Quine, Willard Van Orman

"Experience underdetermines theory at every level of inquiry."

"What seems obvious to one generation may seem absurd to another."

"The philosopher's task is to clarify concepts, not to solve metaphysical mysteries."

"Learning is a matter of habit formation, not of grasping eternal truths."

"Abstract entities exist only insofar as they serve our practical purposes."

"Truth conditions are relative to our system of beliefs and linguistic conventions."

"The problem of other minds is less mysterious once we abandon Cartesian assumptions."

"Sense and reference depend on the total context of use, not on words in isolation."

"There is no purely objective starting point for knowledge; all inquiry begins within tradition."

"Similarity judgments are culturally variable and not grounded in objective properties."

"The essence of something is what we choose to regard as essential for our purposes."

"Ordinary objects are not fundamentally different from theoretical entities in science."

"Logic is revisable just like any other scientific theory."

"What we call knowledge is really just justified true belief that coheres with our other beliefs."

"The mind is not a mirror of nature but a tool for navigating experience."

"Synonymy is a philosophical fiction; no two expressions are truly equivalent."

"Our linguistic categories shape what we can perceive and understand about reality."

"Quantification is the key to understanding what a theory commits us to believing."

"Sense experience alone cannot determine the structure of our scientific theories."

"The indeterminacy of translation reveals the indeterminacy of all interpretation."

"Natural language is too vague and ambiguous for precise philosophical reasoning."

"We construct our knowledge of external objects from the flow of our sensory experience."

"Nominalism—rejection of abstract objects—leads to greater conceptual simplicity."

"The meanings of words are not in the head but in the whole speech community."

"Belief in the external world is a pragmatic assumption we make to organize experience."

"Mathematical entities do not exist independently; they are useful fictions."

"Every statement can be tested, but not every statement can be tested in isolation."

"The distinction between analytic and synthetic statements breaks down under scrutiny."

"Our concepts are tools that we sharpen or replace as our needs and knowledge develop."

"Objectivity in science is achieved through intersubjective agreement, not through direct access to reality."