I know that most men -- not only those considered clever, but even those who are very clever and capable of understanding most difficult scientific, mathematical, or philosophic, problems -- can seldom discern even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as obliges them to admit the falsity of conclusions they have formed, perhaps with much difficulty -- conclusions of which they are proud, which they have taught to others, and on which they have built their lives.more Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoi quotes | Freethinkers are those who are willing to use their minds without prejudice and without fearing to understand things that clash with their customs, privileges, or beliefs. This state of mind is not common, but it is essential for right thinking; where it is absent, discussion is apt to become worse than useless.more Leo Nikolaevich Tolstoi quotes | Whenever there is a simple error that most laymen fall for, there is always a slightly more sophisticated version of the same problem that experts fall for.more Amos Tversky quotes | Let me make the superstitions of a nation and I care not who makes its laws or its songs either.more Mark Twain quotes | Often the less there is to justify a traditional custom the harder it is to get rid of it.more Mark Twain quotes | ... if it is a Miracle, any sort of evidence will answer, but if it is a Fact, proof is necessary.more Mark Twain quotes | I am aware that when even the brightest mind in our world has been trained up from childhood in a superstition of any kind, it will never be possible for that mind, in its maturity, to examine sincerely, dispassionately, and conscientiously any evidence or any circumstance which shall seem to cast a doubt upon the validity of that superstition... (more)more Mark Twain quotes | One of the proofs of the immortality of the soul is that myriads have believed in it. They have also believed the world was flat.more Mark Twain quotes | Just as there is a very short distance between the U.S. and Cuba, there is a very short distance between a democracy and a dictatorship where the government gets to decide what to do, how to think, and how to live. And sometimes your freedom is not taken away at gunpoint, but instead it is done one piece of paper at a time, one seemingly meaningless rule at a time, one small silencing at a time. Never allow the government – or anyone else – to tell you what you can or cannot believe or what you can and cannot say or what your conscience tells you to have to do or not do.more Armando Valladares quotes | When you control opinion, as corporate America controls opinion in the United States by owning the media, you can make the [many] believe almost anything you want, and you can guide them.more Gore Vidal quotes | The mere summoning of a witness and compelling him to testify against his will, about his beliefs, expressions or associations, is a measure of governmental interference. And when those forced revelations concern maters that are unorthodox, unpopular, or even hateful to the general public, the reactions in the life of the witness may be disastrous.more Earl Warren quotes | Neither the trappings of robes, nor temples of stone, nor a fixed
liturgy, nor an extensive literature or history is required to meet the
test of beliefs cognizable under the Constitution as religious. So far
as our law is concerned, one person's religious beliefs held for one
day are presumptively entitled to the same protection as the beliefs of
millions which have been shared for thousands of years.more Judge Jack B. Weinstein quotes | It is a mindless philosophy that assumes that one's private beliefs have nothing to do with public office. Does it make sense to entrust those who are immoral in private with the power to determine the nation's moral issues and, indeed, its destiny? .... The duplicitous soul of a leader can only make a nation more sophisticated in evil.more Dr. Ravi Zacharias quotes | Fact of the matter is, there is no hip world, there is no straight world. There's a world, you see, which has people in it who believe in a variety of different things. Everybody believes in something and everybody, by virtue of the fact that they believe in something, use that something to support their own existence.more Frank Zappa quotes |
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