Michael Shermer Quotes

Science is the best idea humans have ever had. The more people who embrace that idea, the better.

In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.

Reason, observation, and experience; the holy trinity of science.

Science is simply common sense at its best, that is, rigidly accurate in observation, and merciless to fallacy in logic.

Far from being demeaning to human spiritual values, scientific rationalism is the crowning glory of the human spirit.

It's for scientists to lay out the data and lay out what they think, and then it's for the public to make up its own mind. We don't live in a priesthood where some small group imposes its views on other people - that's not the way that science works, and it's not the way a democratic society should work.

I take what I see work. I'm a strict believer in the scientific principle of believing nothing, only taking the best evidence available at the present time, interpreting it as best you can, and leaving your mind open to the fact that new evidence will appear tomorrow.

My colleagues have learned to respect nothing but evidence, and to believe that their highest duty lies in submitting to it, however it may jar against their inclinations.

If I let myself believe anything on insufficient evidence, there may be no great harm done by the mere belief; it may be true after all, or I may never have occasion to exhibit it in outward acts. But I cannot help doing this great wrong towards Man, that I make myself credulous. The danger to society is not merely that it should believe wrong things, though that is great enough; but that it should become credulous, and lose the habit of testing things and inquiring into them; for then it must sink back into savagery.

Science is the acceptance of what works and the rejection of what does not. That needs more courage than we might think.

Science is not a substitute for common sense, but an extension of it.

Science built the Academy, superstition the Inquisition.

Avoid the precepts of those thinkers whose reasoning is not confirmed by experience.

The old saying of ‘Vox populi, vox Dei’, as every philosopher knows, cannot be trusted in science.

In practical life we are compelled to follow what is most probable ; in speculative thought we are compelled to follow truth. A man would perish of hunger and thirst, if he refused to eat or drink, till he had obtained positive proof that food and drink would be good for him. But in philosophic reflection this is not so. On the contrary, we must take care not to admit as true anything, which is only probable. For when one falsity has been let in, infinite others follow.

To mistrust science and deny the validity of scientific method is to resign your job as a human. You'd better go look for work as a plant or wild animal.

Europe and the world are waiting for us to defend the spirit of the enlightenment everywhere.

The enlightenment is under threat. So is reason. So is truth. So is science, especially in the schools of America.

Science, as opposed to technology, does violence to common sense.

I cannot live on myths; somehow, science convinces me more easily. I am prone to lean towards science, ethics, and philosophy rather than myth, religion, and rituals.

But I think you can strip the emotion and the subjectivity away while you focus on doing the science - and that's really important.

It is clear that I am a person who believes fundamentally in facts, evidence, data, and science, which supports decision-making and allows us to function as a society based on knowledge.

Educated guesswork' is what science is. You form hypotheses, test them against the evidence, and if they fit the evidence, you can assume you've got close to the truth.

The scientist believes in proof without certainty, the bigot in certainty without proof.

That kind of skeptical, questioning, "don't accept what authority tells you" attitude of science - is also nearly identical to the attitude of mind necessary for a functioning democracy. Science and democracy have very consonant values and approaches, and I don't think you can have one without the other.