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Home
Authors
Willard Van Orman Quine
About the author
We do not learn first what to talk about and then what to say about it.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Talk
#First
Physics investigates the essential nature of the world, and biology describes a local bump. Psychology, human psychology, describes a bump on the bump.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#World
#Nature
#Physics
#Psychology
'Ouch' is not independent of social training. One has only to prick a foreigner to appreciate that it is an English word.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#English
#Word
#Training
To be is to be the value of a variable.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Value
Uncritical semantics is the myth of a museum in which the exhibits are meanings and the words are labels. To switch languages is to change the labels.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Words
#Change
#Myth
#Semantics
Confusion of sign and object is original sin coeval with the word.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Word
#Sin
#Confusion
It is one of the consolations of philosophy that the benefit of showing how to dispense with a concept does not hinge on dispensing with it.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Philosophy
Language is a social art.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Art
#Language
Language is conceived in sin and science is its redemption.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Science
#Language
#Sin
Meaning is what essence becomes when it is divorced from the object of reference and wedded to the word.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Word
#Meaning
The familiar material objects may not be all that is real, but they are admirable examples.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#May
One man's observation is another man's closed book or flight of fancy.
Willard Van Orman Quine,
#Man
#Observation
#Fancy