Sam Harris Quotes

No simplicity of mind, no obscurity of station, can escape the universal duty of questioning all that we believe.

The scientist is a lover of truth for the very love of truth itself, wherever it may lead.

Debate is so much better than denial.

Quotations are useful in periods of ignorance or obscurantist beliefs.

It is always good to explore the stuff you don't agree with, to try and understand a different lifestyle or foreign worldview. I like to be challenged in that way, and always end up learning something I didn't know.

One unerring mark of the love of truth is not entertaining any proposition with greater assurance than the proofs it is built upon will warrant.

No religious position is loyally served by refusing to consider annoying theories which may well turn out to be facts.

I don't mind anybody coming after me as long as they're coming with facts.

The aim of argument, or of discussion, should not be victory, but progress.

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 you want someone to accept new evidence, make sure to present it to them in a context that doesn’t trigger a defensive, emotional reaction.

College is an environment designed to encourage openness - the ability to think of things in novel ways and entertain unconventional beliefs.

The scientific attitude of mind involves a sweeping away of all other desires in the interest of the desire to know.

I believe unconditionally in the ability of people to respond when they are told the truth. We need to be taught to study rather than believe, to inquire rather than to affirm.

Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much arguing, much writing, many opinions; for opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making.

Skepticism is not an end in itself; it is a tool for the discovery of truths.

Maintain a constant watch at all times against a dogmatical spirit: fix not your assent to any proposition in a firm and unalterable manner, till you have some firm and unalterable ground for it, and till you have arrived at some clear and sure evidence.

The most essential mental quality for a free people, whose liberty is to be progressive, permanent and on a large scale, is much stupidity.

Unless you have the courage to doubt you will never come to know the truth.

The scarcest resource is not oil, metals, clean air, capital, labour, or technology. It is our willingness to listen to each other and learn from each other and to seek the truth rather than seek to be right

If we are to use our minds rightly, we must live in an attitude of constant openness and learning.

We're too smart to know there aren't easy answers. But we're not dumb enough to accept that there aren't better answers.

I like to consider my mind an open door. It's just not a revolving door.

Believe those who seek the truth, doubt those who find it; doubt all, but do not doubt yourself.

In disputes upon moral or scientific points, ever let your aim be to come at truth, not to conquer your opponent. So you never shall be at a loss in losing the argument, and gaining a new discovery.