Argument Quotes - Page 28

• The strangest thing about the low quality of Internet argument is that effective argument isnt really so difficult. Sure, not everyone can be Clarence Darrow, but anyone who wants to be at least competent at argument can do it.

  Barry Eisler

  Quality, Want, Internet

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• It would be awesome to be so impressive that we could sway people to our way of thinking just by declaiming our thoughts, but probably most of us lack such gravitas. Luckily, there's something even better: evidence, logic, and argument.

  Barry Eisler

  Thinking, People, Would Be

  "How to Argue (VIDEO)" by Barry Eisler, www.huffingtonpost.com. November 15, 2010.

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• Yesterday, the Supreme Court spent over an hour listening to arguments on whether Obamacare is unconstitutional. Yeah, listening to arguments about Obamacare for an hour, or as most people call that, 'Thanksgiving Dinner.'

  Jimmy Fallon

  Obamacare, Yesterday, People

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• In our time, political speech and writing are largely the defense of the indefensible. Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging and sheer cloudy vagueness.

  George Orwell

  Party, Writing, Squares

  George Orwell (2001). “Orwell and Politics”, p.459, Penguin UK

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• As long as human beings are imperfect, there will always be arguments for extending the power of government to deal with these imperfections. The only logical stopping place is totalitarianism -- unless we realize that tolerating imperfections is the price of freedom.

  Thomas Sowell

  Government, Long, Imperfection

  Thomas Sowell (2013). “Ever Wonder Why?: and Other Controversial Essays”, p.332, Hoover Press

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• However much the creationist leaders might hammer away at their scientific and philosophical points, they would be helpless and a laughing-stock if that were all they had. It is religion that recruits their squadrons. Tens of millions of Americans, who neither know nor understand the actual arguments for - of even against - evolution, march in the army of the night, their Bibles held high. And they are a strong and frightening force, impervious to, and immunized against, the feeble lance of mere reason.

  Isaac Asimov

  Strong, Philosophical, Army

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• Teller contended, not implausibly, that hydrogen bombs keep the peace, or at least prevent thermonuclear war, because the consequences of warfare between nuclear powers are now too dangerous. We haven't had a nuclear war yet, have we? But all such arguments assume that the nuclear-armed nations are and always will be, without exception, rational actors, and that bouts of anger and revenge and madness will never overtake their leaders (or military and secret police officers in charge of nuclear weapons). In the century of Hitler and Stalin, this seems ingenuous.

  Carl Sagan

  Revenge, Military, War

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• You can not have an argument with a fully conscious person.

  Eckhart Tolle

  Conscious, Can Not, Persons

  Eckhart Tolle (2010). “The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment”, p.182, New World Library

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• Matt 13:57. Then Jesus told them, 'A prophet is honored everywhere except in his own hometown and among his own family.' The other night I ate at a real nice family restaurant. Every table had an argument going.

  George Carlin

  Inspirational, Jesus, Nice

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• We have received no single argument in favour of this document except political pressure. No link has been established between carbon dioxide emissions and climate change. No other objective facts have been presented in recent time. The IPCC's reports in 1990 and 1995 show it clearly.

  Andrey Illarionov

  Kyoto Protocol, Political, Climate

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• The Last Argument of Kings.

  Louis XIV

  Kings, Finals, Lasts

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• If I were wrong, wouldn't one be enough?

  Albert Einstein

  Enough, Ifs

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• Bertrand Russell used to employ the method of "evidence against interest"; in other words of deciding that a critique of capital punishment, say, carried more weight if it came from a prison governor. (My friend John O'Sullivan puts it like this: If the pope says he believes in God, he's only doing his job; if he says he doesn't believe in God, he may be on to something.)

  Christopher Hitchens

  Jobs, Believe, Punishment

  "What Sharon Did" by Christopher Hitchens, www.slate.com. January 5, 2006.

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• I have argued with him on almost every subject in the world, and we have always been on opposite sides, without affectation or animosity... It is necessary to disagree with him as much as I do, in order to admire him as I do; and I am proud of him as a foe even more than as a friend.

  Gilbert K. Chesterton

  Order, Opposites, World

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• Forget the Bible, the greatest argument against human evolution is a YouTube comment thread.

  Damien Fahey

  Funny, Evolution, Forget

  Twitter post from May 11, 2012

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• There are important arguments to be made about the relative merits of an hereditary or an elected head of state: but not at the level of the human frailties of particular monarchs or presidents. No one seriously contends that the American presidency should be abolished because Bill Clinton is a self-confessed adulterer. So why should the abolition of the British monarchy be contemplated because the same is true of Prince Charles?

  David Cannadine

  Self, Important, President

  David Cannadine (1998). “History in Our Time”, Penguin Group USA

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• The claim is also sometimes made that science is as arbitrary or irrational as all other claims to knowledge, or that reason itself is an illusion. As Ethan Allen said Those who invalidate reason ought seriously to consider whether they argue against reason with or without reason; if with reason, then they establish the principle that they are labouring to dethrone. If they argue without reason, which they must do, in order to be consistent with themselves, they are out of reach of rational conviction, nor do they deserve a rational argument.

  Carl Sagan

  Science, Order, Principles

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• We had an argument once, yeah. It was the best thing that could have happened to our working relationship. After that, we understood each other and got along much better. I always respected Barry Bonds, and I wanted to let him know that I did in a certain way.

  Andy Van Slyke

  Sports, Way, Yeah

  "Answer Man: Andy Van Slyke talks slugging Bonds, coaching first". Interview with David Brown, sports.yahoo.com. May 1, 2008.

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• My argument has always been that this is not an anti-Bush film, it's a pro-democracy film. And if George W.Bush comes out on the wrong side of democracy, that's his problem.

  John Sayles

  Democracy, Sides, Problem

  "Liberal America's last stand" by John Sayles, www.theguardian.com. July 21, 2005.

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• All things considered, I can see no reason to adopt the afterlife hypothesis. I am sure I shall remain in a minority for a long time to come, especially among experiencers, but for me the evidence and the arguments are overwhelming ... We are biological organisms, evolved in fascinating ways for no purpose at all and with no end in mind. We are simply here and this is how it is. I have no self and "I" own nothing. There is no one to die. There is just this moment, and now this, and now this.

  Susan Blackmore

  Self, Afterlife, Long

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• The influence of the leaders is due in very small measure to the arguments they employ, but in a large degree to their prestige. The best proof of this is that, should they by any circumstance lose their prestige, their influence disappears.

  Gustave Le Bon

  Leader, Atheism, Degrees

  Gustave Le Bon (2012). “The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind”, p.126, Courier Corporation

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• You explain right well, and you shew that you understand argument and are not a mere sophist since you accept that which cannot be denied.

  Giordano Bruno

  Atheism, Accepting, Wells

  Dorothea Waley Singer, Giordano Bruno (1968). “Giordano Bruno; his life and thought: With annotated translation of his work, On the infinite universe and worlds”, Greenwood Pub Group

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• You can make an argument that Bill O'Reilly is a conservative or a Republican. Bill's kind of unpredictable. Somebody might say that he would have been comfortable in the Democratic Party of Scoop Jackson.

  Brit Hume

  Party, Literature, Might

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• As is so often the case with pieces that appear in the 'Onion,' I honestly could not decide whether this was a clever hoax or not - the arguments were almost exactly as stupid as the real thing.

  Christopher Hitchens

  Clever, Real, Stupid

  "Equal Time" by Christopher Hitchens, www.slate.com. August 23, 2005.

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• As for Hitler, his professed religion unhesitatingly juxtaposed the God-Providence and Valhalla. Actually his god was an argument at a political meeting and a manner of reaching an impressive climax at the end of speeches.

  Albert Camus

  Political, Atheism, Valhalla

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