Famous Quotes & Sayings

Charles Dickens

I believe the spreading of Catholicism to be the most horrible means of political and social degradation left in the world.

Charles Stross

I'm an atheist .I was raised in British reform Judaism, which is not like American reform Judaism, much less any other strain of organised religion. So: no cults here.

Charles Stross

I wish I was still an atheist. Believing I was born into a harsh, uncaring cosmos – in which my existence was a random roll of the dice and I was destined to die and rot and then be gone forever – was infinitely more comforting than the truth. Because the truth is that my God is coming back. When he arrives I’ll be waiting for him with a shotgun. And I’m keeping the last shell for myself.

Alan Watts

Jesus was not the man he was as a result of making Jesus Christ his personal savior.

Alan Alda

I still don't like the word agnostic. It's too fancy. I'm simply not a believer. But, as simple as this notion is, it confuses some people. Someone wrote a Wikipedia entry about me, identifying me as an atheist because I'd said in a book I wrote that I wasn't a believer. I guess in a world uncomfortable with uncertainty, an unbeliever must be an atheist, and possibly an infidel. This gets us back to that most pressing of human questions: why do people worry so much about other people's holding beliefs other than their own?

Dave Foley

Isn't the essential pillar of Catholicism papal infallibility? Well, then how can the church ever change its mind about anything unless God gets confused one day? Not all religions claim the direct authority of God speaking to their leader. You know, I'm an atheist, but I'm a Puritan atheist.

David Cross

I'd like to think that I'm not just making the point that I'm an atheist over and over, but that I explore different facets of religion. There's no way of bringing up religion without sounding like an asshole.

David Cross

I was born Jewish, but I am an atheist. I dont believe in God.

Dave Barry

I liked making people laugh, and I decided I was an atheist early on. My Dad was all right with that. We argued about it all the time, but it was good-natured. He was the most open-minded human being I've ever known.

Charles Dickens

I know nothing of philosophical philanthropy. But I know what I have seen, and what I have looked in the face in this world here, where I find myself. And I tell you this, my friend, that there are people (men and women both, unfortunately) who have no good in them-none. That there are people whom it is necessary to detest without compromise. That there are people who must be dealt with as enemies of the human race. That there are people who have no human heart, and who must be crushed like savage beasts and cleared out of the way.

David Mitchell

I'm not from a milieu where high-register language or philosophical ideas were welcome.

Carl Sagan

There is today-in a time when old beliefs are withering-a kind of philosophical hunger, a need to know who we are and how we got here. It is an on-going search, often unconscious, for a cosmic perspective for humanity

Bryce Dallas Howard

The greatest sci-fis, in my mind, are two things: They're what-ifs - what if this happened, and you get to see it - but they're also these philosophical cautionary tales. They deal with the underlying themes beneath the what-if.

Camille Paglia

Homeric mind is ingenuity, practical intelligence. There is no Rodin-like deep thinking, no mathematical or philosophical speculation. Odysseus thinks with his hands.

William Shakespeare

A great cause of the night is lack of the sun.

David Hume

Do you come to a philosopher as to a cunning man, to learn something by magic or witchcraft, beyond what can be known by common prudence and discretion?

David Hume

Scholastic learning and polemical divinity retarded the growth of all true knowledge.

David Hume

No advantages in this world are pure and unmixed.

John Fiske

The persecuting spirit has its origin... in the assumption that one's own opinions are infallibly correct.

John Fiske

The persecuting spirit has its origin . . . in the assumption that one's own opinions are infallibly correct.

Astro Teller

The assumption that humans could be a reliable back up for the system was a fallacy!

Tom Shaheen

We want to see first how the lottery is received. Based on all of the polls, we're making the assumption that it's going to be very highly received. But a poll is a poll, and until we actually see what happens when tickets go on sale, we'll have a better idea by then.

Henry Crumpton

We have no intelligence or evidence that indicates that he (Bin Laden) is dead or incapacitated, so our working assumption is that he is still alive.

Norm Stamper

We have no indication that he has left this immediate area, so we make the assumption that he is still afoot or ... holed up somewhere in this area,

Tom Daschle

We have no choice but to revisit the question on other bills. Especially given the relationship between guns and schools these days, I think it's a natural assumption that one could make that there could be some amendments which will be offered,

Natalie Massenet

It's a false assumption that people with a lot of money have a lot of free time to shop.

Ellen Galinsky

What this finding reflects is the dissonance of today's reality and yesterday's old ideas. There's the assumption that family for women detracts from work while for men it supposedly enhances their viability and stability.