412 Quotes by Alfred North Whitehead

The safest general characterization of the European philosophical tradition is that it consists of a series of footnotes to Plato.

Get your knowledge quickly and then use it. If you can use it you will retain it.

There are no whole truths; all truths are half-truths. It is trying to treat them as whole truths that plays the devil.

We think in generalities, but we live in detail. To make the past live, we must perceive it in detail in addition to thinking of it in generalities.

Everything of importance has already been seen by someone who did not discover it.

The essence of dramatic tragedy is not unhappiness. It resides in the solemnity of the remorseless working of things.

Ideas won't keep; something must be done about them.

The certainty of mathematics depends on its complete abstract generality.

The point about zero is that we do not need to use it in the operation of daily life. No one goes out to buy zero fish.