...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.

The new frontiers to be conquered are mainly in the convolutions of the cortex.

The new frontiers to be conquered are mainly in the convolutions of the cortex.

The burning of an author's books, imprisonment for opinion's sake, has always been the tribute that an ignorant age pays read more

The burning of an author's books, imprisonment for opinion's sake, has always been the tribute that an ignorant age pays to the genius of its time.

There is no reason why humanity cannot be served equally by weighty and trivial motives.

There is no reason why humanity cannot be served equally by weighty and trivial motives.

The highest stage in moral culture at which we can arrive is when we recognize that we ought to control read more

The highest stage in moral culture at which we can arrive is when we recognize that we ought to control our thoughts.

We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them.

We fear things in proportion to our ignorance of them.

There is a guilty conscience behind every brazen word and act and behind every manifestation of self-righteousness.

There is a guilty conscience behind every brazen word and act and behind every manifestation of self-righteousness.

Give light, and the darkness will disappear of itself.

Give light, and the darkness will disappear of itself.

The most basic inherent constraint is that neither time nor wisdom are free goods available in unlimited quantity. This means read more

The most basic inherent constraint is that neither time nor wisdom are free goods available in unlimited quantity. This means that in social processes, as in economic processes, it is not only impossible to attain perfection but irrational to seek perfection- or even to seek the "best possible" result in each separate instance.