Margaret Oliphant Quotes

The great benefit of philosophy, which is also its great weakness, is that all its steps are taken in the spirit of doubt.

Nothing should be taken for granted, even if everybody believes it.

We must strive for literacy and education that teach us to never quit questioning and probing at the assumptions of the day.

Be Skeptical, but learn to listen.

Never assume the obvious is true.

In all affairs it's a healthy thing now and then to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.

Interrogate yours hidden assumptions

I have learned yet again (this has been going on all my life) what folly it is to take any thing for granted without examining it skeptically.

Test everything, including assumptions

I don't want you to trust me, I want you to question everything I say.

You should never assume anything coming from a critical standpoint. You should go into everything assuming you're going to get crushed.

Ours is an age of criticism, to which everything must be subjected.

I appear as a skeptic, who believes that doubt is the great engine, the great fuel of all inquiry, all discovery and all innovation.

The least questioned assumptions are often the most questionable.

A critique does not consist in saying that things aren't good the way they are. It consists in seeing on just what type of assumptions, of familiar notions, of established and unexamined ways of thinking the accepted practices are based... To do criticism is to make harder those acts which are now too easy.

I try to encourage people to think for themselves, to question standard assumptions... Don't take assumptions for granted. Begin by taking a skeptical attitude toward anything that is conventional wisdom. Make it justify itself. It usually can't. Be willing to ask questions about what is taken for granted. Try to think things through for yourself.

Assumption Theory: The only safe assumption in life is that the person who assures you that everything is all right is all wrong.

Look at all the sentences which seem true and question them.

Question everything, even if it represents generations of conventional wisdom.

My investment of time, as an educator, in my judgment, is best served teaching people how to think about the world around them. Teach them how to pose a question. How to judge whether one thing is true versus another.

... the important thing is to, first of all, question everything you read or hear or see or are told. Question it, and try to see the world for what it actually is, as opposed to what someone or some company or some organization or some government is trying to represent it as, or present it as, however they've mislabeled it or dressed it up or told you.

If you believe certain words, you believe their hidden arguments. When you believe something is right or wrong, true or false, you believe the assumptions in the words which express the arguments. Such assumptions are often full of holes, but remain most precious to the convinced.

Don’t just teach your children to read… Teach them to question what they read. Teach them to question everything.

A 'why' is a dangerous thing... It challenges old, comfortable ways, forces people to think about that they do instead of just mindlessly doing it. (Haplo) ... I think the danger is not so much in asking the 'why' as in believing you have come up with the only answer. (Alfred)

Doubt is an element of criticism, and the tendency of criticism is necessarily skeptical.