Christopher Hitchens Quotes

Being a Humanist means trying to behave decently without expectation of rewards or punishment after you are dead.

I was brought up an atheist and have always remained so. But at no time was I led to believe that morality was unimportant or that good and bad did not exist. I believe passionately in the need to distinguish between right and wrong and am somewhat confounded by being told I need God, Jesus or a clergyman to help me to do so.

One of the great tragedies of mankind is that morality has been hijacked by religion.

Morality may exist in an atheist without any religion, and in a theist with a religion quite unspiritual.

One of the great tragedies of mankind is that morality has been hijacked by religion. So now people assume that religion and morality have a necessary connection. But the basis of morality is really very simple and doesn't require religion at all.

With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.

We need an approach to ethics which makes no recourse to religion and can be equally acceptable to those with faith and those without.

I would not say that ethical behavior is not possible for the atheist or agnostic. It is. A couple of pretty good examples are Bertrand Russell and Jean-Paul Sartre. However, I will have to say that if we take the human lot as a whole, these two men must be seen as exceptions.

The very idea that we get a moral compass from religion is horrible. Not only should we not get our moral compass from religion, as a matter of fact we don't.

Well, I'll put it this way: you can certainly say belief in God makes people behave worse. That can be proved beyond a doubt.

Computer programmers, biotechnologists, environmental scientists, neuroscientists, nanotech engineers - all of these fields, and more, should have at least a course in ethics as part of their degree requirements.

It makes me upset, if not angry, when people assume that there can be no morality without a religious framework. If there's a moral framework without all that religious stuff, it's more valuable.

Although religion might be useful in developing a solid moral framework - and enforcing it - we can quite easily develop moral intuitions without relying on religion.

The whole history of man is continuous proof of the maxim that to divest one's methods of ethical concepts means to sink into the depths of utter demoralization.

The confusing of marriage with morality has done more to destroy the conscience of the human race than any other single error.

There must be in prudence also some master virtue.

That which is selfish is immoral, and that which is unselfish is moral.

I think we have to give religion its due. I think we have to respect those for whom religion is important, but equally respect those who can achieve good morality without religion.

We all know that men and women can be good without faith. And we also know that faith is an incredibly important source of goodness in our country.

Men think they may justly do that for which they have a precedent.

Oh, I hate the cheap severity of abstract ethics!

There is no ethics in general. There are only-eventually-ethics of processes by which we treat the possibilities of a situation.

Where all are selfish, the sage is no better than the fool, and only rather more dangerous.

But the nature of the universe is such that ends can never justify means. On the contrary, the means always determine the end.

Let us with Caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.