#ogre

Even the sober desire for progress is sustained by faith—faith in the intrinsic goodness of human nature and in the omnipotence of science. It is a defiant and blasphemous faith, not unlike that held by the men who set out to build a "city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven" and who believed that "nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. ↗

— Eric Hoffer

#progress #progressivism #the-true-believer #faith

An enlightened trust in the sovereignty of human reason can be every bit as magical as the exploits of Merlin, and a faith in our capacity for limitless self-improvement just as much a wide-eyed superstition as a faith in leprechauns. ↗

— Terry Eagleton

#rationalism #scientism #faith

Your faith in Homo technologicus -the Tinkering Man- has one fatal flaw. It offers you no escape clause. ↗

— David Brin

#progress #faith

In these days of faith-cures, and hypnotism, and telepathy, and subliminalities – why, the simple old world grows very confusing. But rarely, very rarely novel. ↗

— Walter de La Mare

#novelty #progress #faith

Do you realize it’s been only a century that we’ve been able to go from house to car to office to car to wherever, with the heater on, and the defroster on, protected from the rain and the cold? It hasn’t been much longer than that we’ve had lighting for streets. Think of all that darkness, all that world out there, all that mystery that we’ve turned into well-lighted concrete bunkers, safe and warm and dull. ↗

— Sheri S. Tepper

#technology #family

To progress is always to begin always to begin again ↗

— Martin Luther

#progress #salvation #sanctification #forgiveness

I am not too happy with terms like “the left”, to be honest. And I don’t use it much….if by “the left” you mean people who are committed to peace and justice and freedom and so on, there can’t be elements of the left opposed to workers’ movement, at least under that definition. ↗

— Noam Chomsky

#progressives #freedom

There should be painless progression, attended by life and peace....Mortals will some day assert their freedom in the name of Almighty God....Dropping their present beliefs, they will recognize harmony and as the spiritual reality and discord as the material unreality. Chapter VII pp. 224 and 228 Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures ↗

— Mary Baker Eddy

#initiative #progress #sadness #freedom

Rights are not easy to obtain, and once we understand this, we must work attentively and persistently - and never become careless or lazy. ↗

— Malalai Joya

#politics #progress #rights #freedom

We should use our imagination more than our memory. ↗

— Shimon Peres

#history #imagination #peace #progress #imagination