Stanislaus Leszczynski Quotes

Not to be absolutely certain is, I think, one of the essential things in rationality.

Belief in truth begins with doubting all that has hitherto been believed to be true.

Doubt is not an agreeable condition, but certainty is an absurd one.

We cannot infer that because sciences of things divine and human are full of controversies and quarrels, therefore their whole subject-matter is uncertain ; for there have been many persons so enamoured of contradiction, as to turn into ridicule geometrical axioms.

We'd all like to be certain of what we know, but I think the most important question is to ask yourself do you really know what you know?

I'm a rationalist and a skeptic, someone who safely separates faith from reason.

Skepticism may undermine beliefs, but never belief.

Truth is something that we can attempt to doubt, and then perhaps, after much exertion, discover that part of the doubt is not justified.

Philosophy begins when one learns to doubt -- particularly to doubt one's cherished beliefs, one's dogmas and one's axioms.

He believed in the primacy of doubt, not as a blemish upon our ability to know, but as the essence of knowing.

Inquiry is fatal to certainty.

The first step towards philosophy is incredulity.

Religion deals in certainties and philosophy deals more in un-answered questions.

Nothing fortifies scepticism more than the fact that there are some who are not sceptics; if all were so, they would be wrong.

Because a truly skeptical position would be a very uncertain one.

If a man will begin with certainties, he shall end in doubts, but if he will content to begin with doubts, he shall end in certainties.

Philosophy would render us entirely Pyrrhonian, were not nature too strong for it.

Science is what you know. Philosophy is what you don't know.

Knowledge is justified belief.

The scientist insists on verification; the religious theologian does not; the philosopher sometimes does and sometimes does not

In this quest to seek and find God in all things there is still an area of uncertainty. There must be. If a person says that he met God with total certainty and is not touched by a margin of uncertainty, then this is not good. For me, this is an important key. If one has the answers to all the questions—that is the proof that God is not with him. It means that he is a false prophet using religion for himself. The great leaders of the people of God, like Moses, have always left room for doubt.

That's something I learned as a philosophy major: The philosophy ethos is, always question, never rest.

In philosophy you're never 100% sure. You're always undermining what you think you know. That's always been my philosophy and my intellectual ethos.

We must consider both the ultimate end and all clear sensory evidence, to which we refer our opinions; for otherwise everything will be full of uncertainty and confusion.