#skepticism

A drop of water is not immortal; it can be resolved into oxygen and hydrogen. If, therefore, a drop of water were to maintain that it had a quality of aqueousness which would survive its dissolution we should be inclined to be skeptical. In like manner we know that the brain is not immortal... ↗

— Bertrand Russell

#athiesm #athiest #immortality #mortality #skepticism

Adventure,' then, is what might otherwise be called hardship if it were attempted in a different spirit. Turning a difficult task or a perilous journey into an adventure is largely a matter of telling yourself the right story about it, which is one thing that Lewis's child characters have learned from reading, 'the right books. ↗

— Laura Miller

#books #lit #reading #skepticism

Excuse me if I feel skeptical,' I said. 'Coach's foot fell off. How exactly do you propose to cure that? Superglue? ↗

— Carrie Harris

#zombies #skepticism

I can indeed hardly see how anyone ought to wish Christianity to be true for if so the plain language of the text seems to show that the men who do not believe, and this would include my father, brother and almost all of my friends, will be everlastingly punished. And this is a damnable doctrine. ↗

— Charles Darwin

#charles-darwin #religion #skepticism #men

The real reason why so few men believe in God is that they have ceased to believe that even a God can love them. ↗

— Thomas Merton

#skepticism #love

Skeptics always want miracles such as stepping down from the Cross, but never the greater miracle of forgiveness. ↗

— Fulton J. Sheen

#jesus #miracles #skepticism #the-cross #forgiveness

Is it more probable that nature should go out of her course or that a man should tell a lie? We have never seen, in our time, nature go out of her course. But we have good reason to believe that millions of lies have been told in the same time. It is therefore at least millions to one that the reporter of a miracle tells a lie. ↗

— Thomas Paine

#religion #science #skepticism #age

I have always strenuously supported the right of every man to his own opinion, however different that opinion might be to mine. He who denies to another this right, makes a slave of himself to his present opinion, because he precludes himself the right of changing it. ↗

— Thomas Paine

#religion #skepticism #age

Nevertheless, a distinction must be made between skepticism as a philosophical thesis and skepticism as an attitude in life. As a philosophical thesis, it is a contradictory one, since it affirms the impossibility of knowing truth, although this affirmation itself claims to be true. Thus, skepticism as a thesis refutes itself in the very act of being formulated. The other aspect is different: this is the abstention from all judgments, skepticism in life, which neither affirms nor denies. This skepticism appears in history time and again, although here, too, it is doubtful whether human life can remain floating in this abstention without taking root in convictions. ↗

— Julián Marías

#attitude

With their backs to the sunrise they worship the night. ↗

— Robert G. Ingersoll

#skepticism #superstition #religion