“الإفراط في القراءة لا يجعلنا أكثر ذكاءًا. إن بعض الناس يلتهمون الكتب التهاماً. وهم يفعلون ذلك بغير التدبُّر اللازم لهضم الأفكار، ولمعالجة، وإدراك، وامتصاص ما قرأوه. وحين يشرع أناس من هذا النوع بالحديث، فإن أفواههم تقذف بقطع كاملة من هيغل، وهيدغر، وماركس؛ كمن يتقيّأ طعاماً نيّئاً؛ بدون الهضم الضروريّ. إن القراءة تستلزم جهداً ذاتيّاً، وهي في ذلك تُشبه احتياج النحلة للجهد الجوّاني، فضلاً عن الوقت، لتحويل الرحيق إلى عسل. ـ”
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“the paradox of tolerance: unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, 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.—In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be most unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.”
― The Open Society and Its Enemies
― The Open Society and Its Enemies
“Aestheticism and radicalism must lead us to jettison reason, and to replace it by a desperate hope for political miracles. This irrational attitude which springs from intoxication with dreams of a beautiful world is what I call Romanticism. It may seek its heavenly city in the past or in the future; it may preach ‘back to nature’ or ‘forward to a world of love and beauty’; but its appeal is always to our emotions rather than to reason. Even with the best intentions of making heaven on earth it only succeeds in making it a hell – that hell which man alone prepares for his fellow-men.”
― The Open Society and its Enemies
― The Open Society and its Enemies
Abbas’s 2025 Year in Books
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