Skepticism Quotes

Good characters in fiction are the very devil. Not only because most authors have too little materia...

You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lif...

You could just as well say that an agnostic is a deeply religious person with at least a rudimentary...

Some information is classified legitimately; as with military hardware, secrecy sometimes really is ...

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.

The truth may be puzzling. It may take some work to grapple with. It may be counterintuitive. It may...

It seems to me what is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most sk...

The method of science is tried and true. It is not perfect, it's just the best we have. And to aband...

Who is more humble? The scientist who looks at the universe with an open mind and accepts whatever t...

Present global culture is a kind of arrogant newcomer. It arrives on the planetary stage following f...

People are not stupid. They believe things for reasons. The last way for skeptics to get the attenti...

You can get into a habit of thought in which you enjoy making fun of all those other people who don'...

Those who make uncritical observations or fraudulent claims lead us into error and deflect us from t...

Both [P. T.] Barnum and H. L. Mencken are said to have made the depressing observation that no one e...

The major religions on the Earth contradict each other left and right. You can't all be correct. And...

Every aspect of Nature reveals a deep mystery and touches our sense of wonder and awe. Those afraid ...

When I wake up I go through an abbreviated process of mourning all over again. Plainly, there’s some...

Nevertheless, (Jefferson) believed that the habit of skepticism is an essential prerequisite for res...

Why do we put up with it? Do we like to be criticized? No, no scientist enjoys it. Every scientist f...

At the heart of science is an essential balance between two seemingly contradictory attitudes--an op...

It is certainly true that all beliefs and all myths are worthy of a respectful hearing. It is not tr...

The chief deficiency I see in the skeptical movement is its polarization: Us vs. Them — the sense th...

But in introducing me simultaneously to skepticism and to wonder, they taught me the two uneasily co...

If we can't think for ourselves, if we're unwilling to question authority, then we're just putty in ...

All science asks is to employ the same levels of skepticism we use in buying a used car or in judgin...

deluded or not, supporters of superstition and pseudoscience are human beings with real feelings, wh...

The limit of man s knowledge in any subject possesses a high interest which is perhaps increased by ...

...Whilst on board the Beagle I was quite orthodox, and I remember being heartily laughed at by seve...

Nothingever happened on this globe, for good, at which some people did not have their fill of laught...

I believe that we do not know anything for certain, but everything probably.

It's not always a question of you changing your mind. I think very often your mind changes you. You ...

The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks.

I have always felt that doubt was the beginning of wisdom, and the fear of God was the end of wisdom...

The fear of God is not the beginning of wisdom. The fear of God is the death of wisdom. Skepticism a...

Scientific knowledge advances haltingly and is stimulated by contention and doubt.

We live in a culture that has, for centuries now, cultivated the idea that the skeptical person is a...

I’m saying there is evil in the world,” Master Kit said, hefting the box on his hip, “and doubt is t...

I am ready to reject all belief and reasoning and can look upon no opinion even as more probable or...

When anyone tells me that he saw a dead man restored to life, I immediately consider with myself whe...

To be a philosophical Sceptic is the first and most essential step towards being a sound, believing ...

Does a man of sense run after every silly tale of hobgoblins or fairies, and canvass particularly th...

As every inquiry which regards religion is of the utmost importance, there are two questions in part...

Scepticism is the first step towards truth.

Travel was a species of warfare.

Unbelief is as much of a choice as belief is. What makes it in many ways more appealing is that wher...

Great intellects are skeptical.

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

Tell people there's an invisible man in the sky who created the universe, and the vast majority will...

Skepticism, not cleanliness, is next to godliness. Skepticism is the father of freedom. It is like t...

Her mind escaped between them, and went exploring for itself through the great gaps they had made in...

Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he...

The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wron...

The Greeks made Space the subject-matter of a science of supreme simplicity and certainty. Out of it...

Simply to acquiesce in skepticism can never suffice to overcome the restlessness of reason.

Skepticism is thus a resting-place for human reason, where it can reflect upon its dogmatic wanderin...

Don't you believe in flying saucers, they ask me? Don't you believe in telepathy? — in ancient astro...

No amount of belief makes something a fact.

She believed in nothing. Only her scepticism kept her from being an atheist.

[T]he longer you stay skeptical, doubtful, intellectually uncomfortable, the better it is for you.

Reality provides us with facts so romantic that imagination itself could add nothing to them.

On this rock we had built our church. We had founded our idealism on the most nihilistic implication...

Since total skepticism about ultimate beliefs is strictly impossible, in that no belief can be doubt...

If I were to construct a God I would furnish Him with some way and qualities and characteristics whi...

Skeptical scientists often point out, as Carl Sagan has, that the wonders of real science far surpas...

I believe the experiences reported in this book are reproducible by anyone who wishes to try. I went...

...Spinoza’s Conjecture:“Belief comes quickly and naturally, skepticism is slow and unnatural, and m...

Je hay entre autres vices, cruellement la cruauté, et par nature et par jugement, comme l'extreme de...

J'accuse toute violence en l'education d'une ame tendre, qu'on dresse pour l'honneur, et la liberté.

L'honneste est stable et permanent.

D'autant que nous avons cher, estre, et estre consiste en mouvement et action.

Heureuse la mort qui oste le loisir aux apprests de tel equipage.

L'utilité du vivre n'est pas en l'espace: elle est en l'usage.

Il n'est rien qui tente mes larmes que les larmes.

Les naturels sanguinaires à l'endroit des bestes, tesmoignent une propension naturelle à la cruauté.

Nature a, (ce crains-je) elle mesme attaché à l'homme quelque instinct à l'inhumanité

Scepticism does not abolish the world, it turns it into questions.

Many in the church have turned their back on serious study, and have embraced an anti-intellectualis...

God is an ever-receding pocket of scientific ignorance.

I'd ask [God] why he keeps trying to kill us all with disease, pestilence, and natural disasters. I'...

How have people come to be taken in by The Phenomenon of Man? We must not underestimate the size of ...

For a scientist must indeed be freely imaginative and yet skeptical, creative and yet a critic. Ther...

The fact that we can neither prove nor disprove the existence of something does not put existence an...

I have found it an amusing strategy, when asked whether I am an atheist, to point out that the quest...

We are talking about a bet, remember, and Pascal wasn't claiming that his wager enjoyed anything but...

Most institutions demand unqualified faith but the institution of science makes skepticism a virtue.

After that [father's death] I never cried with any real conviction, nor expected much of anyone's Go...

Are you really surprised by the endurance of religion? What ideology is likely to be more durable th...

I know of no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too desirous of e...

Tell a devout Christian that his wife is cheating on him, or that frozen yogurt can make a man invis...

It is also worth noting that one can obtain a Ph.D. in any branch of science for no other purpose th...

Religious moderation is the product of secular knowledge and scriptural ignorance.

To point out nonepistemic motives in another’s view of the world, therefore, is always a criticism, ...

Questions invaded my mind and I was young and skeptical, wanting to believe in the power of the mind...

You can't just say there is a god because the world is beautiful. You have to account for bone cance...

It's natural to think that living things must be the handiwork of a designer. But it was also natura...

It Begins with skepticism. The history of human folly, and our own susceptibility to illusions and f...

In post-Nietzschean spirit, the West appears to be busily undermining its own erstwhile metaphysical...

How can anyone trust scientists? If new evidence comes along, they change their minds.

Superstition would seem to be simply cowardice in regard to the supernatural.

Skepticism means not intellectual doubt alone but moral doubt.