Welcome to the Arguable Quotations Website



The Arguable Quotations Website contains some sayings which may run against the current orthodoxy, but may nevertheless have some truth. Think, and return.


The Universe is a billion-piece jigsaw puzzle; keep working away at your corner of it!


Avoid unpleasant things, and you'll have a longer and better life.


Scientific knowledge is a fractal -- it can always be followed to greater depth.


Economizing never made a country great, nor kept a great country so.


You don't get a Nobel Prize for pointing out the obvious, even though it wasn't obvious before you pointed it out.


A good software solution will always beat a good hardware solution.


A square peg in a world of round holes must obtain a square-to-round adapter to thrive.


The lives of many people are full of problems, while others have lives full of interesting puzzles to solve.


Over-regulation is like cholesterol building up in the arteries of a society. It can lead to death.


In activist groups, the campaign may become the object of the activity, rather than its outcome.


Tidiness is the enemy of Nature. But fractals are her friends.


Data is fine, but for the full picture, you need to recognize the patterns.


Fundamental changes in thought have to come from amateurs, because professional groupings do not tolerate deviations from the established line.


To solve a problem, look at places where the problem does not exist, and ask "why not?".


We must be careful with people who insist that "We must .....".


Changing your mind can be a lot of bother.


There is no action or plan so noble that it cannot be criticised, and no action or plan so awful that mitigating circumstances cannot be found for it.


It is a fallacy to suppose that, if presented with a problem, a solution will always be welcome. Paradoxically, some will be more comfortable with the problem than with its solution. In this case, they may generate spurious objections to the solution.


Americans are too patriotic, and too democratic. Too patriotic because it hinders them in regarding non-Americans as full people, and too democratic because it hinders them in effecting societal improvement.


Democracy is a luxury which not every country can afford.


Ecological factors may well be deserving of consideration in decision-making, but if given too much weight may stifle larger projects which could deliver major benefits. Too much caution is not good for the World.


LOSS, the Local Ownership Selfishness Syndrome, is the biggest obstacle to local advancement. It expresses itself in the view that Our Group deserves better access to local things (such as land, culture, capital, financial returns, and local amenities) than do Outsiders.


The 'Peer Review System' works, in science and elsewhere, only up to a certain level of orthodoxy. Above that, it hits the floor level where live those who would be disadvantaged by a change in the status quo.


The urge for recognition of membership of a group may express itself through damaging actions against those outside the group, as much as through helpful actions for those within a group.


Western preference for a corrupt democracy over an efficient 'guided' state must, at times, be questioned.


A new truth is hardest to sell to the experts in that field. The intelligent layman is much more receptive.


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Last update 2018 Oct 21