Disagreements Quotes
Spinoza’s ideas were considered so radical and dangerous that he was the only man in history who was excommunicated by the Catholics, the Jews and the Muslims.
Maher has been criticized for her relativistic definition of “truth” given her role as a former executive of Wikipedia and CEO of NPR. See related quote.
In science it is instinctive and necessary to accept and consider seriously contrary views because if not considered, we may go in an erroneous direction and not learn the truth. This instinct is just the opposite of the norm in politics. In partisan politics, ideology is a dominant driver, and ideas contrary to our ideology are rarely considered because of this logic: If the idea is wrong, we will just waste our valuable time and resources. If it might possibly be right, it would throw our ideology into question and this would cause too much disruption of shake our institutional values which are more important than one point. Besides, if we changed on the basis of a contrary thought, we would be accused of being a flip flopper with no basic principles. For scientists, change and expansion of ideas is essential to the advancement of science. In politics, most practitioner regard it as success if the can govern in the exact way that their political ideology guides them. Few want to reform or alter their ideology. Those who do so are either rejected by the body politic, or who become the greatest of our leaders and politicians.
The great union leader had been shot at though his home window in an attempted assassination. Fortunately, the bullet missed, but national tension was very high. In the half of the 20th century a not uncommon way of busting unions was to hire goons to assault and/or kill union leaders and organizers. A not uncommon method of putting pressure on companies was for unions to have goons sabotage machinery, burn facilities, and destroy or ruin inventory. The WWII period saw this class warfare violence for settling labor issues diminish greatly, and the attack on Reuther potentially might have been the trigger to return to the pre war days of much violence in labor disputes. Mrs. Roosevelt and other national leaders weighed in by many means to prevent that. They were successful, and although there have been a few throwbacks, the class warfare of physical violence is no longer a characteristic of American labor relations. The class warfare has moved to the courts, the lobbyists, campaign organizing and contributions and economic intimidation.
