Jack McDevitt Quotes

Don't fall into the trap of believing so deeply in your own ideology that you cannot even see the flaws in it.

Men who believe too firmly in their theories, do not believe enough in the theories of others. So ... these despisers of their fellows ... make experiments only to destroy a theory, instead of to seek the truth.

People never want to be told anything they do not believe already.

The fact is that people would rather cling when they're afraid of something to a priori beliefs than rather open their minds about it.

To accept opinions is to gain the good solid feeling of being correct without having to think.

Belief gets in the way of learning.

We make up any excuse to preserve myths about people we love, but the reverse is also true; if we dislike an individual we adamantly resist changing our opinion, even when somebody offers proof of his decency, because it's vital to have myths about both the gods and devils in our lives.

We like to continue to believe what we have been accustomed to accept as true, and the resentment aroused when doubt is cast upon any of our assumptions leads us to seek every manner of excuse for clinging to them. The result is that most of our so-called reasoning consists in finding arguments for going on believing as we already do.

Reasoning will never make a man correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning he never acquired

Why is it people who want the truth never believe it when they hear it?

Facts do not find their way into the world in which our beliefs reside; they did not produce our beliefs, they do not destroy them; they may inflict on them the most constant refutations without weakening them, and an avalanche of afflictions or ailments succeeding one another without interruption in a family will not make it doubt the goodness of its God or the talent of its doctor.

The problem is, most people don't like to hear suggestions that directly confront or run counter to their most sacred beliefs.

That's fairly common. We don't believe anything we don't want to believe.

We believe that when we choose anything, judge a stranger and even fall in love, we understand the principal factors that influenced us. Very often nothing could be further from the truth. As a result, many of our most basic assumptions about ourselves, and society, are false.

But people as a rule believe only what they want to believe, and if you tell them anything else they'll call you a trouble-maker and get rid of you and never give you your job back, even if what you said is proved spot on right by time.

We all have a tendency to think that the world must conform to our prejudices. The opposite view involves some effort of thought, and most people would die sooner than think in fact they do so.

Preconceived ideas are like searchlights which illumine the path of the experimenter and serve him as a guide to interrogate nature. They become a danger only if he transforms them into fixed ideas-this is why I should like to see these profound words inscribed on the threshold of all the temples of science: 'The greatest derangement of the mind is to believe in something because one wishes it to be so.'

If we choose only to expose ourselves to opinions and viewpoints that are in line to our own, we become more polarized, more set in our own ways. It will only reinforce and deepen the political divides in our country. But if we choose to actively seek out information that challenges our assumptions and beliefs, perhaps we can begin to understand where the people who disagree with us are coming from.

There is an almost universal tendency, perhaps an inborn tendency, to suspect the good faith of a man who holds opinions that differ from our own opinions. It obviously endangers the freedom and the objectivity of our discussion if we attack a person instead of attacking an opinion or, more precisely, a theory.

Fundamental assumptions in general and scientific assumptions in particular are so hard to overturn because they are based on belief. Beliefs are so hard to overcome because they are irrational and therefore do not yield to logical argument.

The hardest thing in the world is believing someone can change. It's always easier to go along with the way things are than to admit that you might have been wrong in the first place.

Belief is a virus, and once it gets into you, its first order of business is to preserve itself, and the way it preserves itself is to keep you from having any doubts, and the way it keeps you from doubting is to blind you to the way things really are. Evidence contrary to the belief can be staring you straight in the face, and you won't see it... True believers just don't see things the way they are, because if they did, they wouldn't be true believers anymore.

Most elected officials cling to their ideological biases, despite the real-world facts that disprove their theories time and again. Most have no common sense, and most never acknowledge that they were wrong.

Interest blinds some people, and enlightens others.

I don't travel in circles where people say, 'I have faith, I believe this in my heart and nothing you can say or do can shake my faith.' That's just a long-winded religious way to say 'Shut up.'