Quotes About Pragmatism

I'm not an anarchist any longer, because I've concluded that anarchism is an impractical ideal.

When certain characteristics of growing churches become the "holy grail," simply because they work, not because they are biblically sound, then pragmatism has become an idol.

Some people are pragmatists, taking things as they come and making the best of the choices available. Some people are idealists, standing for principle and refusing to compromise. And some people just act on any whim that enters their heads. I pragmatically turn my whims into principles - Calvin

The politics of the possible was being replaced by the politics of purity.

"True" resembles... a compliment paid to sentences that seem to be paying their way and that fit in with other sentences which are doing so.

In this dismissal of origins we see the new pragmatism.

We live, not as we wish to, but as we can.

Life is not a romance novel

We live, not as we wish to, but as we can.

More erudite authors who advocate an irrationalist point of view, such as the pragmatist philosophers, are not to be caught out so easily. They maintain that there is no such thing as objective fact to which our opinions must conform if they are to be true. For them opinions are merely weapons in the struggle for existence, and those which help a man to survive are to be called "true.

Action requires focus and priorities and these inherently require compromises and pragmatism.

The common agenda both sides seem to share is: Whatever works.

When roles shift, ideologies have to shift, and ideologies hate to shift. The workaround is pragmatism—"a practical way of thinking concerned with results rather than with theories and principles." The shift is deeper than moving from one ideology to another; the shift is to discard ideology entirely.

It is unlucky to be stubborn in the face of insurmountable odds

dass es völlig hirnrissig ist, etwas für andere Menschen zu tun, weil man selbst ein Mensch ist und deshalb weiß, wie wenig sie es verdienen? Kaum hat man das erkannt, bricht der Sinn jeglicher Beschäftigung in sich zusammen, und alles, was man fortan unternimmt, kann nur noch als Teil eines Spiels geschehen. Die Christen waren schlicht Pragmatiker mit ihrem 'Liebe deinen Nächsten'. Nur das 'wie dich selbst' hätten sie weglassen sollen.

Ein Tier muss an nichts glauben außer an den unsinnigen Sinn des Überlebens. Allein, der pragmatische Mensch unterscheidet sich vom pragmatischen Tier in einer bedeutenden Einzelheit. Sein Spieltrieb erlischt nicht mit dem Eintritt der Geschlechtsreife. Sein Spieltrieb lebt ewig.

Jenseits von jugendlichen Leidenschaften begegnete man der Welt am besten mit gut gekühltem Pragmatismus.

foreign policy is a matter of costs and benefits, not theology.

Finally, the president added, 'The American people are idealists, but they also want their leaders to be realistic...

The originals are not original, but that Emersonian irony yield to the Emersonian pragmatism that the inventor knows how to borrow.

I'm not religious, I'm not romantic and I live purely by logic. I make every decision by logic and sometimes that leads me to the right and sometimes to the wrong decision.

I do not come bearing a party label on my sleeve - or a quick fix in my back pocket. I do not come with a rigid ideology in my heart - or a soul that tells me to go it alone. I do not come to uproot tradition - or to be imprisoned by it.

Most of Gingrich's moderate positions are rooted in a realpolitik that transcends ideology.

Truth [is] what is better for us to believe.