Quotes About Debate

If you want to see tribalism at its fiercest, check out a "Nikon vs. Canon" Internet discussion group.)

Linguists call the inventory of concepts and the schemes that combine them "conceptual semantics."1 Conceptual semantics—the language of thought—must be distinct from language itself, or we would have nothing to go on when we debate what our words mean.

When Tetlock was asked at a public lecture to forecast the nature of forecasting, he said, "When the audience of 2515 looks back on the audience of 2015, their level of contempt for how we go about judging political debate will be roughly comparable to the level of contempt we have for the 1692 Salem witch trials.

Disagreement is necessary in deliberations among mortals.

You must force yourself to consider opposing arguments. Especially when they challenge your best loved ideas.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.

It's the chattering buzz of ideologically possessed demons.

the best way to learn about something is to talk about it

Without free speech there is no true thought.

tedious, ideology-ridden professors.

biologists have been arguing for decades about the definition of "life" (the zombie-rights activists are a powerful lobby group),

La polémica es, después de todo, la forma única de la labor intelectual: la república de gérmenes racionales que constituye nuestra alma no es más que un fermento peculiar de lo que ya hay en otras almas. El contenido de nuestro cerebro se organiza en la lucha con los idearios ajenos. La historia de las ciencias es íntegramente la relación de las polémicas entre grandes pensadores.

If you publish a scientific paper it is very hard to start a nationwide debate about something. If you do this in a movie, you can start a debate. We like to create a bridge between those two worlds - film and science.

Arguments out of a pretty mouth are unanswerable.

Our disputants put me in mind of the skuttle fish, that when he is unable to extricate himself, blackens all the water about him, till be becomes invisible.

Much might be said on both sides.

My voice is still for war.Gods! can a Roman senate long debateWhich of the two to choose, slavery or death?

Oratory is the power to talk people out of their sober and natural opinions.

Most Canadians don't understand the House of Commons. They turn on their televisions, see us yelling at one another, and dismiss us as a bunch of fools.

The aim of an argument or discussion should not be victory, but progress.

El objetivo de la argumentación o de la discusión, no debe de ser la victoria, si no el progreso

O siamo capaci di sconfiggere le opinioni contrarie con la discussione, o dobbiamo lasciarle esprimere. Non è possibile sconfiggere le opinioni con la forza, perché questo blocca il libero sviluppo dell'intelligenza.

Brouwer's criticisms of classical mathematics were concerned with what I shall refer to as "the debasement of meaning".

Those who invalidate reason, ought seriously to consider, 'whether they argue against reason, with or without reason; if with reason, then they establish the principle, that they are laboring to dethrone;' but if they argue without reason, (which, in order to be consistent with themselves, they must do,) they are out of the reach of rational conviction, nor do they deserve a rational argument.