Murray Gell-Mann Quotes

It is time that we admitted that faith is nothing more than the license religious people give one another to keep believing when reasons fail.

There are a lot of scientists or other people who can be very skeptical or rational within their field, but they may well not do that in other aspects of their lives, when it comes to things like religion, or what have you. People have this amazing gift for being selective with their curiosity and skepticism.

I don't discount belief. I just discount most of the things that people believe in.

The problem I want to talk to you about tonight is the problem of belief. What does it mean to believe? We use this word all the time, and I think behind it lurk some really extraordinary taboos and confusions. What I want to argue tonight is that how we talk about belief- how we fail to criticize or criticize the beliefs of others, has more importance to us personally, more consequence to us personally and to civilization than perhaps anything else that is in our power to influence.

I can believe things that are true and things that aren't true and I can believe things where nobody knows if they're true or not.

Men are most apt to believe what they least understand.

Whatever the Thinker thinks, the Prover will prove. And if the Thinker thinks passionately enough, the Prover will prove the thought so conclusively that you will never talk a person out of such a belief, even if it is something as remarkable as the notion that there is a gaseous vertebrate of astronomical heft ("GOD") who will spend all eternity torturing people who do not believe in his religion.

Not that believing such things has anything to do with whether they are true. You see that, don't you?

Doubt your doubts before you doubt your beliefs.

When did ignorance become a point of view?

Most people can't think, most of the remainder won't think, and the small fraction who do think mostly can't do it very well.

The typical person has no trouble believing without knowing. What people need to realize is simply that you do not need to believe to know.

Faith is the lack of evidence, and it shouldn't be that difficult to convince people that the right reason to believe something is that there is evidence for it. People do not innately go for this view, but nevertheless it is not that difficult to teach.

If you came into the theater believing in the talking snake, it's kind of hard to leave the theater still believing in the talking snake.

What people believe is a measure of what they suffer.

But what, after all, is faith? It is a state of mind that leads people to believe something - it doesn't matter what - in the total absence of supporting evidence. If there were good supporting evidence then faith would be superfluous, for the evidence would compel us to believe it anyway. It is this that makes the often-parroted claim that 'evolution itself is a matter of faith' so silly. People believe in evolution not because they arbitrarily want to believe it but because of overwhelming, publicly available evidence.

I believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. And I say no, it's not, Dad. Well, I believe that it is. Well, you know, some people believe they're Napoleon. That's fine. Beliefs are neat. Cherish them, but don't share them like they're the truth.

People readily believe what they want to believe.

Be skeptical, but not as a social position, not claiming to be so intelligent that you cannot believe what other people say. It's not about being right and making everybody else wrong. No, you are skeptical because you know without a doubt that everybody lives in their own story, and in their story they have their own truth. But it's only truth in their mind, just as your truth is only truth in your mind, and nobody else's.

I believe that people believe what they believe they believe.

Believe in order to Understand and Understand in order to Believe

Finding bad reasons for what one believes for other bad reasons - that's philosophy.

I cannot have God in my heart if he is not in my head. Before I can believe in, I must believe that.

Buddha urged people to investigate things - he didn't just command them to believe.

People needed to believe in gods, if only because it was so hard to believe in people.