Science Religion Quotes

• Acceptance without proof is the fundamental characteristic of Western religion, rejection without proof is the fundamental characteristic of Western science.

  Gary Zukav

  Acceptance, Science, Faith Religion

  Gary Zukav (1979). “The dancing Wu Li masters: an overview of the new physics”, Bantam

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• From religion comes a man's purpose; from science, his power to achieve it. Sometimes people ask if religion and science are not opposed to one another. They are: in the sense that the thumb and fingers of my hands are opposed to one another. It is an opposition by means of which anything can be grasped.

  William Henry Bragg

  Mean, Men, Hands

  Sir William Henry Bragg (1942). “The World of Sound: Six Lectures Delivered at the Royal Institution”

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• God was invented to explain mystery. God is always invented to explain those things that you do not understand.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Religious, Religion, Atheism

  "Superstrings: A Theory of Everything?". Book edited by Paul C. W. Davies and Julian R. Brown, June 16, 1988.

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• A commonsense interpretation of the facts suggests that a superintellect has monkeyed with physics, as well as with chemistry and biology, and that there are no blind forces worth speaking about in nature. The numbers one calculates from the facts seem to me so overwhelming as to put this conclusion almost beyond question.

  Fred Hoyle

  Science, If There Is A God, Numbers

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• Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution.

  Theodosius Dobzhansky

  Health, Science, Light

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• Science is the century-old endeavour to bring together by means of systematic thought the perceptible phenomena of this world into as thorough-going an association as possible. To put it boldly, it is the attempt at a posterior reconstruction of existence by the process of conceptualization. Science can only ascertain what is, but not what should be, and outside of its domain value judgements of all kinds remain necessary.

  Karl Popper

  Mean, Science, Judgement

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• The mind likes a strange idea as little as the body likes a strange protein and resists it with similar energy. It would not perhaps be too fanciful to say that a new idea is the most quickly acting antigen known to science.

  Wilfred Trotter

  Science, Ideas, Mind

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• If we watch ourselves honestly we shall often find that we have begun to argue against a new idea even before it has been completely stated.

  Wilfred Trotter

  Science, Ideas, Watches

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• The person who thought there could be any real conflict between science and religion must be either very young in science or ignorant of religion.

  Joseph Henry

  Real, Science, Thinking

  "A Memorial of Joseph Henry".

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• I want to know how God created this world. I am not interested in this or that phenomenon, in the spectrum of this or that element. I want to know God's thoughts, the rest are details.

  Albert Einstein

  God, Believe, Science

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• If people are good because they fear punishment, and hope for reward, then we are a sorry lot indeed.

  Albert Einstein

  Im Sorry, Atheist, Fear

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• The so-called Christian nations are the most enlightened and progressive ... but in spite of their religion, not because of it. The Church has opposed every innovation and discovery from the day of Galileo down to our own time, when the use of anesthetic in childbirth was regarded as a sin because it avoided the biblical curse pronounced against Eve. And every step in astronomy and geology ever taken has been opposed by bigotry and superstition. The Greeks surpassed us in artistic culture and in architecture five hundred years before Christian religion was born.

  Mark Twain

  Christian, Taken, Biblical

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• Emotionally I am an atheist. I don't have the evidence to prove that God doesn't exist, but I so strongly suspect he doesn't that I don't want to waste my time.

  Isaac Asimov

  Atheist, Science, Religion

  Free Inquiry Journal, Spring 1982.

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• There can never be any real opposition between religion and science; for the one is the complement of the other. Every serious and reflective person realizes, I think, that the religious element in his nature must be recognized and cultivated if all the powers of the human soul are to act together in perfect balance and harmony. And indeed it was not by accident that the greatest thinkers of all ages were deeply religious souls

  Max Planck

  Religious, Real, Thinking

  Max Planck (1959). “The new science: 3 complete works: Where is science going? The universe in the light of modern physics; The philosophy of physics”

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• Every one who is seriously involved in the pursuit of science becomes convinced that a spirit is manifest in the laws of the Universe-a spirit vastly superior to that of man, and one in the face of which we with our modest powers must feel humble.

  Albert Einstein

  Inspirational, Humble, Men

  Albert Einstein (2013). “Albert Einstein, The Human Side: Glimpses from His Archives”, p.33, Princeton University Press

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• Science can destroy religion by ignoring it as well as by disproving its tenets. No one ever demonstrated, so far as I am aware, the nonexistence of Zeus or Thor, but they have few followers now.

  Arthur C. Clarke

  Religious, Religion, Atheism

  Arthur C. Clarke (2012). “Childhood's End”, p.14, Hachette UK

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• You can't convince a believer of anything; for their belief is not based on evidence, it's based on a deep seated need to believe

  Carl Sagan

  Death, Faith, Atheist

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• The universe is not only queerer than we suppose; it is queerer than we can suppose

  Bill Bryson

  Funny, Knowledge, Science

  Bill Bryson (2014). “A Short History of Nearly Everything”, p.20, Lulu Press, Inc

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• It was the schoolboy who said, ""Faith is believing what you know ain't so.""

  Mark Twain

  Faith, Atheist, Believe

  Following the Equator ch. 12, "Pudd'nhead Wilson's New Calendar" (1897)

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• Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear.

  Bertrand Russell

  Thinking, Atheism, Science And Religion

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.22, Simon and Schuster

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• Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.

  Richard P. Feynman

  Philosophy, Science, Technology

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• We were convinced that the people need and require this faith. We have therefore undertaken the fight against the atheistic movement, and that not merely with a few theoretical declarations; we have stamped it out.

  Adolf Hitler

  Atheist, Fighting, Faith Religion

  Adolf Hitler (1942). “The Speeches of Adolf Hitler: April 1922-August 1939”

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• The effort to reconcile science and religion is almost always made, not by theologians, but by scientists unable to shake off altogether the piety absorbed with their mother's milk.

  H. L. Mencken

  Mother, Science, Effort

  H.L. Mencken (2013). “Minority Report”, p.248, Knopf

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• In my view, all that is necessary for faith is the belief that by doing our best we shall succeed in our aims: the improvement of mankind.

  Rosalind Franklin

  Views, Succeed, Belief

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• God reveals himself in the orderly harmony of what exists.

  Albert Einstein

  Atheist, Atheism, Agnostic

  Quoted in N.Y. Times, 25 Apr. 1929

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