{"author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend","total_quotes":12,"quotes":[{"text":"All religions are good 'in principle' - but unfortunately this abstract Good has only rarely prevented their practitioners from behaving like bastards.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["abstraction","goodness","religion"],"id":60476,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"Without a constant misuse of language there cannot be any discovery, any progress.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["language","progress","science"],"id":101663,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"The objection that science is self-correcting and thus needs no outside interference overlooks, first, that every enterprise is self-correcting (look at what happened to the Catholic Church after Vatican II) and, secondly, that in a democracy the self-correction of the whole which tries to achieve more humane ways of living overrules the self-correction of the parts which has a more narrow aim -- unless the parts are given temporary independence. Hence in a democracy local populations not only will, but also should, use the sciences in ways most suitable to them. The objection that citizens do not have the expertise to judge scientific matters overlooks that important problems often lie across the boundaries of various sciences so that scientists within these sciences don't have the needed expertise either. Moreover, doubtful cases always produce experts for the one side, experts for the other side, and experts in between. But the competence of the general public could be vastly improved by an education that exposes expert fallibility instead of acting as if it did not exist. (Chapter 19).","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["epistemology","philosophy-of-science","science"],"id":137679,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"Progress has always been achieved by probing well-entrenched and well-founded forms of life with unpopular and unfounded values. This is how man gradually freed himself from fear and from the tyranny of unexamined systems.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["culture","knowledge","philosophy","truth"],"id":159379,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"A scientist, an artist, a citizen is not like a child who needs papa methodology and mama rationality to give him security and direction; he can take care of himself, for he is the inventor not only of laws, theories, pictures, plays, forms of music, ways of dealing with his fellow man, institutions but also of entire world views, he is the inventor of entire forms of life.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["creativity","freedom","science"],"id":259626,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"Somewhere among the commotion I grew rather depressed. The depression stayed with me for over a year; it was like an animal, a well-defined, spatially localizable thing. I would wake up, open my eyes, listen-is it here or isn’t it? No sign of it. Perhaps it’s asleep. Perhaps it will leave me alone today. Carefully, very carefully, I get out of bed. All is quiet. I go to the kitchen, start breakfast. Not a sound. TV-Good Morning America, David what’s-his-name, a guy I can’t stand. I eat and watch the guests. Slowly the food fills my stomach and gives me strength. Now a quick excursion to the bathroom, and out for my morning walk-and here she is, my faithful depression: “Did you think you could leave without me?' I had often warned my students not to identify with their work. I told them, “if you want to achieve something, if you want to write a book, paint a picture, be sure that the center of your existence if somewhere else and that it’s solidly grounded; only then will you be able to keep your cool and laugh at the attacks that are bound to come.' I myself had followed this advice in the past, but now I was alone, sick with some unknown affliction; my private life was in a mess, and I was without a defense. I often wished I had never written that fucking book.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["depression","feyerabend","paul-feyerabend","paul-karl-feyerabend"],"id":302686,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"Science is essentially an anarchic enterprise: theoretical anarchism is more humanitarian and more likely to encourage progress than its law-and-order alternatives.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["epistemological-anarchism","inspirational","philosophy-of-science","science"],"id":325234,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"The only principle that does not inhibit progress is: anything goes.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["progress"],"id":327844,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"The best education consists in immunizing people against systematic attempts at education.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["education","learning"],"id":443141,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"},{"text":"The pygmies, for example, or the Mindoro of the Philippines, do not want equal rights – they just want to be left alone.","author":"Paul Karl Feyerabend","tags":["equal-rights","free-society","humanism"],"id":454572,"author_id":"Paul+Karl+Feyerabend"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":12,"pages":2,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}