Karl Popper - The Open Society and Its Enemies (1945)

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We may become the makers of our fate when we have ceased to pose as its prophets.

Karl Popper
We must plan for freedom, and not only for security, if for no other reason than that only freedom can make security secure.

Karl Popper
There is no history of mankind, there are only many histories of all kinds of aspects of human life. And one of these is the history of political power. This is elevated into the history of the world.

Karl Popper
No rational argument will have a rational effect on a man who does not want to adopt a rational attitude.

Karl Popper
If we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.

Karl Popper
We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant.

Karl Popper
The hope of getting some argument or theory to share our responsibilities is, I believe, one of the basic motives of "scientific" ethics.

Karl Popper
Reason like science, grows by way of mutual criticism; the only possible way of planning its growth is to develop those institutions that safeguard. the freedom of thought

Karl Popper
I may be wrong and you may be right, and by an effort, we may get nearer to the truth

Karl Popper
The moral decisions of others should be treated with respect, as long as such decisions do not conflict with the principle of tolerance.

Karl Popper
Marxism is only an episode—one of the many mistakes we have made in the perennial and dangerous struggle for building a better and a freer world.

Karl Popper
Our greatest troubles spring from something that is as admirable as it is dangerous... our impatience to better the lot of our fellows.

Karl Popper
From Plato to Karl Marx and beyond, the fundamental problem has always been: who should rule the state? (One of my main points will be that this problem must be replaced by a totally different one.)

Karl Popper
What a monument of human smallness is this idea of the philosopher king. What a contrast between it and the simplicity of humaneness of Socrates, who warned the statesmen against the danger of being dazzled by his own power, excellence, and wisdom, and who tried to teach him what matters most — that we are all frail human beings. What a decline from this world of irony and reason and truthfulness down to Plato's kingdom of the sage whose magical powers raise him high above ordinary men; although not quite high enough to forgo the use of lies, or to neglect the sorry trade of every shaman — the selling of spells, of breeding spells, in exchange for power over his fellow-men.

Karl Popper
... the attempt to make heaven on earth invariably produces hell. It leads to intolerance. It leads to religious wars, and to the saving of souls through the inquisition. And it is, I believe, based on a complete misunderstanding of our moral duties. It is our duty to help those who need help; but it cannot be our duty to make others happy, since this does not depend on us, and since it would only too often mean intruding on the privacy of those towards whom we have such amiable intentions.

Karl Popper
The influence (for good or ill) of Plato's work is immeasurable. Western thought, one might say, has been either Platonic or anti-Platonic, but hardly ever non-Platonic.

Karl Popper
The history of power politics is nothing but the history of international crime and mass murder.

Karl Popper
I do not overlook the fact that there are irrationalists who love mankind, and that not all forms of irrationalism engender criminality. But I hold that he who teaches that not reason but love should rule opens up the way for those who rule by hate. (Socrates, I believe, saw something of this when he suggested that mistrust or hatred of argument is related to mistrust or hatred of man).

Karl Popper
Instead of encouraging the student to devote himself to his studies for the sake of studying, instead of encouraging in him a real love for his subject and for inquiry, he is encouraged to study for the sake of his personal career; he is led to acquire only such knowledge as is serviceable in getting him over the hurdles which he must clear for the sake of his advancement.

Karl Popper
The open society is one in which men have learned to be to some extent critical of taboos, and to base decisions on the authority of their own intelligence.

Karl Popper
No book can ever be finished. While working on it we learn just enough to find it immature the moment we turn away from it

Karl Popper