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We are like sailors who on the open sea must reconstruct their ship but are never able to start afresh from the bottom. Where a beam is taken away a new one must at once be put there, and for this the rest of the ship is used as support. In this way, by using the old beams and driftwood the ship can be shaped entirely anew, but only by gradual reconstruction.

— Otto Neurath Otto Neurath (1921)

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More quotes by Otto Neurath

At first the Vienna Circle analysed ‘physics’ in a narrower sense almost exclusively; now psychology, biology,sociology. The task of this movement is unified science and nothing less.

Physicalism (1931)

The motivationless theory of goods [transfers] can bridge the gulf between history and exact research by securing the important continuity of the research, being linked to both.

Otto Neurath Economic Writings. Selections 1904-1945 (2004)

All content of science, and also their protocol statements that are used for verification, are selected on the basis of decisions and can be altered in principle.

Quite a few political economists advocate the thesis that a Robinson Crusoe — or what amounts to the same thing, a controlled economy — calculates in terms of profits and losses.

Otto Neurath (1935)

When devotion to men with an urge for new social organization replaces devotion to men with theological illumination and a way of life pleasing to God, then the actions of the innovator and his formulations are often gauged by their significance for human happiness. Behaviour is examined through the happiness it produces, which is an empirical matter; transcendence is overcome.

Empirical Sociology (1931)

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Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Otto Neurath (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.