“The world runs on individuals pursuing their self interests. The great achievements of civilization have not come from government bureaus. Einstein didn't construct his theory under order from a bureaucrat. Henry Ford didn't revolutionize the automobile industry that way.” WorldWaySelfGovernmentRunningOrderIndividualInterestTheoryIndustryCivilizationAchievementCapitalismConstructsFree MarketSelf InterestAutomobileBureaucratsGreat AchievementAutomobile Industry Author:Milton Friedman
“During all those years of experimentation and research, I never once made a discovery. All my work was deductive, and the results I achieved were those of invention, pure and simple. I would construct a theory and work on its lines until I found it was untenable. Then it would be discarded at once and another theory evolved. This was the only possible way for me to work out the problem.” WayYearsMadeProblemWould BeFoundLinesSimpleResultsTheoryPureResearchDiscoveryWork OutInventionConstructsExperimentationDiscarded Author:Thomas A. Edison
“Our faith in democracy, personal freedoms and human 'rights', and the other comforting prescriptions of the humanist liberal credo stem from the supremacy of maritime over territorial power. Pragmatists may deplore this as crude determinism, as another vain attempt to construct a general theory of history. They should reflect on the sort of political philosophy and structures we might now adhere to had the Habsburgs, Bourbons, Bonaparte, Hitler, Stalin or his heirs prevailed in the titanic world struggles of the past four centuries.” WorldShouldHumansMayPhilosophyMightPastPoliticalStruggleDemocracyFourRightsCenturyTheoryStructureHuman RightsVainHumanistStemConstructsComfortingPolitical PhilosophyPrescriptionsCrudeHeirsSupremacyDeterminismPersonal FreedomTerritorialBourbonCredoMaritimePragmatistsBonaparte Book:Maritime Supremacy & the Opening of the Western Mind: Naval Campaigns that Shaped the Modern World Source: Maritime Supremacy & the Opening of the Western Mind: Naval Campaigns that Shaped the Modern World
“A second possible approach to general systems theory is through the arrangement of theoretical systems and constructs in a hierarchy of complexity, roughly corresponding to the complexity of the "individuals" of the various empirical fields... leading towards a "system of systems." [...] I suggest below a possible arrangement of "levels" of theoretical discourse...(vi) [...] the "animal" level, characterized by increased mobility, teleological behavior and self-awareness...” SelfIndividualAnimalLevelsAwarenessFieldsTheoryBehaviorApproachSelf AwarenessVariousComplexityArrangementsDiscourseConstructsHierarchyTheoreticalCorrespondingMobilitySystems Theory Author:Kenneth E. Boulding
“My thinking was that today's spectator is so well-versed in film language that all theories about suspense, as argued by Dreyer and Hitchcock, on what makes you scared in cinema, can be ditched. It's the spectator, finally, who's going to construct the menace and the fear.” ThinkingWellsTodayFilmLanguageTheoryScaredSuspenseCinemaConstructsSpectatorsMenaceHitchcock Author:Bruno Dumont
“I look at the most promising putative moral theories. I construct crucial thought experiments in areas where they give conflicting advice. I confront their conflicting advice with my own moral sensitivity, my moral intuition. I take the theory that can best explain the content of my intuitions as gaining inductive support through an inference to the best explanation.” GivingLooksMy OwnMoralSupportAdviceTheoryAreasIntuitionExperimentsExplanationCrucialSensitivityConstructsInference Author:Torbjorn Tannsjo
“To construct a scientific theory from the data and to be able to recognize that it is a reasonable theory is possible only if there are some very sharp restrictive principles that lead you to go in one direction and not in another direction. Otherwise, you wouldn't have science at all, merely randomly chosen hypotheses.” IfsAblePrinciplesTheoryChosenDataReasonableConstructsHypothesisOne DirectionScientific Theory Author:Noam Chomsky