#epistemology

They won't listen. Do you know why? Because they have certain fixed notions about the past. Any change would be blasphemy in their eyes, even if it were the truth. They don't want the truth; they want their traditions. ↗

— Isaac Asimov

#change

A prepared mind is always made up; it knows what it thinks and why it thinks that. When it's time to change, it just makes itself up a different way. A really made-up mind--made up properly, knowing what it knows and on what basis it knows it--is open. People close an undecided mind because they're trying to protect those sore uncertainties from getting bumped and scraped. ↗

— John Barnese

#open-minds #opinions #thought #change

The command of our language is crucial to focusing our thoughts and communicating them with precision to others. ↗

— Felix Alba-Juez

#philosophy #science #communication

I do not think there is a demonstrative proof (like Euclid) of Christianity, nor of the existence of matter, nor of the good will and honesty of my best and oldest friends. I think all three are (except perhaps the second) far more probable than the alternatives. The case for Christianity in general is well given by Chesterton…As to why God doesn't make it demonstratively clear; are we sure that He is even interested in the kind of Theism which would be a compelled logical assent to a conclusive argument? Are we interested in it in personal matters? I demand from my friend trust in my good faith which is certain without demonstrative proof. It wouldn't be confidence at all if he waited for rigorous proof. Hang it all, the very fairy-tales embody the truth. Othello believed in Desdemona's innocence when it was proved: but that was too late. Lear believed in Cordelia's love when it was proved: but that was too late. 'His praise is lost who stays till all commend.' The magnanimity, the generosity which will trust on a reasonable probability, is required of us. But supposing one believed and was wrong after all? Why, then you would have paid the universe a compliment it doesn't deserve. Your error would even so be more interesting and important than the reality. And yet how could that be? How could an idiotic universe have produced creatures whose mere dreams are so much stronger, better, subtler than itself? ↗

— C.S. Lewis

#christianity #epistemology #god #proof #trust

Foreknowledge cannot be gotten from ghosts and spirits, cannot be had by analogy, cannot be found out by calculation. It must be obtained from people, people who know the conditions of the enemy. ↗

— Sun Tzu

#empiricism #epistemology #military-philosophy #philosophy #war

Without causality in the world, there is no point in educating people, or making any moral or political appeal. ↗

— Felix Alba-Juez

#philosophy #science #education

Is numerical equality (forced by the use of specific physical units) the same as conceptual equality? Of course NOT! ↗

— Felix Alba-Juez

#philosophy #physics #relativity #science #equality

Where both reason and experience fall short, there occurs a vacuum that can be filled by faith. ↗

— Jostein Gaarder

#experience

Postulates are based on assumption and adhered to by faith. Nothing in the Universe can shake them. ↗

— Isaac Asimov

#faith

They don't have intelligence. They have what I call 'thintelligence.' They see the immediate situation. They think narrowly and they call it 'being focused.' They don't see the surround. They don't see the consequences. ↗

— Michael Crichton

#intelligence