“An aphorism can never be the whole truth; it is either a half-truth or a truth-and-a-half.”
Die Fackel no. 270/71 (19 January 1909)
Die Fackel
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Karl Kraus 94
Czech playwright and publicist 1874–1936Related quotes
Prologue.
Attributed from posthumous publications, Dialogues of Alfred North Whitehead (1954)
“Half the Truth is often as arrant a Lye, as can be made.”
Political, Moral, and Miscellaneous Reflections (1750), Miscellaneous Thoughts and Reflections
“The most effective propaganda is a mixture of truths, half truths, and lies.”
Counterterrorism and Cybersecurity: Total Information Awareness (2nd Edition), 2015
“It’s always better to tell a half-truth than a half-lie.”
Source: Moon Over Soho (2011), Chapter 13, “Autumn Leaves” (p. 277)
“Add a few drops of venom to a half truth and you have an absolute truth.”
Section 216
The Passionate State Of Mind, and Other Aphorisms (1955)
“Who never doubted never half believed
Where doubt there truth is—'t is her shadow.”
Scene V, A Country Town; comparable to Alfred, Lord Tennyson "There lives more faith in honest doubt / Believe me, than in half the creeds."
Festus (1839)
“Now, there is a good foundation for this. But it's a half-truth.”
Interview with David Brancaccio (2003)
Context: The Republican Party has been captured by a bunch of extremists … People who maintain that markets will take care of everything, that you leave it to the markets and the markets know best. Therefore, you need no government, no interference with business. Let everybody pursue his own interests. And that will serve the common interest. Now, there is a good foundation for this. But it's a half-truth.
Source: Social Amnesia: A Critique of Conformist Psychology from Adler to Laing (1975), p. 23-25
Context: The Adlerians, in the name of “individual psychology,” take the side of society against the individual. … Adler’s later thought succumbs to the worst of his earlier banalization. It is conventional, practical, and moralistic. “Our science … is based on common sense.” Common sense, the half-truths of a deceitful society, is honored as the honest truths of a frank world.