Quotes from Famous Freethinkers

[It Aint Necessarily So]

"Where a religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its professors are obliged to call for help of the civil power, ‘tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one." - Benjamin Franklin

 

[ChristineM]

Learning never exhausts the mind.
Leonardo da Vinci

 

[ChristineM]

In my country we go to prison first and then become President.
Nelson Mandela

 

[ChristineM]

"An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself without going in partnership with state legislatures. Certainly he ought not so to act that laws become necessary to keep him from being laughed at. No one thinks of protecting Shakespeare from ridicule, by the threat of fine and imprisonment." - Robert Green Ingersoll

Blasphemy case against Stephen Fry dropped due to lack of ‘outraged people’

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

Blasphemy case against Stephen Fry dropped due to lack of ‘outraged people’

Yes, Ireland was quickly ridiculed by Twitter and other social media. It was quite funny-- and the Powers That Be were having none of it.

Most amusing. It's almost as if there really wasn't a god who felt offended in the first place...

 

[ChristineM]

Yes, Ireland was quickly ridiculed by Twitter and other social media. It was quite funny-- and the Powers That Be were having none of it.

Most amusing. It's almost as if there really wasn't a god who felt offended in the first place...

Blasphemy is not about offending a myth, it's about ridiculing those who bow to the myth.

 

[ChristineM]

The difference between false memories and true ones is the same as for jewels: it is always the false ones that look the most real, the most brilliant.
Salvador Dali

 

[ChristineM]

Culture is the widening of the mind and of the spirit.
Jawaharlal Nehru

 

[Jedster]

"We are ants making a run for it across the face of infinity"
Mary O'Ryan (nee O'Snodic)

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"But who prays for Satan? Who, in the eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?"

~ Mark Twain

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"Why can't I leave religion alone?" Because it storms its way into my children's schools, it weasels its way into my government, and its followers demand I can't do what I want with my own body. Right now people are being tortured, beaten, raped and murdered in the name of religion. Is that reason enough?

~ Allie Jackson

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"Religious apologists complain bitterly that atheists and secularists are aggressive and hostile in their criticism of them. I always say: look, when you guys were in charge, you didn't argue with us, you just burnt us at the stake. Now what we're doing is, we're presenting you with some arguments and some challenging questions, and you complain."

~ A.C. Grayling

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"Socrates famously said that the unconsidered life is not worth living. He meant that a life lived without forethought or principle is a life so vulnerable to chance, and so dependent on the choices and actions of others, that it is of little real value to the person living it. He further meant that a life well lived is one which has goals, and integrity, which is chosen and directed by the one who lives it, to the fullest extent possible to a human agent caught in the webs of society and history."

~ A.C. Grayling

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"People should be left to believe what they like, so long as they harm no one else. Apart from normal expectations of politeness, it is not however clear why people should require their personal beliefs to be treated with special sensitivity by others, to the point that if others fail to tip-toe respectfully around them they will start throwing bombs."

~ A.C. Grayling

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"I do not believe that there are any such things as gods and goddesses, for exactly the same reasons as I do not believe there are fairies, goblins or sprites, and these reasons should be obvious to anyone over the age of ten."
~ A.C. Grayling

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"And I say, the meaning of life is what you make it. There will be as many different meaningful lives as there are people to live them."

~ A.C. Grayling

 

[Bob the Unbeliever]

"Try lighting your house by prayer instead of electricity and see which one works."

~ A.C. Grayling

 

[ChristineM]

"I refuse to prove that I exist," says God, "for proof denies faith, and without faith I am nothing."
Douglas Adams

 

[ChristineM]

Healey’s First Law Of Holes... When in one, stop digging.
Denis Healey

 

[ChristineM]

Religious wars are basically people killing each other over who has the better imaginary friend.
Said to be by Napoleon Bonaparte

By the same token :-

The trouble with quotes on the Internet is that you never know if they are genuine.
Said to be by Abraham Lincoln ;-)