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Sideroxylon
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A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. -- Mark Twain.
Since the arrival of the Internet I reckon it would be still trying to find a clean pair of jocks.
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The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; whence proceed sciences which may be called "sciences as one would." For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of the vulgar. Numberless in short are the ways, and sometimes imperceptible, in which the affections color and infect the understanding.
Francis Bacon, Novum Organum (1620)
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Therefore, the seeker after the truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and, following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them, but rather the one who suspects his faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits to argument and demonstration, and not to the sayings of a human being whose nature is fraught with all kinds of imperfection and deficiency. Thus the duty of the man who investigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himself an enemy of all that he reads, and, applying his mind to the core and margins of its content, attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs his critical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency.
Alhazen (965-1040)
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If your conclusions contradict common sense, then so much for common sense; if they conflict with received philosophical opinion, then too bad for received opinion; but if they deny the very facts of our experience, then you must consign your conclusions to the flames.
Richard Feynman paraphrased by Baggini & Fosl in "The Philosophers Toolkit".
A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. -- Mark Twain.
Since the arrival of the Internet I reckon it would be still trying to find a clean pair of jocks.
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The human understanding is no dry light, but receives infusion from the will and affections; whence proceed sciences which may be called "sciences as one would." For what a man had rather were true he more readily believes. Therefore he rejects difficult things from impatience of research; sober things, because they narrow hope; the deeper things of nature, from superstition; the light of experience, from arrogance and pride; things not commonly believed, out of deference to the opinion of the vulgar. Numberless in short are the ways, and sometimes imperceptible, in which the affections color and infect the understanding.
Francis Bacon, Novum Organum (1620)
-----------------------------------
Therefore, the seeker after the truth is not one who studies the writings of the ancients and, following his natural disposition, puts his trust in them, but rather the one who suspects his faith in them and questions what he gathers from them, the one who submits to argument and demonstration, and not to the sayings of a human being whose nature is fraught with all kinds of imperfection and deficiency. Thus the duty of the man who investigates the writings of scientists, if learning the truth is his goal, is to make himself an enemy of all that he reads, and, applying his mind to the core and margins of its content, attack it from every side. He should also suspect himself as he performs his critical examination of it, so that he may avoid falling into either prejudice or leniency.
Alhazen (965-1040)
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If your conclusions contradict common sense, then so much for common sense; if they conflict with received philosophical opinion, then too bad for received opinion; but if they deny the very facts of our experience, then you must consign your conclusions to the flames.
Richard Feynman paraphrased by Baggini & Fosl in "The Philosophers Toolkit".
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