13 quotes found
“Shallow men believe in luck or in circumstance. Strong men believe in cause and effect.”
“Spinoza was the supreme rationalist. He saw an endless stream of causality in the world. For him there is no such entity as will or will power. Nothing happens capriciously. Everything is caused by...”
“Man is so intelligent that he feels impelled to invent theories to account for what happens in the world. Unfortunately, he is not quite intelligent enough, in most cases, to find correct explanati...”
“To imagine the way we think is the singular causative agent of all we go through is to practice cruelty toward ourselves.”
“There are no telegraphs on Tralfamadore. But you're right: each clump of symbols is a brief, urgent message-- describing a situation, a scene. We Tralfamadorians read them all at once, not one afte...”
“The only simple truth is that there is nothing simple in this complex universe. Everything relates. Everything connects”
“The sum of the particular intentions of God is the universe itself.”
“Thirty years ago, we used to ask: Can a computer simulate all processes of logic? The answer was yes, but the question was surely wrong. We should have asked: Can logic simulate all sequences of ca...”
“Causality is a pointless superstition. These days it would take more than one book to persuade anyone of that.”
“We are particularly concerned with the question to what degree approval and implementation of an explanatory model minimising collective or institutional responsibility for certain problems and emp...”
“Thus he has two standpoints from which he can consider himself...: first, as belonging to the world of sense, under the laws of nature (heteronomy), and, second, as belonging to the intelligible wo...”
“Insofar as it is true, the idea that our actions or beliefs are merely one link in a causal link that runs back to the beginning of the universe is making a trivial claim. Insofar as it is saying s...”
