To Say That I Would Have Done

The Problem Is Not That Religious People Are Stupid. It's Not That Religious Fundamentalists Are Stupid. I Happen To Think That You Can Be So Well Educated That You Can Build A Nuclear Bomb, And Still Get--and Still Believe That You Will Get The 72 Virgins In Paradise--that Is The Problem. The Problem Is That--religion--because It Has Been Sheltered From Criticism As It Has Been--allows People--perfectly Sane, Perfectly Intelligent People--to Believe En Masse, What Only Idiots Or Lunatics Could Believe In Isolation.

If History Reveals Any Categorical Truth, It Is That An Insufficient Taste For Evidence Regularly Brings Out The Worst In Us. Add Weapons Of Mass Destruction To This Diabolical Clockwork, And You Have . . . A Recipe For The Fall Of Civilization.

Principle #1: Avoid Dangerous People And Dangerous Places. Principle #2: Do Not Defend Your Property. Principle #3: Respond Immediately And Escape.

It's Not So Much Religion Per Se, It's False Certainty That Worries Me, And Religion Just Has More Than Its Fair Share Of False Certainty Or Dogmatism. I'm Really Concerned When I See People Pretending To Know Things They Clearly Cannot Know.

The Only Thing That Permits Human Beings To Collaborate With One Another In A Truly Open-ended Way Is Their Willingness To Have Their Beliefs Modified By New Facts. Only Openness To Evidence And Argument Will Secure A Common World For Us.