Opposing Ideas Quotes

The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function.

If you believe in democracy, you accept, by definition, the existence and triumph of opposing ideas. The people who believe deeply in the Internet's force as a commons operate on that kind of premise.

There are two sides to every question, exactly opposite to each other.

Nationalism is not to be confused with patriotism. Both words are normally used in so vague a way that any definition is liable to be challenged, but one must draw a distinction between them, since two different and even opposing ideas are involved. By ‘patriotism’ I mean devotion to a particular place and a particular way of life, which one believes to be the best in the world but has no wish to force on other people. Patriotism is of its nature defensive, both militarily and culturally. Nationalism, on the other hand, is inseparable from the desire for power. The abiding purpose of every nationalist is to secure more power and more prestige, not for himself but for the nation or other unit in which he has chosen to sink his own individuality.

Democracy depends on the idea that we hold each others’ right to express ourselves and be heard above our own desire to always get the outcomes we want. You can’t impose tolerance top-down.

In times of social turmoil, our impulse is often to pull back on free expression. We want the progress that comes from free expression, but not the tension.

Defenders see things way different than blockers.

While I worry about an erosion of truth, I don’t think people want to live in a world where you can only say things that tech companies decide are 100 percent true.

If your mind is open to opposing ideas, your intelligence will go up. If your mind is closed to opposing ideas, your ignorance is in control. Intelligence or ignorance? Your ability to keep an open mind and appreciate multiple points of view is conscious choice. And one that can open your world, and shape your childs future.

Increasingly, we’re seeing people try to define more speech as dangerous because it may lead to political outcomes they see as unacceptable. Some hold the view that since the stakes are so high, they can no longer trust their fellow citizens with the power to communicate and decide what to believe for themselves.

A powerful idea communicates some of its power to the man who contradicts it. Partaking of the universal community of minds, it infiltrates, grafts itself on to, the mind of him who it refutes, among other contiguous ideas, with the aid of which, counter-attacking, he complements and corrects it; so that the final verdict is always to some extent the work of both parties to a discussion.

Often, the people who call the most for us to remove content are often the first to complain when it’s their content that falls on the wrong side of a policy.

My lyrics are a big pile of contradictions.

Ideas come in pairs and they contradict one another; their opposition is the principal engine of reflection.

Some people believe giving more people a voice is driving division rather than bringing us together. More people across the spectrum believe that achieving the political outcomes they think matter is more important than every person having a voice.

The most repressive societies have always restricted speech the most — and when people are finally able to speak, they often call for change.

But this is one of the things that makes rap at its best so human. It doesn't force you to pretend to be only one thing or another, to be a saint or a sinner. It recognizes that you can be true to yourself and still have unexpected dimensions and opposing ideas. Having a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other is the most common thing in the world. The real bullshit is when you act like you don't have contradictions inside you, that you're so dull and unimaginative that your mind never changes or wanders into strange, unexpected places.

The only way to oppose a bad idea is to replace it with a good idea.

Stated clearly enough, an idea may cancel itself out.

I'm full of contradictions.

In times of social tension we pull back on expression, and we always end up believing that it was the wrong thing to do.

F. Scott Fitzgerald has an indespensible quote: 'The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at once and still retain the ability to function'. Or, as I like to call it, 'O.J. killed his wife, and the police are corrupt.'

Juxtaposition is interesting to me.

Rules about what you can and can’t say often have unintended consequences. … In everything we do, we need to make sure we’re empowering people, not simply reinforcing existing institutions and power structures.

To hold in the mind forever two ideas which seemed to be in opposition. The first . . . acceptance totally without rancor, of life as it is, and men as they are [;] . . . the second . . . that one must never, in one's life, accept . . . injustices as commonplace but must fight them with all one's strength.