Ayn Rand Quotes

I stick my finger into existence.. it smells of nothing. Where am I? Who am I? What is this thing called the world? What does this word mean?

I secretly think reality exists so we can speculate about it.

Studying consciousness tells us more about how the world is fundamentally strange. I think we have a few revolutions to go yet before we get to the bottom of it.

Metaphysics is a science.

No school of philosophy has ever solved this question of whether being determines consciousness or the other way around. It may be a false antithesis.

Einstein said, if everything exists as a substance of qualities, and qualities exist only in mind, then all is mind.

I think, therefore I am.

How do you prove we exist? Maybe we don't.

I'm the idea of the human imagination, which, when you think about it, is the only thing we can really be certain ISN'T imaginary.

Metaphysics is almost always an attempt to prove the incredible by an appeal to the unintelligible.

The object of knowledge is what exists and its function to know about reality.

The only roads of enquiry there are to think of: one, that it is and that it is not possible for it not to be, this is the path of persuasion (for truth is its companion); the other, that it is not and that it must not be - this I say to you is a path wholly unknowable.

I desire therefore I exist.

...physics is the study of the structure of consciousness.

Among the facts of the universe to be accounted for, it may be said, is Mind; and it is self evident that nothing can have produced Mind but Mind.

We may well ask, What causes induce us to believe in the existence of body? but 'tis vain to ask. Whether there be body or not? That is a point which we must take for granted in all our reasonings.

To be is to be perceived

Whether if soul did not exist time would exist or not, is a question that may fairly be asked; for if there cannot be someone to count there cannot be anything that can be counted, so that evidently there cannot be number; for number is either what has been, or what can be, counted.

We have the notion that we exist but we have no way to prove it. 'I am' is the closest foundation we can get.

The world is real. Consciousness is the illusion.

First, philosophy concerns itself with all kinds of issues that don't get much airtime in day-to-day life. What's the nature of reality? Can we ever truly know anything, and if so, how? What does it mean to be a moral agent? And while we're at it, is there any such thing as agency anyway?

The two basic topics which fascinate me are 'What is reality?' and 'What constitutes the authentic human being?'

The greatest mystery of existence is existence itself.

There are big questions science doesn't answer, such as why is there something rather than nothing? There can't be a scientific answer to that because it's the answer that precedes science.

Human beings are not capable of creating a thought that truly conceives of this existence. Nobody knows if we are really here, alive, or anything. It's a mystery.