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Certainty Quotes

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Certainty Quotes

“The Greeks made Space the subject-matter of a science of supreme simplicity and certainty. Out of it grew, in the mind of classical antiquity, the idea of pure science. Geometry became one of the most powerful expressions of that sovereignty of the intellect that inspired the thought of those times. At a later epoch, when the intellectual despotism of the Church, which had been maintained through the Middle Ages, had crumbled, and a wave of scepticism threatened to sweep away all that had seemed most fixed, those who believed in Truth clung to Geometry as to a rock, and it was the highest ideal of every scientist to carry on his science 'more geometrico.”

MindMatterTruthScienceBeliefSpacePowerInspireSimplicityIntellectAstronomyThoughtCertaintySkepticismMathematicianPhysicistMiddle AgesGeometryDespotismAntiquityScepticismGreeksAncient GreeksInstitute For Advanced Study
Author:Hermann Weyl
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“It probably goes without saying that certainty is also the great enemy of art, and the deadly enemy of the artist. I suspect the artists that will speak to our moment (and survive it ) best will be ones with the lowest levels of certainty, who haven’t allowed the lure of social media to turn them into certainty pimps, who recall Milan Kundera’s observation that the novelist/artist teaches us to comprehend the world as a question, not an answer. As Kundera notes, “There is wisdom and tolerance in that attitude.” The artists who I’m most interested in these days are the ones who struggle always to be “heard over the noisy foolishness of human certainties.”

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Author:Junot Díaz
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“Each person would like to be certain of the approval of the other, but to be certain of the other is already to lose that sense of the other as an independent judge. I want you to say 'I love you', but the last thing I would want to do is to ask you, much less force you, to say it. I want you to say it freely, and not because I want you to or expect you to. But then, you know that I do want you to say it, and I know that you know that I want you to say it. So you say it; I don't really believe you. Did you say it because you mean it? Or in order not to hurt my feelings? And so I get testy, more demanding, to which your response is, quite reasonably, to become angry or defensive, until finally I provoke precisely what I feared all along, - an outburst of abuse. But then, I fell righteously hurt; you get apologetic. You seek forgiveness; I hesitate. You aren't sure whether I will say it or not: I'm not sure whether you mean it or not, but I say, 'I forgive you'. You wonder whether I'm really forgiving you or just trying to keep from hurting your feelings, and so you become anxious, testy, and so on.”

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Book:In the Spirit of Hegel
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“In the nine years since [Robert] Harris’s novel [Conclave] was published our culture has, if anything, become more enamored with certainty, not less — which is really saying something. Ours is a culture, a society, that seems fantastically certain of certainty. Certainty rules our political discourse, an our-side-is-right-the-other-side-wrong absolutism that the internet helps to empower. As Warzel and Caulfield lamented in The Atlantic recently, ours is a culture “where every event — every human success or tragedy — becomes little more than evidence to score political points... It is a culture where you never have to change your mind or even confront uncomfortable information.” You don’t need to be Wittgenstein to recognize that certainty as a habit of the mind, as an epistemological reflex, ain’t been doing us any favors — not at the level of the individual or the society. Certainty is a state of final judgment — one might even say terminal judgment. Certainty is the opposite of curiosity and open-ness, and about the worst form of knowing there is because it brooks no discussion, no amelioration, no correction, no testing.”

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Author:Junot Díaz
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“I am Jacks's true love. I believe it with the same confidence that I believe that water fills the oceans and morning follows the night. I believe it with all my heart and soul. And there has to be some sort of magic in that.' 'I don't believe that's how magic works.' Lala looked at her sadly. 'Believing something doesn't make it true.”

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Book:A Curse for True Love
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“She knows her timing, always knows. The time to strike or the time to starve. Her eyes as a clock, she watches she waits she learns, and in the second she blinks, she changes her mind just like that.”

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Author:Anthony Liccione
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“Just because you feel lost doesn't mean that you're doing something wrong. Feeling certain that you are correct in every decision and situation is an addiction. If you think that the journey of self-discovery will bring you more solid facts and certainties about yourself and the world, you will be frustrated. The more you see, the more lost you will feel. That is natural. The more you discover of yourself, the more confused you will become. This is natural. The wiser you get, the more you will see that there are many paths walked by just as many people, and that just because yours is different from someone else's doesn't mean one of you is wrong. This is natural. Over time, you will develop humility, compassion, and a higher tolerance for confusion. If you allow the feeling of being lost to drive you into a search for absolute truths and correct answers, you may feel more secure when you get there, but in reality, you will be taking a step back. Allow yourself to be lost, and you will see so much more of the forest of your soul than if you beeline back for the trail. Explore. Get lost. Embrace the inevitability of confusion.”

PlayWisdomLostJourneySelf AwarenessAddictionSelf DiscoveryConfusionCertaintyExplorationSeeking TruthSelf ExplorationAddiction To Certainty
Author:Vironika Tugaleva
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“In the presence of Esch, values have hidden their faces. Order, loyalty, sacrifice—he cherishes all these words, but exactly what do they represent? Sacrifice for what? Demand what sort of order? He doesn't know. If a value has lost its concrete content, what is left of it? A mere empty form; an imperative that goes unheeded and, all the more furious, demands to be heard and obeyed. The less Esch knows what he wants, the more furiously he wants it. Esch: the fanaticism of the era with no God. Because all values have hidden their faces, anything can be considered a value. Justice, order—Esch seeks them now in the trade union struggle, then in religion; today in police power, tomorrow in the mirage of America, where he dreams of emigrating. He could be a terrorist or a repentant terrorist turning in his comrades, or a party militant or a cult member a kamikaze prepared to sacrifice his life. All the passions rampaging through the bloody history of our time are taken up, unmasked, and terrifyingly displayed in Esch's modest adventure.”

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Book:The Art of the Novel
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“My mother and father were always pushing me away from secondhand answers—even the answers they themselves believed. I don’t know that I have ever found any satisfactory answers of my own. But every time I ask it, the question is refined. That is the best of what the old heads meant when they spoke of being “politically conscious”—as much a series of actions as a state of being, a constant questioning, questioning as ritual, questioning as exploration rather than the search for certainty.”

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Book:Between the World and Me
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“Mr. Halsworth paced stiffly around the classroom and tapped his pointer stick to the chalkboard with “Darwinism” written on the center, dead- center, the kind of dead-centeredness so as to safely and absolutely hide his embarrassed uncertainty of why there was electricity in his brain, seven guided octillion atoms in his body, standing on an earth of perfect living conditions, and intuition of a God in his gut.”

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Book:The Goodbye Song
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“My peak? Would I even have one? I hardly had had anything you could call a life. A few ripples. some rises and falls. But that's it. Almost nothing. Nothing born of nothing. I'd loved and been loved, but I had nothing to show. It was a singularly plain, featureless landscape. I felt like I was in a video game. A surrogate Pacman, crunching blindly through a labyrinth of dotted lines. The only certainty was my death.”

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Book:Dance Dance Dance
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“The changes we make in life often happen when we have a degree of certainty. However, the pain of our past failures and the fears of our peers often fuel our uncertainty. This inability to predict the future is why people find themselves stuck and unable to move forward. They don't want to feel the emotions of failure. They prefer to talk themselves into settling for an "okay" life, rather than the life they really want. However, failure is a matter of perspective! Is it not failure when you don't take a chance on the one thing you need? There is no happiness in regret, staying safe or settling for anything less than what you can have through action.”

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Author:Shannon L. Alder
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“He did not want to be young again -- that time had had particular and transcendent horrors -- but the thought of being any older filled him with panic. He could not imagine finding tranquility of soul in old age; if he could only be allowed to mark time for a while all might yet be well, one might suddenly achieve equilibrium, certainty, serenity. There would still be possibilities. Hopes.”

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Book:Passing On
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“I like the scientific spirit—the holding off, the being sure but not too sure, the willingness to surrender ideas when the evidence is against them: this is ultimately fine—it always keeps the way beyond open—always gives life, thought, affection, the whole man, a chance to try over again after a mistake—after a wrong guess.”

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Book:Walt Whitman's Camden conversations
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