There is an almost universal tendency, perhaps an inborn tendency, to suspect the good faith of a man who holds opinions that differ from our own opinions. It obviously endangers the freedom and the objectivity of our discussion if we attack a person instead of attacking an opinion or, more precisely, a theory.

It is part of my thesis that all our knowledge grows only through the correcting of our mistakes.

The question is not how to get good people to rule; THE QUESTION IS: HOW TO STOP THE POWERFUL from doing as much damage as they can to us.

Plato felt that a complete reconstruction of society's political program was needed.

The history of science is everywhere speculative. It is a marvelous hiatory. It makes you proud to be a human being.

Science does not rest upon solid bedrock. The bold structure of its theories rises, as it were, above a swamp. It is like a building erected on piles. The piles are driven down from above into the swamp, but not down to any natural or 'given' base; and if we stop driving the piles deeper, it is not because we have reached firm ground. We simply stop when we are satisfied that the piles are firm enough to carry the structure, at least for the time being.

I have spoken to Einstein and he admitted to me that his theory was in fact no different from the one of Parmenides.