Sidney Hook Quotes on Knowledge
Sidney Hook (1902–1989) was the leading American interpreter of John Dewey's pragmatism in the second half of the twentieth century and the author of Towards the Understanding of Karl Marx (1933) — a Deweyan reading of Marx that influenced an entire generation of American intellectuals. The Hero in History (1943) develops the corresponding pragmatic epistemology of historical explanation, arguing against both Hegelian historical inevitabilism and Carlylean great-man theory in favour of an instrumentalist analysis of how individual agency and structural conditions interact. Reason, Social Myths, and Democracy (1940) extends the framework to political philosophy.
Quotes
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Attributed to Sidney Hook:
“Marx is best understood as a philosopher of practice, not of dogma.”
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“Nothing and no one is immune from criticism .”
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“Everyone involved in a controversy has an intellectual responsibility to inform himself of the available facts.”
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“Criticism should be directed first to policies, and against persons only when they are responsible for policies, and against their motives or purposes only when there is some independent evidence of their character.”
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“Because certain words are legally permissible, they are not therefore morally permissible.”
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“Before impugning an opponent's motives, even when they legitimately may be impugned, answer his arguments.”
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“Do not treat an opponent of a policy as if he were therefore a personal enemy or an enemy of the country or a concealed enemy of democracy.”
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“Do not hesitate to admit lack of knowledge or suspend judgment if evidence is not decisive either way.”
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“Only in pure logic and mathematics, not in human affairs, can one demonstrate that something is strictly impossible. Because something is logically possible, it is not therefore probable... The question is always one of the balance of probabilities. And the evidence for probabilities must include more than abstract possibilities.”
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“The cardinal sin, when we are looking for truth of fact or wisdom of policy, is refusal to discuss, or action which blocks discussion.”
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