The possibilities that lie in the future are infinite. When I say ‘It is our duty to remain optimists,’ this includes not only the openness of the future but also that which all of us contribute to it by everything we do: we are all responsible for what the future holds in store. Thus it is our duty, not to prophesy evil but, rather, to fight for a better world. — Karl Popper, The Myth of the Framework (1994)

The color of the Sun ten billion years hence depends on gravity and radiation pressure, on convection and nucleosynthesis. It does not depend at all on the geology of Venus, the chemistry of Jupiter, or the pattern of craters on the Moon. But it does depend on what happens to intelligent life on the planet Earth. It depends on politics and economics and the outcomes of wars. It depends on what people do: what decisions they make, what problems they solve, what values they adopt, and on how they behave towards their children. — David Deutsch, The Fabric of Reality, Chapter 8: The Significance of Life

Don't worry about what anybody else is going to do. The best way to predict the future is to invent it. — Alan Kay

Pessimists sound smart. Optimists make money. — Nat Friedman

In the interests of the quest for truth and of our liberation from errors we have to train ourselves to view our own favourite ideas just as critically as those we oppose. — Karl Popper

The true Enlightenment thinker, the true rationalist, never wants to talk anyone into anything. No, he does not even want to convince; all the time he is aware that he may be wrong. Above all, he values the intellectual independence of others too highly to want to convince them in important matters. He would much rather invite contradiction, preferably in the form of rational and disciplined criticism. He seeks not to convince but to arouse - to challenge others to form free opinions. — Karl Popper

Enlightenment is the emancipation of man from a state of self-imposed tutelage ... of incapacity to use his own intelligence without external guidance. Such a state of tutelage I call 'self-imposed' is due, not to lack of intelligence, but to lack of courage or determination to use one's own intelligence without the help of a leader. Sapere aude! Dare to use your own intelligence! This is the battle-cry of the Enlightenment. — Immanuel Kant

[A rationalist] is a man who would rather be unsuccessful in convincing another man by argument than successful in crushing him by force, by intimidation and threats, or even by persuasive propaganda. — Karl Popper

We live on an island surrounded by a sea of ignorance. As our island of knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance. — John Wheeler

The existing scientific concepts cover always only a very limited part of reality, and the other part that has not yet been understood is infinite. — Werner Heisenberg

Science is most significant as one of the greatest spiritual adventures that man has yet known. — Karl Popper

Although I am a typical loner in daily life, my consciousness of belonging to the invisible community of those who strive for truth, beauty, and justice has preserved me from feeling isolated. — A. Einstein

If I thought of a future, I dreamt of one day founding a school in which young people could learn without boredom, and would be stimulated to pose problems and discuss them; a school in which no unwanted answers to unasked questions would have to be listened to; in which one did not study for the sake of passing examinations. — Karl Popper, Unended Quest, p. 40

Hence it appears that no vice can be more destructive than that which teaches us to regard any judgment as final, and not open to review. — William Godwin

The only real radicalism in our time will come as it always has — from people who insist on thinking for themselves and who reject party-mindedness. — Christopher Hitchens

If the future was present approved, everyone would be doing it. — Bryan Johnson

Mimicking the herd invites regression to the mean. — Charlie Munger

One should respect public opinion in so far as is necessary to avoid starvation and to keep out of prison, but anything that goes beyond this is voluntary submission to an unnecessary tyranny, and is likely to interfere with happiness in all kinds of ways. A society composed of men and women who do not bow too much to the conventions is a far more interesting society than one in which all behave alike. —Bertrand Russell

When you develop your opinions on the basis of weak evidence, you will have difficulty interpreting subsequent information that contradicts these opinions, even if this new information is obviously more accurate. — Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Whenever a theory appears to you as the only possible one, take this as a sign that you have neither understood the theory nor the problem which it was intended to solve. ― Karl Popper

In this age, the mere example of nonconformity, the mere refusal to bend the knee to custom, is itself a service. Precisely because the tyranny of opinion is such as to make eccentricity a reproach, it is desirable, in order to break through that tyranny, that people should be eccentric. Eccentricity has always abounded when and where strength of character has abounded; and the amount of eccentricity in a society has generally been proportional to the amount of genius, mental vigour, and moral courage which it contained. That so few now dare to be eccentric, marks the chief danger of the time. — J. S. Mill

The ultimate resource is people—skilled, spirited, and hopeful people who will exert their wills and imaginations for their own benefit, and so, inevitably, for the benefit of us all. — Julian Simon

I think that there is only one way to science - or to philosophy, for that matter: to meet a problem, to see its beauty and fall in love with it; to get married to it and to live with it happily, till death do ye part - unless you should meet another and even more fascinating problem or unless, indeed, you should obtain a solution. But even if you do obtain a solution, you may then discover, to your delight, the existence of a whole family of enchanting, though perhaps difficult, problem children, for whose welfare you may work, with a purpose, to the end of your days. — Karl Popper

Your blessing in life is when you find the torture you're comfortable with. And that's marriage, kids, work, exercise... not eating the food you want to eat. Find the torture you're comfortable with, and you'll do well. — Jerry Seinfeld

I don’t believe in being good at a lot of things—or even more than one. You want it to be all you’ve got. People are always trying to add more stuff to life. Reduce it to simpler, pure moments. That’s the golden way of living, I think. — Jerry Seinfeld

When you love something it's a bottomless pool of energy. You can't force yourself to be what you make yourself into. Love is endless, will is finite. — Jerry Seinfeld

If you’re efficient, you’re doing it the wrong way. The right way is the hard way. The show was successful because I micromanaged it—every word, every line, every take, every edit, every casting. That’s my way of life. — Jerry Seinfeld

Freedom's worst enemy is anarchy. — John Gray

It took some time before I recognized that [egalitarianism] as no more than a beautiful dream; that freedom is more important than equality; that the attempt to realize equality endangers freedom; that, if freedom is lost, there will be no equality among the unfree. — Karl Popper

Those who promise us paradise on earth never produced anything but a hell. — Karl Popper

I hold that he who teaches that not reason but love should rule opens up the way for those who rule by hate. — Karl Popper

If our civilization is to survive, we must break with the habit of deference to great men. — Karl Popper

You don't have to be brilliant, only a little bit wiser than the other guys, on average, for a long, long time. — Charlie Munger

The best thing a human being can do is to help another human being know more. — Charlie Munger

I think a life properly lived is just learn, learn, learn all the time. — Charlie Munger

Climb as high as you can by advancing one inch at a time, that’s the secret of life — Charlie Munger

The greatest danger for most of us is not that our aim is too high and we miss it, but that it is too low and we reach it. — Michelangelo

La civilisation commence quand tu donnes la priorité à l'autre sur toi-même. — Emmanuel Levinas

If we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — Karl Popper

If you see fraud and don’t say fraud, you are a fraud. — Nassim Taleb

If you do not take risks for your opinion, you are nothing. — Nassim Taleb

The secret of intellectual excellence is the spirit of criticism; it is intellectual independence. — Karl Popper

Every intellectual has a very special responsibility. He has the privilege and the opportunity of studying. In return, he owes it to his fellow men (or ‘to society’) to represent the results of his study as simply, clearly and modestly as he can. — Karl Popper

You have to be willing to take whatever you’ve done and whoever you were and throw them away. The more the outside world tries to reinforce an image of you, the harder it is to continue to be an artist. — Steve Jobs

I much prefer the sharpest criticism of a single intelligent man to the thoughtless approval of the masses. — Johannes Kepler

It is not knowledge, but the act of learning, not possession but the act of getting there, which grants the greatest enjoyment. — Carl Gauss

I don't believe in the idea that there are a few peculiar people capable of understanding math, and the rest of the world is normal. Math is a human discovery, and it's no more complicated than humans can understand. I had a calculus book once that said, 'What one fool can do, another can.' What we've been able to work out about nature may look abstract and threatening to someone who hasn't studied it, but it was fools who did it, and in the next generation, all the fools will understand it. There's a tendency to pomposity in all this, to make it deep and profound. ― Richard P. Feynman

Freedom is no mere ideology but a way of life which makes life better and more worth living. — Karl Popper

To be an individualist means to see in every human individual an end in itself, and not merely a means to further other interests, for example, those of the state. — Karl Popper

Life is not a dress rehearsal — this is probably it. Make it count. Time is extremely limited and goes by fast. Do what makes you happy and fulfilled — few people get remembered hundreds of years after they die anyway. Don’t do stuff that doesn’t make you happy (this happens most often when other people want you to do something). Don’t spend time trying to maintain relationships with people you don’t like, and cut negative people out of your life. Negativity is really bad. Don’t let yourself make excuses for not doing the things you want to do. — Sam Altman