“Surely it is more interesting to argue about what the truth is, than about what some particular thinker, however great, did or did not think.”

—  David Deutsch, book The Fabric of Reality

The Fabric of Reality (1997)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "Surely it is more interesting to argue about what the truth is, than about what some particular thinker, however great,…" by David Deutsch?
David Deutsch photo
David Deutsch20
British physicist 1953

Related quotes

Albert Camus photo

“I may not have been sure about what really did interest me, but I was absolutely sure about what didn't.”

Albert Camus book The Stranger

The Stranger (1942)

“There continue to be complex debates about what Nietzsche understood truth to be. Quite certainly, he did not think, in pragmatist spirit, that beliefs are true if they serve our interests or welfare: we have just seen some of his repeated denials of this idea. The more recently fashionable view is that he was the first of the deniers, thinking that there is no such thing as truth, or that truth is what anyone thinks it is, or that it is a boring category that we can do without. This is also wrong, and more deeply so. Nietzsche did not think that the ideal of truthfulness went into retirement when its metaphysical origins were discovered, and he did not suppose, either, that truthfulness could be detached from a concern for the truth. Truthfulness as an ideal retains its power, and so far from his seeing truth as dispensable or malleable, his main question is how it can be made bearable.”

Bernard Williams (1929–2003) English moral philosopher

Source: Truth and Truthfulness (2002), p. 16

“A great deal of what we know about reality is accompanied by little more interest than simple curiosity.”

Roger Haight (1936) American theologian

Source: Dynamics Of Theology, Chapter Eight, Symbolic Religious Communication, p. 147

Dejan Stojanovic photo

“If what we think of ourselves were true, the planet would overflow with geniuses. They blossomed; they did not talk about blossoming. They grew; they did not talk about growing.”

Dejan Stojanovic (1959) poet, writer, and businessman

“A Thought about Ourselves,” p. 122
The Sun Watches the Sun (1999), Sequence: “Hopelessness”

Van Morrison photo

“Men saw the stars at the edge of the sea
They thought great thoughts about liberty
Poets wrote down words that did fit
Writers wrote books
Thinkers thought about it.”

Van Morrison (1945) Northern Irish singer-songwriter and musician

Take It Where You Find It
Song lyrics, Wavelength (1978)

George Bancroft photo

“Truth is not exciting enough to those who depend on the characters and lives of their neighbors for all their amusement; and if a story is told of more than common interest, ennui is sure to have its joy in adding embellishments. If hours did not hang heavy, what would become of scandal?”

George Bancroft (1800–1891) American historian and statesman

"Ennui", p. 64
Literary and Historical Miscellanies (1855)

Margrethe II of Denmark photo

“We do not have that much to moan about when one thinks of what people did not moan about before.”

Margrethe II of Denmark (1940) Queen of Denmark

From &#x27;Om man så må sige – 350 Dronning Margrethe-citater&#x27;, quoted in English here http://trondni.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/new-books-wit-and-wisdom-of-margrethe-ii.html. <br class="br">Society

“I am less than what you tell about me but more than what you think about me”

Ali book Nahj al-Balagha

Nahj al-Balagha
Context: A man sarcastically started praising Imam Ali, though he had no faith in him and Imam Ali hearing these praises from him said "I am less than what you tell about me but more than what you think about me."

Nicholas Sparks photo

“When I told you that I’d pray for you, what did you think I was talking about?”

Nicholas Sparks book A Walk to Remember

Source: A Walk to Remember

Woodrow Wilson photo

“We are constantly thinking of the great war … which which we think to-day as a war which saved the Union, and it did indeed save the Union, but it was a war that did a great deal more than that. It created in this country what had never existed before — a national consciousness. It was not the salvation of the Union, it was the rebirth of the Union.”

Woodrow Wilson (1856–1924) American politician, 28th president of the United States (in office from 1913 to 1921)

Memorial Day Address (31 May 1915)
1910s

Related topics