Moral Beliefs Quotes

• Among the sayings and discourses imputed to him (i.e. Jesus) by his biographers, I find many passages of fine imagination, correct morality, and of the most lovely benevolence; and others again of so much ignorance, so much absurdity, so much untruth, charlatanism, and imposture, as to pronounce it impossible that such contradictions should have proceeded from the same being.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Religious, Jesus, Ignorance

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• While I think in principle people should not have irrational beliefs, I should say that as a matter of fact, it is people who hold what I regard as completely irrational beliefs who are among the most effective moral actors in the world, in many respects. They're among the worst, but also among the best, even though the moral beliefs are ostensibly the same.

  Noam Chomsky

  Thinking, People, Principles

  Source: chomsky.info

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• I've been very lucky, and therefore I owe it to try and reduce the inequity in the world. And that's kind of a religious belief. I mean, it's at least a moral belief.

  Bill Gates

  Religious, Mean, Trying

  "Bill Gates: The Rolling Stone Interview". Interview with Jeff Goodell, www.rollingstone.com. March 13, 2014.

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• If we want to understand the distinctive constitution of Europe, we must go back to its religious foundations. For the moral beliefs which Christianity fostered still underpin civil society in Europe, the institutions that surround us.

  Larry Siedentop

  Religious, Europe, Foundation

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• We can tolerate great diversity in our aesthetic beliefs, but we can't tolerate much diversity in our moral beliefs.

  Jonathan Haidt

  Diversity, Aesthetic, Tolerate

  Interview with Tamler Sommers, www.believermag.com. August 2005.

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• A whole lot of us go through life assuming that we are basically right, basically all the time, about basically everything: about our political and intellectual convictions, our religious and moral beliefs, our assessments of other people, our memories, our grasp of facts. As absurd as it sounds when we stop to think about it, our steady state seems to be one of unconsciously assuming that we are very close to omniscient.

  Kathryn Schulz

  Religious, Memories, Thinking

  "Being Wrong: Adventures in the Margin of Error". Book by Kathryn Schultz, www.huffingtonpost.com. 2011.

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• There is a difference between criticizing people and criticizing a people's uninformed ideals. That is, unless one defines himself or others by their ideals, then he is offended, and usually offended secretly. Because oddly enough, this person is the same person quickest to resort to dismissive name-calling, such as 'bigot' or 'zealot'. And oddly enough, he is always the one, the 'open-minded' one, who adamantly protests for, not only himself, but others not to listen to any type of scholarly theological truth inherently for the sake of his own personal, moral beliefs.

  Criss Jami

  Names, Differences, People

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• If Christ be a fraud, he was among the most peculiar yet brilliant of frauds in saying that only he was the way, the truth, and the life. This is the importance of grace - some people think that simply being nice and not harming others is morality; others think that following rules and tithing are morality. But without Christ, all moral beliefs ultimately boil down to the one sin which perpetually rails against the concept of grace: man's lawful, religious, and futile attempt at establishing his own righteousness.

  Criss Jami

  Religious, Nice, Men

  Criss Jami (2015). “Killosophy”, p.15, Criss Jami

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• Should our moral beliefs really prove to be dependent on factual assumptions shown to be incorrect, it would be hardly moral to defend them by refusing to acknowledge the facts.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Would Be, Facts, Assumption

  "The Constitution of Liberty". Book by Friedrich Hayek, Postscript: Why I Am Not a Conservative, 1960.

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• I am frankly sick and tired of the political preachers telling me as a citizen that if I want to be a moral person, I must believe in A, B, C, and D. Just who do they think they are? And from where do they presume to claim the right to dictate their moral beliefs to me?

  Barry Goldwater

  Believe, Tired, Thinking

  "Excerpts From Goldwater Remarks". Remarks in the Congressional Record, www.nytimes.com. September 15, 1981.

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• I'm not very interested in myself. I do have a deep moral belief that you should always look out at other things and not be self-centred.

  A. S. Byatt

  Self, Looks, Should

  "That thinking feeling" by Marianne Brace, www.theguardian.com. June 9, 1996.

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