Samuel Butler Quotes

Logic teaches rules for presentation, not thinking.

You should carefully study the Art of Reasoning, as it is what most people are very deficient in, and I know few things more disagreeable than to argue, or even converse with a man who has no idea of inductive and deductive philosophy.

Logic can become enormously difficult, and it would undoubtedly be well to produce more assurance in its use.

The knowledge of the theory of logic has no tendency whatever to make men good reasoners.

Logic is in the eye of the logician.

Logic is the art of making truth prevail.

Logic: The art of thinking and reasoning in strict accordance with the limitations and incapacities of the human misunderstanding.

Bad reasoning as well as good reasoning is possible; and this fact is the foundation of the practical side of logic.

Those who invalidate reason ought seriously to consider whether they argue against reason with or without reason.

Logic is pointless.

I hope you become comfortable with the use of logic without being deceived into concluding that logic will inevitably lead you to the correct conclusion.

Logic is the art of convincing us some truth.

Contrariwise, if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic.

Reasoning draws a conclusion, but does not make the conclusion certain, unless the mind discovers it by the path of experience.

Euclid taught me that without assumptions there is no proof. Therefore, in any argument, examine the assumptions.

Logic is neither an art nor a science but a dodge.

Logic has made me hated in the world.

Logic takes care of itself; all we have to do is to look and see how it does it.

Logic must look after itself. In a certain sense, we cannot make mistakes in logic.

Philosophy is easier than politics.

Logic is the art of going wrong with confidence.

When a thing is said to be not worth refuting you may be sure that either it is flagrantly stupid—in which case all comment is superfluous—or it is something formidable, the very crux of the problem.

Reason is not automatic. Those who deny it cannot be conquered by it. Do not count on them. Leave them alone.

To reason logically is so to link one's propositions that each should contain the reason for the one succeeding it, and should itself be demonstrated by the one preceding it. Or at any rate, whatever the order adopted in the construction of one's own exposition, it is to demonstrate judgments by each other.

...logical validity is not a guarantee of truth.