Thomas Babington Macaulay Quotes

I don't feel that an atmosphere of debate and total disagreement and argument is such a bad thing. It makes for a vital and alive field.

Men are never so likely to settle a question rightly as when they discuss it freely. A government can interfere in discussion only by making it less free than it would otherwise be. Men are most likely to form just opinions when they have no other wish than to know the truth.

Reducing every issue to an argument can become stale but it's often a very good way of clarifying issues.

The clash of ideas is the sound of freedom.

Brown’s core value of promoting the free and open exchange of ideas is bedrock to our capacity to fulfill our mission as a university. This value applies not only when ideas are agreeable and aligned with our own. Protecting the right to free expression and promoting open discourse is even more essential when ideas are divergent, abhorrent or even hurtful.

I think it's important to have conversation about things instead of shutting things down.

If you don't like what someone has to say, argue with them.

I think debate is good. Everyone has an opinion, and it's definitely healthy to voice those.

I tend to solicit opinions from all those around me. I like to hear opinions and the rationale behind it from everybody in the room. Perhaps it's the result of going to law school and using the Socratic method.

I don't have all the answers. I'm just supposed to present what I think is an issue and have dialogue start.

I want people to have conversations, to have controversy because it creates dialogue and builds bridges.

I spend a lot of time talking to people who disagree with me - I would go so far as to say that it's my favourite leisure activity.

All silencing of discussion is an assumption of infallibility.

When there is information, there is enlightenment. When there is debate, there are solutions.

I like better for one to say some foolish thing upon important matters than to be silent. That becomes the subject of discussion and dispute, and the truth is discovered.

Theory now: concern for truth must not hobble our discussion.

Classroom discussion is where you learn how to debate an idea and stick with an opinion, even when others don't agree - and not take it personally, either.

I wouldn't want to debate me every day.

A university is supposed to be a place where all ideas are discussed.

As an academic, I value the free exchange of ideas.

I invite a variety people on my show with wide-ranging opinions - sometimes even my jaw hits the floor, too - but I let them speak. Whether it's left, right, or center, I want to expose my viewers to other perspectives. Agree with them or not, the nation needs to listen.

At the heart of every great movie is conflict. It's the same with a meeting. There should be conflict and tension.

I enjoy a challenge or provocation, something to think about, to talk about after it's done.

'In his celebrated book, 'On Liberty', the English philosopher John Stuart Mill argued that silencing an opinion is "a peculiar evil." If the opinion is right, we are robbed of the "opportunity of exchanging error for truth"; and if it's wrong, we are deprived of a deeper understanding of the truth in its "collision with error." If we know only our own side of the argument, we hardly know even that: it becomes stale, soon learned by rote, untested, a pallid and lifeless truth.'

Reason and free inquiry are the only effectual agents against error... They are the natural enemies of error, and of error only... If [free enquiry] be restrained now, the present corruptions will be protected, and new ones encouraged.