Rational Quotes - Page 19

• I am against the war, but I do support our white troops. No, I'm kidding, I'm kidding. I'm not a Republican. I'm not a member of the party of inclusion. Wonderful, tolerant, rational human beings they are.

  David Cross

  Funny, War, Party

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• Only the stupid and the wicked can fear rational criticism.

  Mario Bunge

  Stupid, Criticism, Wicked

  Source: deutsche-denker.de

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• One can discern a few very general myths that facilitate the birth of further myths: that everything is possible; that whatever we have failed to explain in normal and earthly terms must have paranormal or supernatural explanations; and that science, being rational, cannot explain the irrational, such as taste and love.

  Mario Bunge

  And Love, Taste, Normal

  Source: deutsche-denker.de

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• Under theocracies and other authoritarian regimes, the rulers are the moral authorities. Under genuine democracy some basic values are entrenched in the legal system, which is expected to be under democratic vigilance, and others are left to the person or the group, which ideally debate moral problems in a rational, free and cooperative manner.

  Mario Bunge

  Democracy, Groups, Legal System

  Source: deutsche-denker.de

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• I do feel that a poem needs not just space, but, ideally, space around that space - space for meditation, reverie, subliminal link-ups. I sense that poetry happens at a level above or below intelligence. It doesn't come into being at a purely rational level.

  Michael Longley

  Space, Meditation, Needs

  Source: www.poetrymagazines.org.uk

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• The pace at which science has progressed has been too fast for human behaviour to adapt to it. As I said we are still apes. A part of our brain is still a paleo-brain and many of the reactions come from our fight or flight instinct. As long as this part of the brain can take over control the rational part of the brain (we will face these problems).

  Jean-Marie Lehn

  Fighting, Long, Brain

  Source: www.lindau-nobel.org

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• It is tempting to believe that social evils arise from the activities of evil men and that if only good men (like ourselves, naturally) wielded power, all would be well. That view requires only emotion and self-praise - easy to come by and satisfying as well. To understand why it is that 'good' men in positions of power will produce evil, while the ordinary man without power but able to engage in voluntary cooperation with his neighbors will produce good, requires analysis and thought, subordinating emotions to the rational.

  Friedrich August von Hayek

  Believe, Men, Position Of Power

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• When you're working on development issues, optimism is not always based on rational analysis, often it is a moral choice.

  Jim Yong Kim

  Issues, Optimism, Choices

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• However the great successes of science - Galileo's telescopic observations, Newton's law of gravity, etc - all of this great success caused people to sort of say, what if we could establish religion on that same successful basis? What if we could have a good rational foundation for religious belief. What if religion could be sort of like science. Of course, that can't be.

  George Coyne

  Religious, Successful, Law

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• The knowledge of God, the belief in God, is what I call an a-rational process. It's not rational - it doesn't proceed by scientific investigation - but it's not irrational because it doesn't contradict my reasoning process. It goes beyond it.

  George Coyne

  Knowledge Of God, Belief, Process

  Source: www.pbs.org

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• Bolivia also depends not only on tin and other minerals, but also depends on the gas and oil. A rational extraction should be made, taking care of the environment. We should give added value to this natural resource, and generate revenue to fight poverty with more resources, that come from natural resources.

  Evo Morales

  Fighting, Oil, Giving

  Interview with David Hirschman, bigthink.com. September 22, 2010.

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• History does not record anywhere or at any time a religion that has any rational basis.

  Robert A. Heinlein

  Atheism, Doe, Records

  Robert A. Heinlein (1987). “Time Enough for Love”, p.224, Penguin

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• From whence it is obvious to conclude that, since our Faculties are not fitted to penetrate into the internal Fabrick and real Essences of Bodies; but yet plainly discover to us the Being of a GOD, and the Knowledge of our selves, enough to lead us into a full and clear discovery of our Duty, and great Concernment, it will become us, as rational Creatures, to imploy those Faculties we have about what they are most adapted to, and follow the direction of Nature, where it seems to point us out the way.

  John Locke

  God, Real, Knowledge

  John Locke (1721). “An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding (Complete)”, p.714, Library of Alexandria

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• Good and evil, reward and punishment, are the only motives to a rational creature

  John Locke

  Philosophical, Punishment, Evil

  Some Thoughts Concerning Education sec. 54 (1693)

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• I am no Hindu, but I hold the doctrine of the Hindus concerning a future state (rebirth) to be incomparably more rational, more pious, and more likely to deter men from vice than the horrid opinions inculcated by Christians on punishments without end.

  William Jones

  Christian, Men, Vices

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• Instead of a bottom-line based on money and power, we need a new bottom-line that defines productivity and creativity as where corporations, governments, schools, public institutions, and social practices are judged as efficient, rational and productive not only to the extent they maximize money and power, but to the extent they maximize love and caring, ethical and ecological sensitivity, and our capacities to respond with awe and wonder at the grandeur of creation.

  Michael Lerner

  Creativity, School, Caring

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• I contend that most emotional distress is best understood as a rational response to sick societies.

  Oliver James

  Emotional, Sick, Distress

  Oliver James (2007). “Affluenza: How to be Successful and Stay Sane”

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• But as sickness and diseases have created the necessity of medicines and physicians, so the disorders of our rational nature have introduced the necessity of education and tutors.

  John Wesley

  Medicine, Disease, Physicians

  John Wesley, John Emory (1835). “The Works of the Late Reverend John Wesley, A.M.: From the Latest London Edition with the Last Corrections of the Author, Comprehending Also Numerous Translations, Notes, and an Original Preface, Etc”, p.308

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• I believe there is no liturgy in the world, either in ancient or modern language, which breathes more of a solid, scriptural, rational piety, than the Common Prayer of the Church of England.  And though the main of it was compiled considerably more than two hundred years ago, yet is the language of it, not only pure, but strong and elegant in the highest degree.

  John Wesley

  Strong, Prayer, Believe

  John Wesley “John Wesley's The Book of Common Prayer”, Lulu.com

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• It certainly seems too simple to say what I am going to say, yet it is almost as if you would be better off turning the entire rational approach upside down, taking it for granted that all of its assumptions were false, for they are indeed more false than true.

  Seth

  Simple, Would Be, Upside Down

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• Mysticism is a rational enterprise. Religion is not. The mystic has recognized something about the nature of consciousness prior to thought, and this recognition is susceptible to rational discussion. The mystic has reasons for what he believes, and these reasons are empirical. The roiling mystery of the world can be analyzed with concepts (this is science), or it can be experienced free of concepts (this is myticism). Religion is nothing more than bad concepts held in place of good ones for all time. It is the denial-at once full of hope and full of fear-of the vastitude of human ignorance.

  Sam Harris

  Believe, Ignorance, World

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• Continually one faces the horrible matter of making decisions. The solution is, as far as possible, to avoid conscious rational decisions and choices; simply to do what you find yourself doing; to float in the great current of life with as little friction as possible; to allow things to settle themselves, as indeed they do with the most infallible certainty.

  Christopher Morley

  Decision, Choices, Finding Yourself

  CHRISTOPHER MORLEY (1923). “INWARD HO!”

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• Darwinism removed the whole idea of God as the creator from the sphere of rational discussion.

  Julian Huxley

  Ideas, Spheres, Discussion

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• For the first time in history, the rational and the good are fully armed in the battle against evil. Here we finally find the answer to our paradox; now we can understand the nature of the social power held by evil. Ultimately, the evil, the irrational, truly has no power. The evil men’s control of morality is transient; it lives on borrowed time made possible only by the errors of the good. In time, as more honest men grasp the truth, evil’s stranglehold will be easily broken.

  Andrew Bernstein

  Men, Errors, Evil

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• In a rational society we would want our presidents to be teachers. In our actual society we insist they be cheerleaders.

  Steve Allen

  Teacher, President, Want

  Steve Allen (1994). “Reflections”

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