#agnostic

Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind and accepts whatever the universe has to teach us, or somebody who says everything in this book must be considered the literal truth and never mind the fallibility of all the human beings involved? ↗

— Carl Sagan

#humility #science #skepticism #truth #science

Thus, as far as he is a scientific man, as far as he knows anything, he is a materialist; outside his science, in spheres about which he knows nothing, he translates his ignorance into Greek and calls it agnosticism. ↗

— Friedrich Engels

#engels #marx #marxism #science #science

In Mere Christianity, C. S. Lewis argues that human beings cannot be truly good or moral without faith in God and without submis- sion to the will of Christ. Unfortunately, Lewis does not provide any actual data for his assertions. They are nothing more than the mild musings of a wealthy British man, pondering the state of humanity’s soul between his sips of tea. Had Lewis actually famil- iarized himself with real human beings of the secular sort, per- haps sat and talked with them, he would have had to reconsider this notion. As so many apostates explained to me, morality is most certainly possible beyond the confines of faith. Can people be good without God? Can a moral orientation be sustained and developed outside of a religious context? The answer to both of these questions is a resounding yes. ↗

— Phil Zuckerman

#atheism #ethics #morality #morals #religion

People are invariably surprised to hear me say I am both an atheist and an agnostic, as if this somehow weakens my certainty. I usually reply with a question like, “Well, are you a Republican or an American?” The two words serve different concepts and are not mutually exclusive. Agnosticism addresses knowledge; atheism addresses belief. The agnostic says, “I don't have a knowledge that God exists.” The atheist says, “I don't have a belief that God exists.” You can say both things at the same time. Some agnostics are atheistic and some are theistic. ↗

— Dan Barker

#agnosticism #atheism #atheist

I have a great love and respect for religion, great love and respect for atheism. What I hate is agnosticism, people who do not choose. ↗

— Orson Welles

#atheism #choose #great #great love #hate

His mother and father were agnostics, and Jim respected devout Christians in the same way that he respected people who were members of the Graf Zeppelin Club or shopped at the Chinese department stores, for their mastery of an exotic foreign ritual. Besides, those who worked hardest for others, like Mrs. Philips and Mrs. Gilmour and Dr. Ransome, often held beliefs that turned out to be correct. ↗

— J.G. Ballard

#chinese-department-stores #christianity #the-graf-zeppelin-club #respect

My mother was very agnostic. She would never set foot in the synagogue, she couldn't be doing with it. ↗

— Janet Suzman

#doing #foot #mother #never #set

You happen to be talking to an agnostic. You know what an agnostic is? A cowardly atheist. ↗

— Studs Terkel

#atheist #cowardly #happen #know #talking

Objection, evasion, joyous distrust, and love of irony are signs of health; everything absolute belongs to pathology. ↗

— Friedrich Nietzsche

#absolution #agnosticism #distrust #evasion #health

If a person is intelligent, then of course he is either an agnostic or an atheist. Just as he is a physical coward. They are automatic definitions of high intelligence. ↗

— John Fowles

#atheist #coward #intelligence #intelligence