Science has a simple goal: to figure out what the world actually is. Not all the possible ways it could be, nor the particular way it should be. Just what it is.

— Sean Carroll, The Big Picture

[A State is] a human community that (successfully) claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory.

— Max Weber, Politics as a Vocation

Ceaseless optimism about the future only makes for a greater shock when things go wrong; by fighting to maintain only positive beliefs about the future, the positive thinker ends up being less prepared, and more acutely distressed, when things eventually happen that he can’t persuade himself to believe are good.

— Oliver Burkeman, The Antidote

If she thinks this formula is beautiful: eπi + 1 = 0, it is probably because there is no obvious reason why five of the most important constants in the universe should appear in the same equation.

— Francis Su, Mathematics for Human Flourishing

It is no longer a case of thinking for oneself, but rather of placing trust in another. And in that, no doubt, lies the most profound and significant difference between philosophy and religion.

— Luc Ferry, A Brief History of Thought