… homo erectus: we stand corrected.
— @ltdn
“The value of philosophy is, in fact, to be sought largely in its very uncertainty. The man who has no tincture of philosophy goes through life imprisoned in the prejudices derived from common sense, from the habitual beliefs of his age or his nation, and from convictions which have grown up in his mind without the co-operation or consent of his deliberate reason. To such a man the world tends to become definite, finite, obvious; common objects rouse no questions, and unfamiliar possibilities are contemptuously rejected. As soon as we begin to philosophize, on the contrary, we find that even the most everyday things lead to problems to which only very incomplete answers can be given.
Philosophy, though unable to tell us with certainty what is the true answer to the doubts it raises, is able to suggest many possibilities which enlarge our thoughts and free them from the tyranny of custom. Thus, while diminishing our feeling of certainty as to what things are, it greatly increases our knowledge as to what they may be; it removes the somewhat arrogant dogmatism of those who have never traveled into the region of liberating doubt, and it keeps alive our sense of wonder by showing familiar things in an unfamiliar aspect.”
— Bertrand Russell, British philosopher, logician, mathematician, historian, and social critic (1872-1970), The Problems of Philosophy (1912), Cosimo, Inc, 2010, p. 113-114. (via amiquote)
The next word or phrase that’s written has to feel as if it’s being written for the first time, that you are discovering the meaning of the word as you put it down.
— Derek Walcott, as cited in Advice to Writers by Jon Winokur (via litverve)
(via crashinglybeautiful)
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside, you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
— Naomi Shihab Nye /v. whiskey river
We can never know what to want, because, living only one life, we can neither compare it with our previous lives nor perfect it in our lives to come.
— Milan Kundera /v. whiskey river
