Money and Knowledge

The only thing more ironic than a wealthy businessman piously sitting in church every Sunday is the scholar sitting next to him even more piously. The love of money may be the root of all evil, but the appetite for knowledge is the original sin.

Uncoordinated

The search for originality and the search for truth are not coordinate investigations.

Remarkably Simple

A remarkable truth is simple, obvious, and irresistible.

Confidence

If we start with principles that are empirically plain and are not the manifestation of general opinion, which is frequently idealized, we can take confidence in our observations. If our principles prove themselves false later on, so be it. The mistake will be honest, it will be our own, and it may even make us wiser in the end. As long as our principles are sound, however, further investigation will only strengthen them.

Unit of Organization

Consider the following observation made by a classical scholar:

“The basis of political organization among the early Romans was the gens or clan. This unit of organization, which in one form or another is common to the Indo-European peoples, retained many of its characteristics and some measure of its social and political importance to a very late period.”

What does the decomposition of this unit of organization signify to those of us who represent the posterity of the Indo-Europeans? Progress? Decline? An indifferent act of nature?

Fate as a Whole

Does the species of man as a whole have a different fate than its individual members?

Perspective

Some are inclined to believe that people of the past were happier than we are now; others believe that they suffered more than we do.

Predictable

Physical probability predicts uniformity and disorder.

Unreasonable Claim

It is reasonable to claim through plain observation that somebody is different, strange, rare, or unique, that somebody is repulsive to us, to most of the human race, and even to himself. It is unreasonable, however, to claim that he is unnatural, if his existence is an observable fact.

Induced Deduction

It is a trick of the moral trade to insist upon deduction as an epistemological method, in defense of premises reached by a concealed or forgotten process of flimsy induction.