David Almond Quotes

Trying to understand superstition rationally is like trying to pick up something made of wood by using a magnet.

The difference between faith and superstition is that the first uses reason to go as far as it can, and then makes the jump; the second shuns reason entirely — which is why superstition is not the ally, but the enemy, of true religion.

I have noticed that many who do not believe in God believe in everything else, even in the evil eye.

As a person, I do ascribe to a lot of magical thinking myself.

By the way, the point between rationality and what we would call the irrational is a very difficult point to establish. There's no specific line, as you know.

It's hard to find logic in things sometimes. That's why I can't analyze things too much, because it often doesn't make much sense.

Logic is one thing, the human animal another. You can quite easily propose a logical solution to something and at the same time hope in your heart of hearts it won't work out.

Even as empiricism is winning the mind, transcendentalism continues to win the heart.

In what depends on the known or the regular course of nature, the mind trusts to itself; but in strange and uncommon situations, it is the dupe of its own perplexity, and, instead of relying on its prudence or courage, has recourse to divination, and a variety of observances, that, for being irrational, are always the more revered.

Gods are fragile things, they may be killed by a whiff of science or a dose of common sense.

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.

The belief of our Reason is an Exercise of Faith, and Faith is an Act of Reason.

Superstition is to religion what astrology is to astronomy the mad daughter of a wise mother. These daughters have too long dominated the earth.

But it is no good using the tongs of reason to pull the Fundamentalists' chestnuts out of the fire of contradiction. Their real troubles lie elsewhere.

My reason nourishes my faith and my faith my reason.

I do not believe in God because I do not believe in Mother Goose.

I don't really believe in palm readers and crystal balls and tarot cards, but I respond to the need for them.

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.

Ignorance is the soil in which belief in miracles grows.

The supreme function of reason is to show man that some things are beyond reason.

When the intensity of emotional conviction subsides, a man who is in the habit of reasoning will search for logical grounds in favour of the belief which he finds in himself.

Happiness is a mystery, like religion, and should never be rationalised.

Superstitions and belief in magic are perennial in just the same way as religion, and something near to being universal among mankind; and why this is so may be interesting, but in most cases the beliefs themselves are devoid of interesting content, at least to me.

You can believe what you want religiously. Religion is one thing, but science, provable science, is something else.

I'm completely lacking any sense of religious belief, but I am superstitious.