Home / Topics / Philosophy Quotes

Philosophy Quotes

Browse 18200 quotes about Philosophy.

Philosophy Quotes

“The surplus of society overrides all our traditions and shapes all our philosophies.”

Philosophy Shapes Tradition Consumerism Overconsumption Surplus

Author:Walter Weyl

“The spirit of Plato dies hard. We have been unable to escape the philosophical tradition that what we can see and measure in the world is merely the superficial and imperfect representation of an underlying reality.”

World Has Beens Hard Philosophy Reality Spirit Dies Tradition Philosophical Imperfect Representation Superficial Plato

Book:The Mismeasure of Man (Revised & Expanded)

Source: The Mismeasure of Man (Revised & Expanded)

“Liberalism is the philosophy for our time, because it does not try to conserve every tradition of the past, because it does not apply to new problems the old doctrinaire solutions, because it is prepared to experiment and innovate and because it knows that the past is less important than the future.”

Knows Trying Doe Important Philosophy Problem Past Solutions Tradition Prepared Experiments Our Time Liberalism

Author:Pierre Trudeau

“Neither an enlightened philosophy, nor all the political wisdom of Rome, nor even the faith and virtue of the Christians availed against the incorrigible tradition of antiquity. Something was wanted, beyond all the gifts of reflection and experience - a faculty of self government and self control, developed like its language in the fibre of a nation, and growing with its growth.”

“Tantra is non-dogmatic, in the sense that we don't care about the sensual world; we don't care about other religious traditions. To not care doesn't mean that we don't learn.”

World Mean Philosophy Care Religious Tradition Don't Care Sensual Dogmatic Tantra Religious Traditions

Author:Frederick Lenz

“An important tradition within westren philosophy believes in the primacy of natural science as a guide to truth. This is sometimes met with the charge that such an allegiance amounts to scientism - the view that the only things that really exist are those recognized by fundamental physical theory, and that the only forms of genuine knowledge are scientific ones.”

Believe Important Sometimes Philosophy Form Natural Views Atheism Theory Amount Mets Tradition Fundamentals Positive Atheism Guides Genuine Allegiance Scientism Natural Science Primacy

Book:Atheism and Theism

Source: Atheism and Theism

“In a world in which we are exposed to more information, more options, more philosophies, more perspectives than ever before, in which we must choose the values by which we will live (rather than unquestioningly follow some tradition for no better reason than that our own parents did), we need to be willing to stand on our own judgment and trust our own intelligence-to look at the world through our own eyes-to chart our course and think through how to achieve the future we want, to commit ourselves to continuous questioning and learning-to be, in a word, self-responsible.”

Source: Nathaniel Brandens Self-Esteem Every Day: Reflections on Self-Esteem and Spirituality

“African tradition deals with life as an experience to be lived. In many respects, it is much like the Eastern philosophies in that we see ourselves as a part of a life force; we are joined, for instance, to the air, to the earth. We are part of the whole-life process. We live in accordance with, in a kind of correspondence with the rest of the world as a whole. And therefore living becomes an experience, rather than a problem, no matter how bad or how painful it may be.”

World Kind May Matter Philosophy Whole Problem Earth Force Process Deals Air Tradition Painful Whole Life Instance Oneness Eastern Correspondence Eastern Philosophy

Book:Conversations with Audre Lorde

Source: Conversations with Audre Lorde

“I would want to conceive of philosophy as grounded in the very long humanist tradition that is the best of the West, which is open to the East and North and South.”

Want Long Philosophy Tradition West South East Humanist Grounded North And South

Author:Cornel West

“There is no rigorous and effective deconstruction without the faithful memory of philosophies and literatures, without the respectful and competent reading of texts of the past, as well as singular works of our own time. Deconstruction is also a certain thinking about tradition and context. Mark Taylor evokes this with great clarity in the course of a remarkable introduction. He reconstitutes a set of premises without which no deconstruction could have seen the light of day.”

“Every faith uses some kind of tool to understand itself better. Faith seeks understanding. The Western tradition has used philosophy to understand the truths of the faith and you come up with theology. Where as, Islam at a certain point said: we'll use law. There are these four major, developed schools of Islamic jurisprudence.”

Kind Said Philosophy Use School Law Used Certain Understanding Four Majors Tradition Tools Islam Western Come Up Theology Islamic Jurisprudence

Author:Francis George

“Philosophy is the art of dying.Philosophy is an activity that has always been concerned with how one seizes hold of one's mortality, and I see myself continuing a very ancient tradition that goes back to Socrates and Epicurus, which is that to be a philosopher is to try and learn how to die. In learning how to die, one learns how to live.”

Trying Art Philosophy Dies Dying Activity Concerned Tradition Ancient Philosopher Mortality Continuing

Author:Simon Critchley

“Western philosophers gained access to Asian and African traditions initially by noting similarities and differences. But that, as A.C. Mukerji, of Allahabad, was to note in 1932, is not to do philosophy, but is at best a preparation.”

Philosophy Differences Tradition Notes Western Philosopher Access Preparation Asian Similarity

Author:Jay L. Garfield

“A little exposure to the philosophy of many Eastern spiritual traditions - including yoga - could easily lead you to conclude that if you aspire to achieve goals in the material world you cannot fulfill yourself spiritually, or vice versa. However, since all of us, at some level, long for fulfillment in all aspects of our life, it is essential to understand that these two aims are not mutually exclusive.”

“When I teach a new group of students, I introduce some yoga philosophy, but I don't overload them with information. Just enough so they understand the real tradition behind this ancient practice and that it's not a stretching class. Guys come in and they're a little nervous. I tell them that when they cross the threshold of the door, they're crossing to a different dimension. They're moving from an externally-oriented reality to an internally-oriented one.”

“It is actually a nice question how far Descartes himself endorses the monological and metaphysically dualistic theory of mind associated with his name and his legacy in early modern philosophy. But Fichte does reject this tradition, by suggesting that an immaterial thinking substance is an incoherent notion, and a rational being whose rationality was not developed through communication with others is a transcendental impossibility.”