Francis Bacon Quotes

Two half philosophers will probably never a whole metaphysician make.

We may either proceed from principles to facts, or recede from facts to principles.

Aristotle: that celebrated heathen, who, in all matters wherein heathenism did not destroy his competence, had established a despotic empire over the Christian world.

Man is a rational animal—so at least I have been told. … Aristotle, so far as I know, was the first man to proclaim explicitly that man is a rational animal. His reason for this view was … that some people can do sums. … It is in virtue of the intellect that man is a rational animal. The intellect is shown in various ways, but most emphatically by mastery of arithmetic. The Greek system of numerals was very bad, so that the multiplication table was quite difficult, and complicated calculations could only be made by very clever people.

Since the time of Plato and Aristotle philosophers have had an interest in taking note of common fallacies in reasoning.

Aristotle can be regarded as the father of logic. But his logic is too scholastic, full of subtleties, and fundamentally has not been of much value to the human understanding. It is a dialectic and an organon for the art of disputation.

Philosophy is the thoughts of men about human thinking, reasoning and imagining, and the real values in human existence.

Being is the soul of every concept, of every judgment and of every reasoning.

Abstract truth is the eye of reason.

Logic is the art of making truth prevail.

Arithmetic is where the content lies, and not logic; but logic prompts certainty, and not arithmetic.

EFFECT, n. The second of two phenomena which always occur together in the same order. The first, called a Cause, is said to generate the other-which is no more sensible than it would be for one who has never seen a dog except in pursuit of a rabbit to declare the rabbit the cause of the dog.

Which came first, the phoenix or the flame?” "...I think the answer is that a circle has no beginning." "Well reasoned.

Damn all false dichotomies to hell

The Absolute and the Infinite can become this universe only by limitation.

When he grew old, Aristotle, who is not generally considered a tightrope dancer, liked to lose himself in the most labyrinthine and subtle of discourses […]. ‘The more solitary and isolated I become, the more I come to like stories,’ he said.

Logic is the science of the laws of thought, as thought,--that is of the necessary conditions to which thought considered in itself is a subject.

Logic doesn't apply to the real world.

Sir, I have found you an argument; but I am not obliged to find you an understanding.

Metaphysics is the finding of bad reasons for what we believe on instinct.

Rationalism is an adventure in the clarification of thought.

Now this principle of induction cannot be a purely logical truth like a tautology or an analytic statement. . . .

It must be so, Plato, thou reason'st well!

Philosophy's work is finding the shortest path between two points.

SOCRATES: Perhaps we may be wrong; if so, you in your wisdom should convince us that we are mistaken in preferring justice to injustice. THRASYMACHUS: And how am I to convince you, he said, if you are not already convinced by what I have just said; what more can I do for you? Would you have me put the proof bodily into your souls?