All We Can Do Is Search For

We Know A Great Deal, But Our Ignorance Is Sobering And Boundless. With Each Step Forward, With Each Problem Which We Solve, We Not Only Discover New And Unsolved Problems, But We Also Discover That Where We Believed That We Were Standing On Firm And Safe Ground, All Things Are, In Truth, Insecure And In A State Of Flux.

The True Enlightenment Thinker, The True Rationalist, Never Wants To Talk Anyone Into Anything. No, He Does Not Even Want To Convince; All The Time He Is Aware That He May Be Wrong. Above All, He Values The Intellectual Independence Of Others Too Highly To Want To Convince Them In Important Matters. He Would Much Rather Invite Contradiction, Preferably In The Form Of Rational And Disciplined Criticism. He Seeks Not To Convince But To Arouse - To Challenge Others To Form Free Opinions.

Every Intellectual Has A Very Special Responsibility. He Has The Privilege And The Opportunity Of Studying. In Return, He Owes It To His Fellow Men (or 'to Society') To Represent The Results Of His Study As Simply, Clearly And Modestly As He Can. The Worst Thing That Intellectuals Can Do - The Cardinal Sin - Is To Try To Set Themselves Up As Great Prophets Vis-à-vis Their Fellow Men And To Impress Them With Puzzling Philosophies. Anyone Who Cannot Speak Simply And Clearly Should Say Nothing And Continue To Work Until He Can Do So.

It Is Easy To Obtain Confirmations, Or Verifications, For Nearly Every Theory-if We Look For Confirmations. Confirmations Should Count Only If They Are The Result Of Risky Predictions... A Theory Which Is Not Refutable By Any Conceivable Event Is Non-scientific. Irrefutability Is Not A Virtue Of A Theory (as People Often Think) But A Vice. Every Genuine Test Of A Theory Is An Attempt To Falsify It, Or Refute It.

Science Must Begin With Myths, And With The Criticism Of Myths.