#lit

All of us take pride and pleasure in the fact that we are unique, but I'm afraid that when all is said and done the police are right: it all comes down to fingerprints. ↗

— David Sedaris

#individuality #fact

I stopped believing there was a power of good and a power of evil that were outside us. And I came to believe that good and evil are names for what people do, not for what they are. ↗

— Philip Pullman

#morality #evil

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

It is your duty,' he said, 'to recover your country not by gold but by the sword. You will be fighting with all you love before your eyes: the temples of the gods, your wives and children, the soil of your native land scarred with the ravages of war, and everything which honor and truth call upon you to defend, or recover, or avenge. ↗

— Livy

#political-philosophy #political-science #speeches #war #love

In four months we could actually have an administration that believes in science. ↗

— Mark Warner

#global-warming #politics #science #values #science

A person is, among all else, a material thing, easily torn and not easily mended. ↗

— Ian Mcewan

#person

Government succeeds by failing. ↗

— L.K. Samuels

#complexity-science #economics #politics #science

What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or in the holy name of liberty or democracy? ↗

— Mahatma Gandhi

#fascism #liberty #loss #politics #society

Solitude is fine but you need someone to tell that solitude is fine. ↗

— Honoré de Balzac

#society #solitude #society

The oppressed are allowed once every few years to decide which particular representatives of the oppressing class are to represent and repress them. ↗

— Karl Marx

#oppression #politics #representation #repression #society