quotes about Atheism
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I'm not an athiest. How can you not believe in something that doesn't exist? That's way too convoluted for me.
-- A. Whitney Brown -
Religions survive mainly because they brainwash the young.
-- A.C. GraylingSource : A.C. Grayling (2012). “Against All Gods: Six Polemics on Religion and an Essay on Kindness”, p.12, Oberon Books
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If the assertion that there is a god is nonsensical, then the atheist's assertion that there is no god is equally nonsensical, since it is only a significant proposition that can be significantly contradicted.
-- A.J. Ayer -
Theism is so confused and the sentences in which "God" appears so incoherent and so incapable of verifiability or falsifiability that to speak of belief or unbelief, faith or unfaith, is logically impossible.
-- A.J. Ayer -
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If 'god' is a metaphysical term, then it cannot be even probable that a god exists. For to say that 'God exists' is to make a metaphysical utterance which cannot be either true or false. And by the same criterion, no sentence which purports to describe the nature of a transcendent god can possess any literal significance.
-- A.J. Ayer -
I take it, therefore, to be a fact, that one's existence ends with death. I think it possible to show how this fact can be emotionally acceptable.
-- A.J. Ayer -
A heathen philosopher once asked a Christian, 'Where is God'? The Christian answered, 'Let me first ask you, Where is He not?'
-- Aaron Arrowsmith -
We have followed a path of moderation, development is our priority, national unity, good community relations, Muslims and non Muslims, this is what has given us the advantage.
-- Abdullah Ahmad Badawi -
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This sense of wonder leads most scientists to a Superior Being - der Alte, the Old One, as Einstein affectionately called the Deity - a Superior Intelligence, the Lord of all Creation and Natural Law.
-- Abdus SalamSource : Abdus Salam, H. R. Dalafi (1994). “Renaissance of Sciences in Islamic Countries”, p.139, World Scientific
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The only person who is a worse liar than a faith healer is his patient.
-- Abraham Lincoln -
Oh, that [his Thanksgiving Message] is some of Seward's nonsense, and it pleases the fools.
-- Abraham Lincoln -
If there is no military need for the building, leave it alone, neither putting anyone in or out of it, except on finding some one preaching or practicing treason, in which case lay hands on him, just as if he were doing the same thing in any other building.
-- Abraham Lincoln -
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I have neither time nor disposition to enter into discussion with the Friend, and end this occasion by suggesting for her consideration the question whether, if it be true that the Lord has appointed me to do the work she has indicated, it is not probable that he would have communicated knowledge of the fact to me as well as to her.
-- Abraham Lincoln -
What good fortune for those in power that people do not think.
-- Adolf Hitler -
The work that Christ started but could not finish, I - Adolf Hitler - will conclude.
-- Adolf Hitler -
I believe today that my conduct is in accordance with the will of the Almighty Creator.
-- Adolf Hitler -
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I am now as before a Catholic and will always remain so.
-- Adolf Hitler -
I am convinced that I am acting as the agent of our Almighty Creator. By fighting the Jews, I am doing the Lord's work.
-- Adolf Hitler -
This human world of ours would be inconceivable without the practical existence of a religious belief.
-- Adolf Hitler -
I am personally convinced of the great power and deep significance of Christianity, and I won't allow any other religion to be promoted.
-- Adolf Hitler -
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The broad masses of a population are more amenable to the appeal of rhetoric than to any other force.
-- Adolf Hitler -
Most successes are unhappy. That's why they are successes - they have to reassure themselves about themselves by achieving something that the world will notice.
-- Agatha Christie -
From 1949 to the present, for every dollar the US spent on an African, it spent $250.65 on an Israeli, and for every dollar it spent on someone from the Western Hemisphere outside the US, it spent $214 on an Israeli.
-- Ahdaf Soueif -
Today, communication itself is the problem. We have become the world's first overcommunicated society. Each year we send more and receive less.
-- Al Ries -
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Dr. King used Gandhi's commitment to non-violence and to passive resistance.
-- Al Sharpton -
Seeking what is true is not seeking what is desirable.
-- Albert Camus -
In order to exist just once in the world, it is necessary never again to exist.
-- Albert Camus -
As for Hitler, his professed religion unhesitatingly juxtaposed the God-Providence and Valhalla. Actually his god was an argument at a political meeting and a manner of reaching an impressive climax at the end of speeches.
-- Albert Camus -
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Beware of those who say: "I know this too well to be able to express it." For if they cannot do so, this is because they don't know it or because out of laziness they stopped at the outer crust.
-- Albert Camus -
For the existentials, negation is their God. To be precise, that god is maintained only through the negation of human reason. But, like suicides, gods change with men.
-- Albert Camus -
I do not want to found anything on the incomprehensible. I want to know whether I can live with what I know and with that alone.
-- Albert Camus -
There exists an obvious fact that seems utterly moral: namely, that a man is always prey to his truths. Once he has admitted them, he cannot free himself from them. One has to pay something. A man who has become conscious of the absurd is forever bound to it.
-- Albert Camus -
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I came- though the child of entirely irreligious (Jewish) parents - to a deep religiousness, which, however, reached an abrupt end at the age of twelve.
-- Albert Einstein -
I have repeatedly said that in my opinion the idea of a personal God is a childlike one.
-- Albert Einstein -
For me the Jewish religion like all other religions is an incarnation of the most childish superstitions.
-- Albert Einstein -
The more I study science, the more I believe in God.
-- Albert Einstein -
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[O]nly if every individual strives for truth can humanity attain a happier future; the atavisms in each of us that stand in the way of a friendlier destiny can only thus be rendered ineffective.
-- Albert Einstein -
You cannot coherently affirm the Christian-truth claim and the dominant model of evolutionary theory at the same time.
-- Albert Mohler -
Death is the only thing we haven't succeeded in completely vulgarizing.
-- Aldous Huxley -
The vast majority of human beings dislike and even actually dread all notions with which they are not familiar... Hence it comes about that at their first appearance innovators have generally been persecuted, and always derided as fools and madmen.
-- Aldous Huxley -
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Christianity accepted as given a metaphysical system derived from several already existing and mutually incompatible systems.
-- Aldous Huxley -
If one were to take the bible seriously one would go mad. But to take the bible seriously, one must be already mad.
-- Aleister Crowley -
We place no reliance On virgin or pigeon; Our Method is Science, Our Aim is Religion.
-- Aleister Crowley -
All religions have based morality on obedience, that is to say, on voluntary slavery. That is why they have always been more pernicious than any political organization. For the latter makes use of violence, the former - of the corruption of the will.
-- Alexander Herzen -
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We know that nature is described by the best of all possible mathematics because God created it. So there is a chance that the best of all possible mathematics will be created out of physicists' attempts to describe nature.
-- Alexander Markovich Polyakov -
I really believe in non-violence, but I also believe in a short of resistance that has to be respectful.
-- Alexandra Paul -
Jesus knows our world. He does not disdain us like the God of Aristotle. We can speak to Him and He answers us. Although He is a person like ourselves, He is God and transcends all things.
-- Alexis Carrel -
A profession that we are a nation "under God" is identical, for Establishment Clause purposes, to a profession that we are a nation "under Jesus," a nation "under Vishnu," a nation "under Zeus," or a nation "under no god," because none of these professions can be neutral with respect to religion.
-- Alfred GoodwinSource : "America's pledge of allegiance ruled unconstitutional" by Duncan Campbell, www.theguardian.com. June 26, 2002.
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It's the noisiest thing I've ever experienced.
-- Alfred GoodwinSource : "Pledge of Allegiance Judges Facing Demonstrators at Courthouse". www.foxnews.com. July 17, 2002.
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There will be certain things in a man that have to be won, not forced; inspired, not compelled.
-- Alfred Whitney GriswoldSource : Alfred Whitney Griswold (1962). “Liberal Education and the Democratic Ideal: And Other Essays”
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The beast faith lives on its own dung.
-- Algernon Charles Swinburne -
Atheism, I began to realize, rested on a less-than-satisfactory evidential basis. The arguments that had once seemed bold, decisive, and conclusive increasingly turned out to be circular, tentative, and uncertain.
-- Alister E. McGrath -
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At Oxford University, the certainties of my atheist faith (and atheism is a faith) began to crumble
-- Alister E. McGrath -
I find it quite improbable that such order came out of chaos. There has to be some organizing principle. God to me is a mystery but is the explanation for the miracle of existence, why there is something instead of nothing.
-- Allan SandageSource : "Sizing up the Cosmos: An Astronomer's Quest" by John Noble Wilford, www.nytimes.com. March 12, 1991.
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The People will not allow themselves to be changed into hogs by the Circes of Atheism. Their souls will flash indignation against their transformers. A day will come when they will see that they are impoverished under the pretext of being enriched; that, when they are robbed of their souls and of God, both their titles to liberty are stolen from them.
-- Alphonse de Lamartine -
If you believe in evolution and naturalism then you have a reason not to think your faculties are reliable.
-- Alvin Plantinga -
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Pray: To ask the laws of the universe to be annulled on behalf of a single petitioner confessedly unworthy.
-- Ambrose BierceSource : Ambrose Bierce (2012). “The Devil's Dictionary”, p.96, Courier Corporation
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The place whereon the priest formerly raveled out the small intestine of the sacrificial victim for purposes of divination and cooked its flesh for the gods. The word is now seldom used, except with reference to the sacrifice of their liberty and peace by a male and a female fool.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
A large stone presented by the archangel Gabriel to the patriarch Abraham, and preserved at Mecca. The patriarch had perhaps asked the archangel for bread.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
Damning, with bell, book and candle / Some sinner whose opinions are a scandal. / A rite permitting Satan to enslave him / Forever, and forbidding Christ to save him.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
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In theology, the state of a luckless mortal prenatally damned. The doctrine of reprobation was taught by Calvin, whose joy in it was somewhat marred by the sad sincerity of his conviction that although some are foredoomed to perdition, others are predestined to salvation.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
A comely female inhabiting the Mohammedan Paradise to make things cheery for the good Mussulman, whose belief in her existence marks a noble discontent with his earthly spouse, whom he denies a soul.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
I keep a conscience uncorrupted by religion, a judgment undimmed by politics and patriotism, a heart untainted by friendships and sentiments unsoured by animosities.
-- Ambrose Bierce -
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Strengthen me by sympathizing with my strength, not my weakness.
-- Amos Bronson Alcott -
Jerusalem has been - and for many, still is - a metaphor for destruction and the vengeance of an offended God. She is the city where believers have killed unbelievers to give life to faith.
-- Amos ElonSource : Amos Elon (1995). “Jerusalem, Battlegrounds of Memory”, Kodansha Globe
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They are mostly Americans and almost all are Protestant. Many have a strong grounding in the Bible. In Jerusalem, they suddenly take off their clothes or shout prophecies on street corners, only to revert to normal after a few days' treatment.
-- Amos ElonSource : Amos Elon (1995). “Jerusalem, Battlegrounds of Memory”, Kodansha Globe
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The evaporation of 4 million who believe in this crap would leave the world a better place.
-- Andrei Codrescu -
I give money for church organs in the hope the organ music will distract the congregation's attention from the rest of the service.
-- Andrew Carnegie -
Thomas Paine needs no monument made with hands; he has erected a monument in the hearts of all lovers of liberty.
-- Andrew Jackson -
Those to whom his word was revealed were always alone in some remote place, like Moses. There wasn't anyone else around when Mohammed got the word either. Mormon Joseph Smith and Christian Scientist, Mary Baker Eddy, had exclusive audiences with God. We have to trust them as reporters--and you know how reporters are. They'll do anything for a story.
-- Andy Rooney -
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I had one nanny who made me sit in front of a bowl of porridge for three or four days running when I refused to eat it. I remember being very unhappy about that.
-- Anjelica Huston -
Interviewer: "Didn't [Sagan] want to believe?" Druyan: "He didn't want to believe. He wanted to know.
-- Ann Druyan -
Carl did not want to believe. He wanted to know.
-- Ann Druyan -
Even now, there are still days so beautiful, I almost believe in God.
-- Ann HoodSource : Ann Hood (2009). “Comfort: A Journey Through Grief”, p.132, W. W. Norton & Company
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But after he was pleased to reveal himself to me I did presently, like Abraham, run to Hagar. And after that he did let me see the atheism of my own heart, for which I begged of the Lord that it might not remain in my heart.
-- Anne Hutchinson -
In all countries, and in all ages, from the Druids down to brother Beecher, priests have aimed at universal power.
-- Anne Royall -
[G]et two-thirds of the states to alter the Constitution; come out with their national religion, and then let the people get their throats ready.
-- Anne Royall -
I find that the whole weight of relieving human misery and distress falls on the shoulders of those Heretics and Infidels; and though great part of this distress has been occasioned by those ravening wolves' hopeful converts.
-- Anne Royall -
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Fanaticism and bigotry require any food but common sense and reason, which would break the charm of those spellbound fanatics.
-- Anne Royall -
We have a right to know or may lawfully know any truth. And a right to know any truth whatsoever implies a right to think freely.
-- Anthony CollinsSource : Anthony Collins (1713). “A discourse of free-thinking, occasion'd by the rise and growth of a sect call'd Free-thinkers. By Anthony Collins”, p.6
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Apologys for self-evident Truths can never have any effect on those who have so little Sense as to deny them. They are the Foundation of all Reasoning, and the only just Bottom on which Men can proceed in convincing one another of the Truth: and by consequence whoever is capable of denying them, is not in a condition to be informed.
-- Anthony Collins -
Demagoguery enters at the moment when, for want of a common denominator, the principle of equality degenerates into the principle of identity.
-- Antoine de Saint-Exupery -
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The creation continues incessantly through the media of man. But man does not create... he discovers.
-- Antonio Gaudi -
Beware of the community in which blasphemy does not exist: underneath, atheism runs rampant.
-- Antonio Machado -
If it is to be established that there is a God, then we have to have good grounds for believing that this is indeed so. Until and unless some such grounds are produced we have literally no reason at all for believing; and in that situation the only reasonable posture must be that of either the negative atheist or the agnostic. So the onus of proof has to rest on the proposition of theism.
-- Antony FlewSource : Antony Flew, John Shosky (1998). “Philosophical Essays”, p.6, Rowman & Littlefield
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However far back we may be able to trace the - so to speak - internal history of the Universe, there can be no question of arguing that this or that external origin is either probable or improbable. We do not have, and we necessarily could not have, experience of other Universes to tell us that Universes, or Universes with these particular features, are the work of Gods, or of Gods of this or that particular sort.
-- Antony FlewSource : Antony Flew (1984). “God, freedom, and immortality: a critical analysis”
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Pascal makes no attempt in this most famous argument to show that his Roman Catholicism is true or probably true. The reasons which he suggests for making the recommended bet on his particular faith are reasons in the sense of motives rather than reasons in the sense of grounds. Conceding, if only for the sake of the present argument, that we can have no knowledge here, Pascal tries to justify as prudent a policy of systematic self-persuasion, rather than to provide grounds for thinking that the beliefs recommended are actually true.
-- Antony Flew -
You cannot ... transmute some incoherent mixture of words into sense merely by introducing the three-letter word "God" to be its grammatical subject.
-- Antony Flew -
Someone tells us that God loves us as a father loves his children. We are reassured. But then something awful happens. Some qualification is made.... We are reassured again. But then perhaps we ask: what is this assurance of God's (appropriately qualified) love worth, what is this apparent guarantee really a guarantee against? Just what would have to happen not merely (morally and wrongly) to tempt but also (logically and rightly) to entitle us to say "God does not love us" or even "God does not exist"?
-- Antony Flew -
Now, if anything at all can be known to be wrong, it seems to me to be unshakably certain that it would be wrong to make any sentient being suffer eternally for any offence whatever.
-- Antony FlewSource : Antony Flew (1984). “God, freedom, and immortality: a critical analysis”
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If God is God He is not good, if God is good He is not God; take the even, take the odd.
-- Archibald MacLeishSource : Archibald MacLeish (1958). “J. B.”
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The infantile cowardice of our time which demands an external pattern, a nonhuman authority.
-- Archibald MacLeish -
Piety's hard enough to take among the poor who have to practice it. A rich man's piety stinks. It's insufferable.
-- Archibald MacLeish -
That peculiar disease of intellectuals, that infatuation with ideas at the expense of experience, that compels experience to conform to bookish expectations.
-- Archibald MacLeish -
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There's probably no God. So stop worrying and enjoy your life.
-- Ariane Sherine -
We may assume the superiority ceteris paribus of the demonstration which derives from fewer postulates or hypotheses - in short, from fewer premises.
-- Aristotle -
If the hammer and the shuttle could move themselves, slavery would be unnecessary.
-- Aristotle -