Dan Barker Quotes

In science, a healthy skepticism is a professional necessity, whereas in religion, having belief without evidence is regarded as a virtue.

I think that there's a strain in journalism that believes that anyone who surrenders him- or herself to faith and to belief necessarily checks reason and rationality at the door.

The truth is that Christian theology, like every other theology, is not only opposed to the scientific spirit; it is also opposed to all other attempts at rational thinking.

Faith feels itself secure neither with universal consent, nor with tradition, nor with authority. It seeks support of its enemy, reason.

The scientist insists on verification; the religious theologian does not; the philosopher sometimes does and sometimes does not

We cannot infer that because sciences of things divine and human are full of controversies and quarrels, therefore their whole subject-matter is uncertain ; for there have been many persons so enamoured of contradiction, as to turn into ridicule geometrical axioms.

Faith... must be enforced by reason... when faith becomes blind it dies.

Religion deals in certainties and philosophy deals more in un-answered questions.

People who dismiss science in favor of religion sometimes confuse the challenge of rigorously understanding the world with a deliberate intellectual exclusion that leads them to mistrust scientists and, to their detriment, what they discover.

Faith is an island in the setting sun, But proof is the bottom line for everyone.

Generally speaking, the errors in religion are dangerous; those in philosophy only ridiculous.

Science stands for rational thought, faith for superstition and unreason.

Religion was always an easy class. All you had to do was suspend the logic and reasoning you were taught in all the other classes.

Listen to authority figures because of their position, but only believe them if they can explain why.

The enemy of science is not religion. Religion comes in endless shapes and forms... The true enemy is the substitution of thought, reflection, and curiosity with dogma.

I find the whole business of religion profoundly interesting. But it does mystify me that otherwise intelligent people take it seriously.

Credulity is belief in slight evidence, with no evidence, or against evidence.

The word 'belief' is a difficult thing for me. I don't believe. I must have a reason for a certain hypothesis. Either I know a thing, and then I know it - I don't need to believe it.

Comparing science and religion isn't like comparing apples and oranges - it's more like apples and sewing machines.

There are two objectionable types of believers: those who believe the incredible and those who believe that 'belief' must be discarded and replaced by 'the scientific method.

It is always more difficult to fight against faith than against knowledge.

If children understand that beliefs should be substantiated with evidence, as opposed to tradition, authority, revelation or faith, they will automatically work out for themselves that they are atheists.

If all you have is faith, then you never actually know anything.

What is faith? If you believe something because you have evidence for it, or rational argument, that is not faith. So faith seems to be believing something despite the absence of evidence or rational argument for it.

Many children are taught to believe in God. I came to believe in the power of systems analysis.