are questions that can be answered in terms of the alternatives that the questions themselves present. But in fact intellectual progress usually occurs through sheer abandonment of questions together with both of the alternatives they assume - an abandonment that results from their decreasing vitality and change of urgent interest. We do not solve them: we get over them. Old questions are solved by disappearing, evaporating, while new questions corresponding to the changed attitude of endeavor and preference take their place.

Compared with the totality of knowledge which is continually utilized in the evolution of a dynamic civilization, the difference between read more

Compared with the totality of knowledge which is continually utilized in the evolution of a dynamic civilization, the difference between the knowledge that the wisest and that which the most ignorant individual can deliberately employ is comparatively insignificant.