“The only interesting answers are those which destroy the questions.”

—  Susan Sontag

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "The only interesting answers are those which destroy the questions." by Susan Sontag?
Susan Sontag photo
Susan Sontag 168
American writer and filmmaker, professor, and activist 1933–2004

Related quotes

Meher Baba photo

“There is only one question. And once you know the answer to that question there are no more to ask. That one question is the Original Question. And to that Original Question there is only one Final Answer. But between that Question and its Answer there are innumerable false answers.”

Meher Baba (1894–1969) Indian mystic

47 : The Question and its Answer, p. 78.
The Everything and the Nothing (1963)

Bertrand Russell photo

“There are a number of purely theoretical questions, of perennial and passionate interest, which science is unable to answer, at any rate at present.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

1940s, Philosophy for Laymen (1946)
Context: There are a number of purely theoretical questions, of perennial and passionate interest, which science is unable to answer, at any rate at present. Do we survive death in any sense, and if so, do we survive for a time or for ever? Can mind dominate matter, or does matter completely dominate mind, or has each, perhaps, a certain limited independence? Has the universe a purpose? Or is it driven by blind necessity? Or is it a mere chaos and jumble, in which the natural laws that we think we find are only a phantasy generated by our own love of order? If there is a cosmic scheme, has life more importance in it than astronomy would lead us to suppose, or is our emphasis upon life mere parochialism and self-importance? I do not know the answer to these questions, and I do not believe that anybody else does, but I think human life would be impoverished if they were forgotten, or if definite answers were accepted without adequate evidence. To keep alive the interest in such questions, and to scrutinize suggested answers, is one of the functions of philosophy.

Francis S. Collins photo

“There are answers that science isn’t able to provide about the natural world—the questions about why instead of the questions about how. I’m interested in the whys. I find many of those answers in the spiritual realm. That in no way compromises my ability to think rigorously as a scientist.”

Francis S. Collins (1950) Geneticist; Director of the National Institutes of Health

Time magazine http://www.numenware.com/article/547

Gautama Buddha photo

“There are these four ways of answering questions. Which four? There are questions that should be answered categorically [straightforwardly yes, no, this, that]. There are questions that should be answered with an analytical (qualified) answer [defining or redefining the terms]. There are questions that should be answered with a counter-question. There are questions that should be put aside. These are the four ways of answering questions.”

Gautama Buddha (-563–-483 BC) philosopher, reformer and the founder of Buddhism

As quoted in: Ṭhānissaro (Bhikkhu.) (2004) Handful of leaves. Vol. 3, p. 80

Michael Swanwick photo

“The oracle-glass was maddeningly literal, capable of answering only the question one asked, rather than that which one wanted answered.”

Michael Swanwick (1950) American science fiction author

Source: Short fiction, King Dragon (2003), p. 6

“The new world will be a place of answers and no questions, because the only questions left will be answered by computers, because only computers will know what to ask.”

James Cameron (journalist) (1911–1985) British journalist

Cameron Country, broadcast on BBC TV, July 12, 1969.

E. W. Hobson photo

“If the question be raised, why such an apparently special problem as the quadrature of the circle, is deserving of the sustained interest which has attained to it, and which it still possesses, the answer is only to be found in a scrutiny of the history of the problem, and especially in the closeness of the connection of that history with the general history of Mathematical Science.”

E. W. Hobson (1856–1933) British mathematician

Source: Squaring the Circle (1913), p. 2

Cory Doctorow photo

“It's the stupid questions that have some of the most surprising and interesting answers. Most people never think to ask the stupid questions.”

Cory Doctorow book For the Win

Source: For the Win

Sharron Angle photo

“I'll answer those questions when I'm the senator.”

Sharron Angle (1949) Former member of the Nevada Assembly from 1999 to 2007

Context: Nathan Baca: If you want to be one of 100 U. S. Senators that are deciding on war powers and on ratifying treaties, which is what a Senator has to do, you have to answer these questions.
Sharron Angle: Well, certainly. And I'll answer those questions when I'm the senator.

“What is the question, to which this is the answer?”

Nancy Kopell (1942) American mathematician

In an interview on DSweb. https://dsweb.siam.org/The-Magazine/Article/interview-with-nancy-kopell Also quoted by Alexandros Gelastopoulos in Synchronization properties and functional implications of parietal beta1 rhythm. https://open.bu.edu/handle/2144/38796 Doctoral dissertation, Boston University (2019). Preface.

Related topics