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About this quote

What does it mean?
If a philosopher’s true statement is trivial, and a non‑trivial one is false.
In plain terms
Only trivial truths are accepted from philosophers.
What can you take from it?
Seek depth beyond obviousness.

Where it applies

  • debate
  • critical thinking
  • education

Putting it to work

  • challenge obvious claims
  • value rigorous argument

Questions to consider

  • Is triviality a good test for truth?
  • How do we identify non‑trivial truths?

Another view

Many profound philosophical insights are non‑trivial yet true.

More from Carl Friedrich Gauss

  1. The total number of Dirichlet's publications is not large: jewels are not weighed on a grocery scale.

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  2. Gauss liked to call [number theory] 'the Queen of Mathematics'. For Gauss, the jewels in the crown were the primes, numbers which had fascinated and teased gen…

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  3. Mathematicians stand on each other's shoulders.

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