Sometimes, when I'm plugged in to this virtual world we call the Internet, I stumble across a precious gem worth sharing with the world. What follows are a few of those gems: some good quotes, an excellent video tribute to Carl Sagan... random stuff meant to give you some random enlightenment. Happy December, folks. Enjoy...
[via The Thinking Atheist]
Truth does not demand belief. Scientists do not join hands every Sunday, singing, yes, gravity is real! I will have faith! I will be strong! I believe in my heart that what goes up, up, up must come down, down. down. Amen! If they did, we would think they were pretty insecure about it.
- Dan Barker
Skepticism's bad rap arises from the impression that, however necessary the activity, it can only be regarded as a negative removal of false claims. Not so... Proper debunking is done in the interest of an alternate model of explanation, not as a nihilistic exercise. The alternate model is rationality itself, tied to moral decency--the most powerful joint instrument for good that our planet has ever known.
- Stephen Jay Gould
How on earth can religious people believe in so much arbitrary, clearly invented balderdash?....The acceptance of a creed, any creed, entitles the acceptor to membership in the sort of artificial extended family we call a congregation. It is a way to fight loneliness. Any time I see a person fleeing from reason and into religion, I think to myself, There goes a person who simply cannot stand being so goddamned lonely anymore.
- Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
Faith is a cop-out. It is intellectual bankruptcy. If the only way you can accept an assertion is by faith, then you are conceding that it can't be taken on its own merits. - Dan Barker
Trillions and trillions of prayers every day asking and begging and pleading for favors. 'Do this' 'Gimme that' 'I want a new car' 'I want a better job'. And most of this praying takes place on Sunday. And I say fine, pray for anything you want. Pray for anything. But...what about the divine plan? Remember that? The divine plan. Long time ago god made a divine plan. Gave it a lot of thought. Decided it was a good plan. Put it into practice. And for billion and billions of years the divine plan has been doing just fine. Now you come along and pray for something. Well, suppose the thing you want isn't in god's divine plan. What do you want him to do? Change his plan? Just for you? Doesn't it seem a little arrogant? It's a divine plan. What's the use of being god if every run-down schmuck with a two dollar prayer book can come along and fuck up your plan? And here's something else, another problem you might have; suppose your prayers aren't answered. What do you say? 'Well it's god's will. God's will be done.' Fine, but if it gods will and he's going to do whatever he wants to anyway; why the fuck bother praying in the first place? Seems like a big waste of time to me. Couldn't you just skip the praying part and get right to his will?
- George Carlin
Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?
- Douglas Adams
We have men sold to build churches, women sold to support the gospel, and babes sold to purchase Bibles for the poor heathen, all for the glory of God and the good of souls. The slave auctioneer's bell and the church-going bell chime in with each other, and the bitter cries of the heart-broken slave are drowned in the relgious shouts of his pious master. Revivals of religion and revivals in the slave trade go hand in hand.
- Frederick Douglass
I'm an atheist, and that's it. I believe there's nothing we can know except that we should be kind to each other and do what we can for other people.
- Katharine Hepburn
Gullibility and credulity are considered undesirable qualities in every department of human life - except religion.
- Christopher Hitchens
Dogma demands authority, rather than intelligent thought, as the source of opinion; it requires persecution of heretics and hostility to unbelievers; it asks of its disciples that they should inhibit natural kindness in favor of systematic hatred.
- Bertrand Russell
They said God was on high and he controlled the world and therefore we must pray against Satan. Well, if God controls the world, he controls Satan. For me, religion was full of misstatements and reaches of logic that I just couldn't agree with.
- Gene Roddenberry
The universe is a strange and wondrous place. The truth is quite odd enough to need no help from pseudoscientific charlatans.
- Richard Dawkins
Dead-Logic.com
BONUS: Check out Mike D's awesome blog entry: The disastrous results of gay marriage, featuring a video that's gone viral (it absolutely blew up my Facebook) of Zach Wahls, a 19 year old who was raised by a lesbian couple. It's just good stuff.
