A Quote by Bertrand Russell

The finding of arguments for a conclusion given in advance is not philosophy, but special pleading

Bertrand Russell

Quote Topics

Advance Conclusion Finding Given Philosophy Pleading Special

Quote Author

Bertrand Russell
British - Celebrity
May 18, 1872 - February 2, 1970

One of the difficulties of politics is that politicians are shocked by those who are really prepared to let their thinking reach any conclusion. Political thinking consists in deciding upon the conclusion first and then finding good arguments for it. An open mind is considered irresponsible- and perhaps it really is.

Richard Crossman

Some of my understanding of what philosophy and ethics is has changed very slowly. One thing that has changed is this for quite a long time I bought-into the idea that philosophy is basically about arguments. I'm increasingly of the view that it isn't. The most interesting things in philosophy aren't arguments. The thing that I think is underestimated is what I call a form of attending. I think that philosophy is at least as much about carefully attending to things as it is about the structure of arguments.

Julian Baggini

The terminology of philosophical art is coercive: arguments are powerful and best when they are knockdown, arguments force you to a conclusion, if you believe the premisses you have to or must believe the conclusion, some arguments do not carry much punch, and so forth. A philosophical argument is an attempt to get someone to believe something, whether he wants to beleive it or not. A successful philosophical argument, a strong argument, forces someone to a belief.

Robert Nozick

When people believe a conclusion is true, they are also very likely to believe arguments that appear to support it, even when these arguments are unsound.

Daniel Kahneman

An advocate who has been well paid in advance will find the cause he is pleading all the more just.

Blaise Pascal

Philosophy is this amazing technique we've devised for getting reality to answer us back when we're getting it wrong. Science itself can't make those arguments. You actually have to rely on philosophy, on philosophy of science.

Rebecca Goldstein

Yes, I have a philosophy, and you have to come with good arguments to change that philosophy, but, if someone has a better argument than me, then I will change.

Louis van Gaal

In thousands of years there has been no advance in public morals, in philosophy, in religion or in politics, but the advance in business has been the greatest miracle the world has ever known.

E. W. Howe

Everybody have equal rights to a life of full flourishing. Philosophy slowly, slowly has given us arguments saying, look, you already committed to your own life flourishing, and you're being inconsistent if you don't expand it. So philosophy often works in trying to show us that there's an inner incoherence in our points of view. We're all committed to one thing when it comes to us and our own kind, but we're not willing to expand it and we're guilty of inconsistency.

Rebecca Goldstein

Rules are not improved by sloganeering, fact-free letter-writing campaigns, or special pleading from interest groups.

Cass Sunstein

The period of time between the uncovering of some fundamental scientific finding that underpinned a medical advance, and the realization of the corresponding advance in the form of a new drug or medical technique that improves the health of patients, is being continually hastened.

Scott Gottlieb

Even when I was a grown woman, he [Father] would leave me on the edge of hysteria in all our arguments: though I married and lived as far as I could spiritually from Bridgeport, he reduced me in a matter of hours to a wriggling child, pleading to go free.

Maureen Howard

What do you know about me, given that I believe in secrecy? ... If I stick where I am, if I don't travel around, like anyone else I make my inner journeys that I can only measure by my emotions, and express very obliquely and circuitously in what I write. ... Arguments from one's own privileged experience are bad and reactionary arguments.

Gilles Deleuze

I share a special bond with Ajax. I think we are a special club. And we're known for our philosophy around the world.

Edwin van der Sar

It's very important to follow your instincts because, beyond what you know exists or what you're told exists in a given area, your intuition plays a big part in finding something special.