Stuart Chase > Quotes

“Common sense is what tells us the earth is flat.”
― Stuart Chase, Language in Thought and Action

“For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don't believe, no proof is possible.”
― Stuart Chase

“People above the line of bare subsistence in this age, and in all earlier ages, do not use the surplus which society has given them primarily for useful purposes. They do not seek to expand their lives, to live more wisely, intelligently, understandingly, but to impress other people with the fact that they have a surplus.”
― Stuart Chase

“A word is not a crystal, transparent and unchanged; it is the skin of a living thought and may vary greatly in color and content according to the circumstances and the time in which it is used.”
― Stuart Chase, Tyranny Of Words

“Labor-saving devices, led by the computer, are encouraging more production and more unemployment. Automation may thus be classified as both asset and liability. It can eliminate a great deal of dull, monotonous labor, but if unrelieved idleness is the end result, the cure may be worse than the disease. The evidence strongly indicates that man is a working animal—in the sense of needing an activity that involves hand and brain, and that makes sense to him.”
― Stuart Chase, The Most Probable World:

“That words are not things. (Identification of words with things, however, is widespread, and leads to untold misunderstanding and confusion.) That words mean nothing in themselves; they are as much symbols as x or y. That meaning in words arises from context of situation. That abstract words and terms are especially liable to spurious identification. The higher the abstraction, the greater the danger. That things have meaning to us only as they have been experienced before. “Thingumbob again.” That no two events are exactly similar. That finding relations and orders between things gives more dependable meanings than trying to deal in absolute substances and properties. Few absolute properties have been authenticated in the world outside. That mathematics is a useful language to improve knowledge and communication. That the human brain is a remarkable instrument and probably a satisfactory agent for clear communication. That to improve communication new words are not needed, but a better use of the words we have. (Structural improvements in ordinary language, however, should be made.) That the scientific method and especially the operational approach are applicable to the study and improvement of communication. (No other approach has presented credentials meriting consideration.) That the formulation of concepts upon which sane men can agree, on a given date, is a prime goal of communication. (This method is already widespread in the physical sciences and is badly needed in social affairs.) That academic philosophy and formal logic have hampered rather than advanced knowledge, and should be abandoned. That simile, metaphor, poetry, are legitimate and useful methods of communication, provided speaker and hearer are conscious that they are being employed. That the test of valid meaning is: first, survival of the individual and the species; second, enjoyment of living during the period of survival.”
― Stuart Chase, Tyranny Of Words

“The American people will never tolerate socialism; will never tolerate fascism; will never surrender their liberties; will never defy their Constitution.” How often have the changes been rung on these stirring statements? One might as well say, “The people of the moon will never tolerate green cheese.” Produce referents for “American people,” “socialism,” “fascism,” “liberty,” “defy their Constitution.” Otherwise such statements can elicit emotion, but little more.”
― Stuart Chase, Tyranny Of Words

“Dewey mournfully remarks, “A certain tragic fate seems to attend all intellectual movements.” With no standard, no proof, anywhere in the premises, a brand of philosophy can be overthrown as easily as it can rise up. Said Thomas Huxley: Generation after generation, philosophy has been doomed to roll the stone uphill; and just as all the world swore it was at the top, down ic has rolled to the bottom again . . . until now the weight and the number of those who refuse to be the prey of verbal mystifications has begun to tell in practical life. Huxley’s grandson, Aldous, observes that philosophical arguments are mostly angry shoutings at one another by two people who use the same words but mean different things by them.”
― Stuart Chase, Tyranny Of Words

“For those who believe, no proof is necessary. For those who don’t believe, no proof is possible”
― Stuart Chase

“For those who believe no proof is necessary. For those who don't believe, no proof is possible.”
― Stuart Chase

“Bad language is now the mightiest weapon in the arsenal of despots and demagogues. Witness Dr. Goebbels.”
― Stuart Chase, Tyranny Of Words