The Act of Creation, London, (1970) p. 253.
Context: Einstein's space is no closer to reality than Van Gogh's sky. The glory of science is not in a truth more absolute than the truth of Bach or Tolstoy, but in the act of creation itself. The scientist's discoveries impose his own order on chaos, as the composer or painter imposes his; an order that always refers to limited aspects of reality, and is based on the observer's frame of reference, which differs from period to period as a Rembrant nude differs from a nude by Manet.
“Meaning is a much more fundamental notion than truth, indeed more fundamental even than the notion of "reality" itself. The basic argument [of the essay] was that claims about truth or reality are meanings made by people according to patterns that they have learned, and that trying to understand how and why people make the meanings they do is more useful than fighting over the truth of their claims.”
Source: Textual politics: Discourse and social dynamics, 1995, p. 156
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Jay Lemke 31
American academic 1946Related quotes
Source: Academy Series - Priscilla "Hutch" Hutchins, Odyssey (2006), Chapter 22 (p. 203)
“Genius, in truth, means little more than the faculty of perceiving in an unhabitual way.”
Source: 1890s, The Principles of Psychology (1890), Ch. 19
Source: The Writings of William James
Mayor Gherkin, Chapter 8, p. 120
Source: 2000s, At First Sight (2005)
Context: ... but what I eventually came to understand was that if a woman truly loves you, you can't always expect her to tell the truth. You see, women are more attuned to feelings than men are, and if they're not being truthful, more often than not it's because they think the truth might hurt your feelings. But it doesn't mean they don't love you.