The Attempt To Make Heaven On Earth

Understanding A Theory Has, Indeed, Much In Common With Understanding A Human Personality. We May Know Or Understand A Man's System Of Dispositions Pretty Well; That Is To Say, We May Be Able To Predict How He Would Act In A Number Of Different Situations. But Since There Are Infinitely Many Possible Situations, Of Infinite Variety, A Full Understanding Of A Man's Dispositions Does Not Seem To Be Possible.

[great Scientists] Are Men Of Bold Ideas, But Highly Critical Of Their Own Ideas: They Try To Find Whether Their Ideas Are Right By Trying First To Find Whether They Are Not Perhaps Wrong. They Work With Bold Conjectures And Severe Attempts At Refuting Their Own Conjectures.

It Is Clear That Everybody Interested In Science Must Be Interested In World 3 Objects. A Physical Scientist, To Start With, May Be Interested Mainly In World 1 Objects--say Crystals And X-rays. But Very Soon He Must Realize How Much Depends On Our Interpretation Of The Facts, That Is, On Our Theories, And So On World 3 Objects. Similarly, A Historian Of Science, Or A Philosopher Interested In Science Must Be Largely A Student Of World 3 Objects.

To Give A Causal Explanation Of An Event Means To Deduce A Statement Which Describes It, Using As Premises Of The Deduction One Or More Universal Laws, Together With Certain Singular Statements, The Initial Conditions ... We Have Thus Two Different Kinds Of Statement, Both Of Which Are Necessary Ingredients Of A Complete Causal Explanation.

The Use Of Violence Is Justified Only Under A Tyranny Which Makes Reforms Without Violence Impossible, And Should Have Only One Aim, That Is, To Bring About A State Of Affairs Which Makes Reforms Without Violence Possible.