Lakatos Imre Quotes & Sayings

Philosophy of science without history of science is empty; history of science without philosophy of science is blind. — Imre Lakatos

The great scientific achievements are research programmes which can be evaluated in terms of progressive and degenerative problemshifts; and scientific revolutions consist of one research programme superceding (overtaking in progress) another. This methodology offers a new rational reconstruction of science. — Imre Lakatos

In degenerating programmes, however, theories are fabricated only in order to accommodate known facts — Imre Lakatos

No experimental result can ever kill a theory: any theory can be saved from counterinstances either by some auxiliary hypothesis or by a suitable reinterpretation of its terms. — Imre Lakatos

It's not a matter of what you deserve -- and more to the point -- certainly not a matter of what you THINK you deserve. All that matters is what you're committed to, and how you honor that commitment, and -- sometimes -- what you are blessed by. — M. Allen Cunningham

I'm just another guy starting out. — Tim Tebow

Indeed, this epistemological theory of the relation between theory and experiment differs sharply from the epistemological theory of naive falsificationism. — Imre Lakatos

Come on, let's go meet the guy who thinks he's my better half . And dear God, I apologize ahead of time if he starts talking to you about how many eight-point bucks he's planning to hunt this weekend. — J. Lynn

You cannot out-train bad nutrition. It's impossible. — Scott Eastwood

The clash between Popper and Kuhn is not about a mere technical point in epistemology. — Imre Lakatos

Marvellous, what ideas the young people have these days. But I don't believe a word of it. — Albert Einstein

In the first few pages, Kundera discusses several abstract historical figures: Robespierre, Nietzsche, Hitler. For Eunice's sake, I wanted him to get to the plot, to introduce actual "living" characters - I recalled this was a love story - and to leave the world of ideas behind. Here we were, two people lying in bed, Eunice's worried head propped on my collarbone, and I wanted us to feel something in common. I wanted this complex language, this surge of intellect, to be processed into love. Isn't that how they used to do it a century ago, people reading poetry to one another? — Gary Shteyngart

It is always useful to think badly about people one has exploited or plans to exploit ... No one likes to think of him or herself as a bad person. To treat badly another person whom we consider a reasonable human being creates a tension between act and attitude that demands resolution. We cannot erase what we have done, and to alter our future behavior may not be in our interest. To change our attitude is easier. — James W. Loewen

The soul is that which beholds beauty even when the mind denies it. — Neale Donald Walsch

Instead of being a page-turner, 'Moby-Dick' is a repository of American history and culture and the essentials of Western literature. The book is so encyclopedic that space aliens could use it to re-create the whale fishery as it once existed on the planet Earth in the midst of the 19th century. — Nathaniel Philbrick

One may rationally stick to a degenerating research programme until it is overtaken by a rival and even after. What one must not do is to deny its poor public record ... It is perfectly rational to play a risky game: what is irrational is to deceive oneself about the risk. — Imre Lakatos

Yeah one run!" Agres yelled Tria and Agres quickly turned back heading east they had no idea where they were going as the fire began to catch up with them Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Was all that was going through Tria's head. — Charon Lloyd-Roberts

When you're tan, you feel better about yourself. — Nicole Polizzi

There is no falsification before the emergence of a better theory. — Imre Lakatos

Blind commitment to a theory is not an intellectual virtue: it is an intellectual crime. — Imre Lakatos

Every night is different, a ball of thread that unrolls differently. — Jane Siberry

Research programmes, besides their negative heuristic, are also characterized by their positive heuristic. — Imre Lakatos

Our empirical criterion for a series of theories is that it should produce new facts. The idea of growth and the concept of empirical character are soldered into one. — Imre Lakatos

The positive heuristic of the programme saves the scientist from becoming confused by the ocean of anomalies. — Imre Lakatos

The classical example of a successful research programme is Newton's gravitational theory: possibly the most successful research programme ever. — Imre Lakatos

It would be wrong to assume that one must stay with a research programme until it has exhausted all its heuristic power, that one must not introduce a rival programme before everybody agrees that the point of degeneration has probably been reached. — Imre Lakatos

... the role of the disappointed lover of a maiden or of any single woman might be ridiculous; but the role of a man who was pursuing a married woman, and who made it the purpose of his life at all cost to draw her into adultery, was one which had in it something beautiful and dignified and could never be ridiculous ... . — Leo Tolstoy

A writer is a reader who is moved to emulation. — William Maxwell

The history of mathematics, lacking the guidance of philosophy, [is] blind, while the philosophy of mathematics, turning its back on the most intriguing phenomena in the history of mathematics, is empty. — Imre Lakatos

Intellectual honesty consists in stating the precise conditions under which one will give up one's belief. — Imre Lakatos

Einstein's results again turned the tables and now very few philosophers or scientists still think that scientific knowledge is, or can be, proven knowledge. — Imre Lakatos

If even in science there is no a way of judging a theory but by assessing the number, faith and vocal energy of its supporters, then this must be even more so in the social sciences: truth lies in power. — Imre Lakatos

That sometimes clear ... and sometimes vague stuff ... which is ... mathematics. — Imre Lakatos

I wanted to show off - a simple impulse or drive; in much the same way as some kids wanted to play football, I wanted to show off. Not complicated in that sense, very natural; it just depends on how you want to show off. — Dylan Moran

Mathematics does not grow through a monotonous increase of the number of indubitably established theorems but through the incessant improvement of guesses by speculation and criticism, by the logic of proofs and refutations. — Imre Lakatos

Belief may be a regrettably unavoidable biological weakness to be kept under the control of criticism: but commitment is for Popper an outright crime. — Imre Lakatos

Man's respect for knowledge is one of his most peculiar characteristics. Knowledge in Latin is scientia, and science came to be the name of the most respectable kind of knowledge. — Imre Lakatos

It is not that we propose a theory and Nature may shout NO; rather, we propose a maze of theories, and Nature may shout INCONSISTENT. — Imre Lakatos

The proving power of the intellect or the senses was questioned by the skeptics more than two thousand years ago; but they were browbeaten into confusion by the glory of Newtonian physics. — Imre Lakatos