Zitate
Miyamoto Musashi | Truth is not what you want it to be
"Truth is not what you want it to be; it is what it is. And you must bend to its power or live a lie."
Miyamoto Musashi
Erich Fromm | Indeed, freedom and the capacity for disobedience are inseparable
"Indeed, freedom and the capacity for disobedience are inseparable; hence any social, political, and religious system which proclaims freedom, yet stamps out disobedience, cannot speak the truth."
Erich Fromm
Voltaire | men can be influenced by making them think for themselves
"Controversy never convinced any man; men can be influenced by making them think for themselves, by seeming to doubt with them, by leading them as if by the hand, without their perceiving it. A good book lent to them, which they read at leisure, produces upon them surer effects, because they do not then blush to be subjugated by the superior reason of an antagonist."
Voltaire
Ayn Rand | He is free to evade reality
"He is free to evade reality, he is free to unfocus his mind and stumble blindly down any road he pleases, but not free to avoid the abyss he refuses to see."
Ayn Rand
Thomas von Aquin | The greatest kindness
"The greatest kindness one can render to any man consists in leading him from error to truth."
Thomas von Aquin
Daniel Dennett | There’s simply no polite way
"There’s simply no polite way to tell people they’ve dedicated their lives to an illusion."
Daniel Dennett
Søren Kierkegaard | There are two ways to be fooled
"There are two ways to be fooled. One is to believe what isn't true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true."
Søren Kierkegaard
Ljudmila Ulitzkaya | Whoever comes to power has passed through a filter
"Whoever comes to power has passed through a filter that does not let decent people pass."
Ljudmila Ulitzkaya
Adyashanti | Enlightenment is a destructive process
"Enlightenment is a destructive process. It has nothing to do with becoming better or being happier. Enlightenment is the crumbling away of untruth. It’s seeing through the facade of pretense. It’s the complete eradication of everything we imagined to be true."
Adyashant
Mahatma Gandhi | the truth is still the truth
"Many people, especially ignorant people, want to punish you for speaking the truth, for being correct, for being you. Never apologize for being correct, or for being years ahead of your time. If you’re right and you know it, speak your mind. Speak your mind. Even if you are a minority of one, the truth is still the truth."
Mahatma Gandhi
Winston Churchill | Men occasionally stumble over the truth
"Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened."
Winston Churchill
Carl Sagan | Imagination will often carry us to worlds
"Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere."
Carl Sagan
Bertrand Russell | system of deception
"Educational systems have been developed not to impart genuine knowledge but to make the people docile to the will of the rulers. Without a sophisticated system of deception in schools, it would be impossible to maintain the appearance of democracy. It is not desired that ordinary citizens think for themselves. Because it is believed that people who think for themselves are difficult to handle. Only the elites are supposed to think. The rest are supposed to obey and follow their leaders, like a herd of mutton. This doctrine has corrupted all state education systems from the ground up, even in democracies."
Bertrand Russell
José Ortega y Gasset | Universal suffrage
"Universal suffrage did not give the masses the right to decide, but to approve the decision of one elite or another."
José Ortega y Gasset
Noam Chomsky | The general population doesn’t know
"The general population doesn't know what's happening, and it doesn't even know that it doesn't know."
Noam Chomsky
James Dresden | Die ideale Tyrannei
"Die ideale Tyrannei ist die, die ignorant von seinen Opfern selbstverwaltet wird. Die perfektesten Sklaven sind deshalb die, die sich glückselig und unbewusst versklaven lassen."
James Dresden
James Dresden | A truth’s initial commotion
"A truth’s initial commotion is directly proportional to how deeply the lie was believed. It wasn’t the world being round that agitated people, but that the world wasn’t flat. When a well-packaged web of lies has been sold gradually to the masses over generations, the truth will seem utterly preposterous and its speaker a raving lunatic."
James Dresden
John Adams | Fear is the foundation of most governments
"Fear is the foundation of most governments; but it is so sordid and brutal a passion, and renders men in whose breasts it predominates so stupid and miserable, that Americans will not be likely to approve of any political institution which is founded on it."
John Adams
Plato | Strange times are these in which we live
"Strange times are these in which we live when old and young are taught falsehoods in school. And the person that dares to tell the truth is called at once a lunatic and fool"
Plato
Jean-Claude Juncker | step by step until there is no turning back
"We decide on something, leave it lying around, and wait and see what happens. If no one kicks up a fuss, because most people don't understand what has been decided, we continue step by step until there is no turning back."
Jean-Claude Juncker
Emile Zola | If you shut up truth
"If you shut up truth and bury it under the ground, it will but grow, and gather to itself such explosive power that the day it bursts through it will blow up everything in its way."
Emile Zola
Friedrich Dürrenmatt | Whoever is content with the world
"Whoever is content with the world, and who profits from its lack of justice, does not want to change it."
Friedrich Dürrenmatt
