Carl Sagan Quotes About Belief

Quotes about: Belief

• Think of how many religions attempt to validate themselves with prophecy. Think of how many people rely on these prophecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to support or prop up their beliefs. Yet has there ever been a religion with the prophetic accuracy and reliability of science? ... No other human institution comes close.

  Carl Sagan

  Science, Thinking, People

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.55, Ballantine Books

• You can't convince a believer of anything; for their belief is not based on evidence, it's based on a deep seated need to believe

  Carl Sagan

  Death, Faith, Atheist

• People are not stupid. They believe things for reasons. The last way for skeptics to get the attention of bright, curious, intelligent people is to belittle or condescend or to show arrogance toward their beliefs.

  Carl Sagan

  Stupid, Believe, Intelligent

• All of us cherish our beliefs. They are, to a degree, self-defining. When someone comes along who challenges our belief system as insufficiently well-based - or who, like Socrates, merely asks embarrassing questions that we haven't thought of, or demonstrates that we've swept key underlying assumptions under the rug - it becomes much more than a search for knowledge. It feels like a personal assault.

  Carl Sagan

  Love, Embarrassing Questions, Keys

  Carl Sagan (2011). “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.297, Ballantine Books

• Where we have strong emotions, we're liable to fool ourselves.

  Carl Sagan

  Happiness, Strong, Atheist

• I believe that in every person is a kind of circuit which resonates to intellectual discovery-and the idea is to make that resonance work

  Carl Sagan

  Believe, Science, Discovery

  Carl Sagan, Tom Head (2006). “Conversations with Carl Sagan”, p.54, Univ. Press of Mississippi

• There is today-in a time when old beliefs are withering-a kind of philosophical hunger, a need to know who we are and how we got here. It is an on-going search, often unconscious, for a cosmic perspective for humanity

  Carl Sagan

  Philosophical, Perspective, Humanity

  Carl Sagan (1973). “Carl Sagan's Cosmic Connection: An Extraterrestrial Perspective”, p.59, Cambridge University Press

• Much of human history can, I think, be described as a gradual and sometimes painful liberation from provincialism, the emerging awareness that there is more to the world than was generally believed by our ancestors.

  Carl Sagan

  Thinking, World, Belief

  Carl Sagan, Jerald F. TerHorst, Allan J. Mayer, Sharon S. McKern, Laurence J. Peter (1980). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”

• After I give lectures-on almost any subject-I am often asked, "Do you believe in UFOs?" I'm always struck by how the question is phrased, the suggestion that this is a matter of belief and not evidence. I'm almost never asked, "How good is the evidence that UFOs are alien spaceships?"

  Carl Sagan

  Believe, Giving, Suggestions

  Carl Sagan (2011). “The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.82, Ballantine Books

• When Kepler found his long-cherished belief did not agree with the most precise observation, he accepted the uncomfortable fact. He preferred the hard truth to his dearest illusions, that is the heart of science.

  Carl Sagan

  Integrity, Heart, Science

  "Cosmos: A Personal Voyage". Documentary (1990 Update). Episode 3: "The Harmony of the Worlds", 1990.

• My deeply held belief is that if a god of anything like the traditional sort exists, our curiosity and intelligence is provided by such a God. We would be unappreciative of that gift if we suppressed our passion to explore the universe and ourselves.

  Carl Sagan

  God, Passion, Religion

  Carl Sagan (1979). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”, Random House Inc

• In college, in the early 1950s, I began to learn a little about how science works, the secrets of its great success, how rigorous the standards of evidence must be if we are really to know something is true, how many false starts and dead ends have plagued human thinking, how our biases can colour our interpretation of evidence, and how often belief systems widely held and supported by the political, religious and academic hierarchies turn out to be not just slightly in error, but grotesquely wrong.

  Carl Sagan

  Religious, College, Thinking

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.98, Ballantine Books

• My deeply held belief is that if a god of anything like the traditional sort exists, our curiosity and intelligence are provided by such a god. We would be unappreciative of those gifts (as well as unable to take such a course of action) if we suppressed our passion to explore the universe and ourselves. On the other hand, if such a traditional god does not exist, our curiosity and our intelligence are the essential tools for managing our survival. In either case, the enterprise of knowledge is consistent with both science and religion, and is essential for the welfare of the human species.

  Carl Sagan

  Passion, Hands, Survival

  Carl Sagan, Jerald F. TerHorst, Allan J. Mayer, Sharon S. McKern, Laurence J. Peter (1980). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”

• We are prodding, challenging, seeking contradictions or small, persistent residual errors, proposing alternative explanations, encouraging heresy. We give our highest rewards to those who convincingly disprove established beliefs.

  Carl Sagan

  Errors, Giving, Challenges

  Carl Sagan (2011). “Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”, p.58, Ballantine Books

• Indeed the reasoned criticism of a prevailing belief is a service to the proponents of that belief; if they are incapable of defending it, they are well advised to abandon it. This self-questioning and error-correcting aspect of the scientific method is its most striking property.

  Carl Sagan

  Errors, Self Questioning, Criticism

  Carl Sagan (1979). “Broca's brain: reflections on the romance of science”, Random House Inc

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