It is the nature of intelligence to outrun previous formulations of itself.

Philosophers
Hilary Putnam
American philosopher (1926-2016) who reshaped late-20th-century analytic philosophy. Founder of functionalism, source of the Twin Earth experiment and semantic externalism, and famous for the brain-in-a-vat scenario.
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Hilary Putnam's Other Quotes
Related Quotes
I know that I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing.
-- Socrates
Reserve your right to think, for even to think wrongly is better than not to think at all.
-- Hypatia
Behold what is absent as firmly present through the mind.
-- Parmenides
New opinions are always suspected, and usually opposed, without any other reason but because they are not already common.
-- John Locke
Do not block the way of inquiry.
-- Charles Sanders Peirce
The fundamental cause of the trouble is that in the modern world the stupid are cocksure while the intelligent are full of doubt.
-- Bertrand Russell