12th April 2013
What Ingersoll said is that an atheist is an agnostic and an agnostic is an atheist. Of course an atheist can’t prove there isn’t a God, because you cannot prove a negative. The atheist basically says that based on everything I see around me, I don’t think so. Every rational thing I see and have learned about the world around me says there isn’t a God, but as far as proving there isn’t a God, no one can do that. Both the atheist and the agnostic say that.
This is part of an interview with Susan Jacoby on the Five Books website - FiveBooks Interviews >
Susan Jacoby on Atheism
A good read.
The religi board at the front of my old house. It was great fun. Sometimes my posts were rubbed out! Haha. The religites didn’t really approve.
A good one.
Oh yes. Doing the former but planning to totally avoid the latter!
You know when I lived in Mullumbimby, NSW I had quite a large blackboard on my property that fronted onto a busy through road. I had a great time finding quotes of various sorts and used to chalk one up per week.
Sometimes, they would be wiped off (hahaha) and I would diligently chalk them up again. I will see if I can find a photo of the board. Cars would often pull off the road in front of the house to read the ‘religi board’ as my husband named it, long before I actually met him. Hilarious and entertaining.
So here I am in Scotland, not on a main road and it all seems a little precious. But I wanted to repeat the quotes in this blog and, of course, add to them after I have finished the ones I have. I am so anal that I kept each post-it note with my quote written on it. I even recorded the number of times I had to reinstate those that were wiped off!! There must be something wrong with me, but I thought I would change this ‘sticky note’ on the blog each week. What do you two think? In terms of frequency that is.
It is a good idea.
So where’s the quote?
Didn’t you ever read read Marion Maddox’s book about Howard and the religious creep that started to permeate Australian politics during Howard’s tenure (both times).
Try to find it and read it – it is a bit of an eye opener.
Religious faith is a desperate marriage of hope and ignorance.
a rather well phrased but cynical and narrow minded speculation not a fact nor a constructive piece of wisdom
Sam Harris is one of the least cynical people I have read or listened to. He just has no patience with the outmoded and dangerous tenets of religious faith and neither do I.
I have posted this as a quotable quote that doesn’t attempt to be a constructive piece of wisdom. It is more an observation and that caught my fancy and with which I agree. I would probably phrase my own observations differently.
Religious faith feeds inchoate fears and stultifies the intellect.
Or something like that, but you get my drift.
I’m tempted to agree but I look around and its apparent that the truth is really not all that much better either. How does it really help you to be ‘wiser’ if it doesn’t add tangibly to your quality of life? Much easier to just blindly believe that there is a light that never goes out, somewhere.
Well, of course, you are right if a presumed easier life is what you want. For my money, I would rather face a reality where I don’t try to bury my head in very shifting sands, blinding and choking as I perceive them to be. I am not an ostrich:-) Besides, truth is never guaranteed to be better than blind faith. It is more honest though.
Your stated stance reminds me of a light interchange:
Intoned: The lord is my shepherd
Interruption: I don’t need no shepherd – I ain’t no sheep
Besides, trying to be wiser is not the aim of knowledge. Knowledge is what arises from a realised and followed curiosity and is served by observance and investigation with understanding as an end product.
Intellectual curiosity is not to be cut off at the knees by superstitious fear thus diverting the intellect to those deadening shifting sands and stopping our curiosity from finding solace in knowledge.
So you appear to disagree with Harris and me and others:-)
It was Carl Sagan who said: ‘It is far better to grasp the universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.’
And it was Richard Dawkins who said: ‘Science frees us from superstition and dogma and enables us to base our knowledge on evidence.’
If there is ‘a light that never goes out’ it will be powered by science not prayer.It is knowledge, not dogma that has driven the quality of life that we enjoy today.
Of course you are right Pj. Prayer is a nothing; an ephemeral wishing. Didn’t make me my cuppa this morning
Yes, Anarchists and Atheists know about life styles.
Reblogged this on Intranetalizando Terrassa and commented:
As soon as we abandon our own reason, and are content to rely on authority, there is no end to our troubles.
I am pleased that you reblogged this. I try to change the quotes on a monthly basis but have been a little slack for months now.