“That an error made on your own is safer than ten truths accepted on faith, because the first leaves you the means to correct it but the second destroys your capacity to distinguish truth from error.”

—  Ayn Rand

Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "That an error made on your own is safer than ten truths accepted on faith, because the first leaves you the means to co…" by Ayn Rand?
Ayn Rand photo
Ayn Rand 322
Russian-American novelist and philosopher 1905–1982

Related quotes

Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle photo

“It is more reasonable to remove error from truth, than to venerate error because it is mix'd with truth.”

Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle (1657–1757) French writer, satirist and philosopher of enlightenment

p, 125
The History of Oracles, and the Cheats of the Pagan Priests (1688)

Hans Reichenbach photo
Sigmund Freud photo

“From error to error, one discovers the entire truth.”

Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) Austrian neurologist known as the founding father of psychoanalysis
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe photo

“It is as certain as it is marvelous that truth and error come from one source. Therefore one often may not injure error, because at the same time one injures truth.”

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) German writer, artist, and politician

Es ist so gewiß als wunderbar, daß Wahrheit und Irrthum aus Einer Quelle entstehen; deßwegen man oft dem Irrthum nicht schaden darf, weil man zugleich der Wahrheit schadet.
Maxims and Reflections (1833)

Francis Bacon photo

“Truth will sooner come out from error than from confusion.”

Aphorism 20
Novum Organum (1620), Book II

“There are then, at least two dialectical truths. The first is that you and I are reasonable creatures; the second that you and I ought to be reasonable. Because of the second, we can say not merely that we cannot reasonably deny the first, but also that we ought not to deny it. If these dialectical propositions are errors, they are irrefutable errors: there is no way for men qua rational creatures to find out what is wrong with them, just as there is no way for men qua rational creatures to cast doubt on their truth.”

Frank Van Dun (1947) Belgian law philosopher

"The Logic of Common Morality" http://web.archive.org/web/20060616233942/http://www.stephankinsella.com/texts/vandun_philosophy_argument.pdf, from E.M. Barth and J.L. Martens, eds., Argumentation Approaches to Theory Formation: Containing the contributions to the Groningen Conference on the Theory of Argumentation, October 1978 (Benjamins, 1982; original from the University of Michigan, digitized Mar 12, 2007. ISBN 9-027-23007-2, 333 pages).

Georg Brandes photo

“The stream of time sweeps away errors, and leaves the truth for the inheritance of humanity.”

Georg Brandes (1842–1927) Danish literature critic and scholar

Ferdinand Lassalle (1881)

Mahatma Gandhi photo

“An error does not become truth by reason of multiplied propagation, nor does truth become error because nobody sees it. Truth stands, even if there be no public support. It is self sustained.”

Mahatma Gandhi (1869–1948) pre-eminent leader of Indian nationalism during British-ruled India

Young India 1924-1926 (1927), p. 1285
1920s

Related topics