Inspirational Quotations

Inspirational Quotes by John Anderson (Scottish Philosopher)

John Anderson (1893–1962) was a Scottish-Australian philosopher. The Challis Professor of Philosophy at Sydney University 1927–58, he founded the empirical brand of philosophy known as Australian realism.

Born in Stonehouse, Lanarkshire, Anderson graduated M.A. from Glasgow University in 1917. He served as assistant in philosophy at the University College, Cardiff (1917–19,) in moral philosophy and logic at the University of Glasgow (1919–20) and lectured in logic and metaphysics at the University of Edinburgh (1920–26) before moving to Australia.

In Sydney, Anderson was a theoretical advisor to the Communist Party of Australia, but moved away from the 1930s and finally adopted a staunchly anti-communist stance. Anderson’s promotion of ‘free thought’ in all subjects—including politics, morality, censorship, university reform, academic freedom, and opposition to religious instruction in education—was controversial and brought him into constant conflict with the university’s senate.

Of the material he published in his lifetime, only Studies in Empirical Philosophy (1962,) a collection of some forty of his major papers, is readily available.

A. J. Baker wrote Anderson’s Social Philosophy (1979) and Australian Realism: The Systematic Philosophy of John Anderson (1986.) Melbourne University’s historian Brian Kennedy wrote the biography A Passion to Oppose (1995.)

More: Wikipedia READ: Works by John Anderson

We have to recognize accident, i.e., the fact that there is no formula, no ‘principle’, which covers all things; that there is no totality or system of things. And this recognition at once supports a life of ‘responsibility and adventure’ and leads to scientific discovery.
John Anderson

We do not, in fact step out of the movement of things, ask ‘What am I to do’ and, having obtained an answer, step in again. All our actions, all our questionings and answerings, are part of the movement of things, and if we can work on things, things can work on us … .
John Anderson

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