Best 132 quotes in «discussion quotes» category

With all the arguments and discussions about the Vietnam War, what did the visual image do? It ended the war.

You cannot have a rational discussion with a man who prefers shooting you to being convinced by you.

At work, you’ll have to be patient at the risky enterprise of talking to other people; so little progress in this since the Pleistocene.

You can say, "Well, I have a question," and someone will say, "Oh, so you hate America." And it has nothing to do with the discussion at all.

A deaf and dumb in the mist of morons is a renowed talkative among brains.

A keen wit stabs harder than a finely honed argument.

A lively discussion is usually helpful, because the hottest fire makes the hardest steel.

And yet, will we ever come to an end of discussion and talk if we think we must always reply to replies? For replies come from those who either cannot understand what is said to them, or are so stubborn and contentious that they refuse to give in even if they do understand.

As more people have found the courage to break through shame and speak about woundedness in their lives, we are now subjected to a mean-spirited cultural response, where all talk of woundedness is mocked. The belittling of anyone's attempt to name a context within which they were wounded, were made a victim, is a form of shaming. It is psychological terrorism. Shaming breaks our hearts. All individuals who are genuinely seeking well-being within a healing context realize that it is important to that process not to make being a victim a stance of pride or a location from which to simply blame others. We need to speak our shame and our pain courageously in order to recover. Addressing woundedness is not about blaming others; however, it does allow individuals who have been, and are, hurt to insist on accountability and responsibility both from themselves and from those who were the agents of their suffering as well as those who bore witness. Constructive confrontation aids our healing.

But never engage in detailed overexplanations of why something is important: one debases a principle by endlessly justifying it.

Discussion is an exchange of knowledge; argument an exchange of ignorance.

Discussions should always be held just before going to bed, your rear protected by sleep. How painful, after an intellectual conversation, to have to go about with your mind so stirred up.

Discuss, don't debate.

Ecologist Paul Ehrlich stressed that people who hold opposing opinions need to engage in open discussion with well-reasoned dissent. Positions should be questioned and criticized, not the people who hold them. Personal attacks preclude open discussion because, once someone is put on the defensive, fruitful exchanges are impossible, at least for the moment.

Dunkle problemer er lys og luft for vår stribare rase. Hissige diskusjoner er et tegn på sunnhet og fred i sinnet. Problemer vokser opp av alt som skjer. De klekkes ut av vinterkulden, de blomstrer frem av sommervarmen, de oppstår av velvære og illebefinnende, av ensomhet og menneskevrimmel.

Don't always use prudence for precaution, sometimes use it for progress.

Elinor agreed to it all, for she did not think he deserved the compliment of rational opposition.

...engaging with a work of ancient philosophy can be a two-way street; bringing it into a discussion can enrich that discussion, which also encouraging us to see the work in light of that discussion.

Every discussion with a girl is an argument, and when you think you are right suddenly you realize that your trapped.

If I don't talk about it, it's either very displeasing or very precious to me.

Focus your attention on the quality of your words, and not the quantity, because few sensible talks attracts millions of listeners more than a thousand gibberish.

Good questions are to be appreciated, not answered.

Heated discussion: when you try to convince others of what you don't believe yourself.

He likes to use his wit and verbal finesse to confuse others and win arguments. Although he can argue successfully that white is black and straight is crooked, you walk away with the feeling that he's won the argument not because he is correct but because you can't outwit him.

If there is no disparity of opinions there is nothing of value being discussed

If people were not at most times led by some system of common ideas, neither a coherent policy nor even a real discussion about particular issues would be possible. It is doubtful whether democracy can work in the long run if the great majority do not have in common at least a general conception of the type of society desired.

I have always loved to begin with the facts, to observe them, to walk in the light of experiment and demonstrate as much as possible, and to discuss the results.

I hated discussing ideas with investors," he said, "because I then become a Defender of the Idea, and that influences your thought process." Once you became an idea's defender you had a harder time changing your mind about it.

I have witnessed how the power of listening, storytelling and embracing gray areas breaks through the rigid 'us vs. them.

Instead of seeing how much pain I can dish out towards those I disagree with, or who I believe have done me wrong, I seek to follow the golden rule and use my words and behavior to create more of what the world needs – love, compassion, and connection.

In five minutes the streets became deserted and only a few disarrayed teenagers could be seen hanging around in front of a big newsstand where coffee and pastries were served, and discussed about all these topics which now are so much affecting our youth, in every way possible.

Pendant des millions d'années, l'humanité a vécu comme les animaux. Par la suite, quelque chose est arrivé qui a libéré le pouvoir de notre imagination. Nous avons appris à parler et à écouter. La parole a permis la communication des idées, abilitant l'être humain à travailler ensemble afin de construire l'impossible. Les plus grandes réalisations de l'humanité se sont matérialisées en parlant, et ses plus grands échecs en ne parlant plus. Cela n'a pas lieu d'être. Nos plus grands espoirs pourraient devenir des réalités dans le futur. Avec la technologie à notre disposition, les possibilités sont illimitées. Tout ce que nous avons à faire est de s'assurer que nous continuions à parler.

It was time to take up the discussion over governance, housing, transportation, security, health care, and education—to define the country we wanted and outline our terms. Who were we. . . . What were our limits and our ambitions?

On every formal visit a child ought to be of the party, by way of provision for discourse. In the present case it took up ten minutes to determine whether the boy were most like his father or mother, and in what particular he resembled either, for of course every body differed, and every body was astonished at the opinion of the others.

On matters where it is difficult or impossible to pin the blame for their policies' failures on conservatives, the fallback position has been to hurl a slur at anyone pointing out the obvious failure....The left's never-ending use of these worn-out attacks on the character and motivations of those who disagree with them has caused them to lose their effect....At the ground level, since liberals have lost the ability to win any and every political discussion by hurling a slur, they are simply resorting to the next level in political interaction: violence and physical intimidation.

In that moment she hated him, loathed him, this good man she had married. There was really nothing so terrible on the reverse side of his goodness, his steadiness, his mild good humor – just the belief, apparently grounded in the bedrock of his soul, that everybody was looking out for number one, each with his or her own little racket.

[Responding to the Bishop of Oxford, Samuel Wilberforce's question whether he traced his descent from an ape on his mother's or his father's side] A man has no reason to be ashamed of having an ape for his grandfather. If there were an ancestor whom I should feel shame in recalling it would rather be a man—a man of restless and versatile intellect—who … plunges into scientific questions with which he has no real acquaintance, only to obscure them by an aimless rhetoric, and distract the attention of his hearers from the real point at issue by eloquent digressions and skilled appeals to religious prejudice.

It is better to purposefully spend time with people talking about things that could improve them or talk about things that could improve me than to just waste time discussing irrelevant things.

It is certainly impossible to lose respect if you lose out of some stupid discussions.

My ideas will not be discussed, they will be executed.

Plain speaking is necessary in any discussion of religion, for if the freethinker attacks the religious dogmas with hesitation, the orthodox believer assumes that it is with regret that the freethinker would remove the crutch that supports the orthodox. And all religious beliefs are 'crutches' hindering the free locomotive efforts of an advancing humanity. There are no problems related to human progress and happiness in this age which any theology can solve, and which the teachings of freethought cannot do better and without the aid of encumbrances.

Rational argument can be conducted with some prospect of success only so long as the emotionality of a given situation does not exceed a critical degree.

Raise your vibration, Not your tone of voice.. You gain inspiration, For Peace is a choice.

...Plato conceived of philosophy as necessarily gregarious rather than solitary. The exposure of presumptions is best done in company, the more argumentative the better. This is why discussion around the table is so essential. This is why philosophy must be argumentative. It proceeds by way of arguments, and the arguments are argued over. Everything is aired in the bracing dialectic wind stirred by many clashing viewpoints. Only in this way can intuitions that have their source in societal or personal idiosyncrasies be exposed and questioned. ... There can be nothing like "Well, that's what I was brought up to believe," or "I just feel that it's right," or "I am privy to an authoritative voice whispering in my ear," or "I'm demonstrably smarter than all of you, so just accept that I know better here." The discussion around the seminar table countenances only the sorts of arguments and considerations that can, in principle, make a claim on everyone who signs on to the project of reason: appealing to, evaluating, and being persuaded by reasons. (pp. 38-39)

She is ugly… end of discussion!

Robert Frost didn’t like to explain his poems—and for good reason: to explain a poem is to suck the air from its lungs. This does not mean, however, that poets shouldn’t talk about their poetry, or that one shouldn’t ask questions about it. Rather, it suggests that any discussion of poetry should celebrate its ultimate ineffability and in so doing lead one to further inquiry. I think of that wonderful scene from Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, where Mosche the Beadle of the local synagogue, in dialogue with the young, precocious author, explains: “Every question possesses a power that does not lie in the answer.

Solutions are not found by pointing fingers they are reached by extending hands.

She was born under the sign of Gemini. And that stands for the good and evil twin. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde both hiding and residing inside her heart. Her good twin was not bad at all. But her evil twin was even better, and showed up to be way too fatal!

The meetings and marches and vigils are cool, but if the enemy isn't present, you're just talking slick to a can of oil.

Some of these things I understand, some I do not. It makes no difference. The discussions give me an excuse to talk to him, fatherly conversations I cannot have with my father, who would like me to be a lawyer.