"The errors of definitions multiply themselves according as the reckoning proceeds; and lead men into absurdities, which at last they see but cannot avoid, without reckoning anew from the beginning." (Thomas Hobbes, "The Moral and Political Works of Thomas Hobbes of Malmesbury", 1750)
"A definition is nothing else but an explication of the meaning of a word, by words whose meaning is already known. Hence it is evident that every word cannot be defined; for the definition must consist of words; and there could be no definition, if there were not words previously understood without definition." (Thomas Reid, "Essays on the Intellectual Powers of Man", 1785)
"There is nothing more difficult than a good definition, for it is scarcely possible to express, in a few words, the abstracted view of an infinite variety of facts." (Humphry Davy, "Consolations in Travel, or the Last Days of a Philosopher" , 1830)
"Questions of Definition are of the very highest importance in Philosophy, and they need to be watched accordingly." (George Campbell, "A Fourth State of Matter, Nature", 1880)
"The more elevated a culture, the richer its language. The number of words and their combinations depends directly on a sum of conceptions and ideas; without the latter there can be no understandings, no definitions, and, as a result, no reason to enrich a language. (Anton Chekhov, [letter to A.S. Suvorin] 1892)
"A definition is the enclosing a wilderness of idea within a wall of words." (Samuel Butler, "The Note-Books of Samuel Butler", 1912)
"Definitions are the guardians of rationality, the first line of defense against the chaos of mental disintegration. (Ayn Rand, The Romantic Manifesto, 1969)
"Definitions, like questions and metaphors, are instruments for thinking. Their authority rests entirely on their usefulness, not their correctness. We use definitions in order to delineate problems we wish to investigate, or to further interests we wish to promote. In other words, we invent definitions and discard them as suits our purposes." (Neil Postman, "Language Education in a Knowledge Context", 1980)
"A full definition of an object must include the whole of human experience, both as a criterion of truth and a practical indicator of its connection with human wants." (Vladimir Lenin)
"Fundamental definitions do not arise at the start but at the end of the exploration, because in order to define a thing you must know what it is and what it is good for." (Hans Freudenthal)
No comments:
Post a Comment