“We are allowed to question people about their politics or ethics and expect them to defend their beliefs, or at least hold their own in any other important matter by recourse to evidence, yet somehow on the massive subject of God and how he might have us behave, all rational discussion must stop the moment we hear 'I believe.”

— Derren Brown

Books, Tricks of the Mind (2006)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update June 3, 2021. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "We are allowed to question people about their politics or ethics and expect them to defend their beliefs, or at least h…" by Derren Brown?

Derren Brown 136

British illusionist 1971

Madeleine L'Engle (1918–2007) American writer

The Rock that Is Higher (1993)

“If this is nothing more than a stipulation about how we ought to use the term ‘ideological’, then perhaps it will do no harm. But if it is a proposal about how historians ought to set about the business of explaining beliefs, then it seems to me fatal for just the reasons I have sought to give. It refuses to recognise that one of the reasons why someone may hold a certain belief is that there is good evidence in favour of it, that it fits well with their other beliefs, and so on – in a word, that it is rational for them to hold it. If we refuse to speak in these terms, we deprive ourselves of an indispensable means of identifying the most appropriate lines of enquiry to follow in any given case.”

Quentin Skinner (1940) British historian

Visions of Politics (2002), "Interpretation, rationality and truth"

“Macro rational expectations, as I have labeled the hypothesis, seems to say that expectations in an economist's model must be perfectly consistent with his model that embodies these expectations. In other words, the agents of his model must all share his views of the relevant economic mechanisms, as well as his data. Why? Because if he holds them they must believe they are God's truth and, if so, rational people can have no other views (and of course we should never ask how they would come by these views and data, that not even other specialists may have heard of yet, let alone accepted). I submit that this view is pretty absurd--I would almost say offensive! I certainly believe that I know more about economics and the economy than (almost) everybody else, and i can even prove it: If everybody shared my vies, then the economy could not be in today's troubles”

Franco Modigliani (1918–2003) Italian-American economist

though it might conceivably be in some different ones!
Conversations with Economists (1983)

“To be told that we ought not to agitate the question of Slavery, when it is that which is forever agitating us, is like telling a man with the fever and ague on him to stop shaking and he will be cured. The discussion of Slavery is said to be dangerous, but dangerous to what?…Discussion is the very life of free institutions, the fruitful mother of all political and moral enlightenment, and yet the question of all questions must be tabooed.”

James Russell Lowell (1819–1891) American poet, critic, editor, and diplomat

The Election in November 1860 (1860)

“Like me, he has a searing belief that books are sacred. They might not be to other people, but when you have a passion, you hold on to it. You defend it. You dont pretend it isn't important at the risk of offending others." -Carrie.”

Candace Bushnell book Summer and the City

Source: Summer and the City

“Skepticism is part of reflection… In religion and ethics, in politics, you have to be skeptical of claims that people make. It applies to all parts of life. Your own beliefs and the beliefs of others, and your willingness to examine these, to see if they hold up under scrutiny.”

Paul Kurtz (1925–2012) American professor of philosophy

9:40–10:10
Exuberant Skepticism (2012)

“But you cannot say anymore that the United States is going to pay for the wall. I am just going to say that we are working it out. Believe it or not, this is the least important thing that we are talking about, but politically this might be the most important talk about.”

Donald J. Trump (1946) 45th President of the United States of America

Full transcripts of Trump's calls with Mexico and Australia By Greg Miller, Julie Vitkovskaya and Reuben Fischer-Baum; Aug. 3, 2017 https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/politics/australia-mexico-transcripts/?utm_term=.95d2f93766d6 (Friday, January 27, 2017)
2010s, 2016, January

“I could go on, but the point is clear: religions make explicit claims about reality—about what exists and happens in the universe. These claims involve the existence of gods, the number of such gods (polytheism or monotheism), their character and behavior (usually loving and beneficent, but, in the case of Hindu and ancient Greek gods, sometimes mischievous or malevolent), how they interact with the world, whether or not there are souls or life after death, and, above all, how the deities wish us to behave—their moral code.
These are empirical claims, and although some may be hard to test, they must, like all claims about reality, be defended with a combination of evidence and reason. If we find no credible evidence, no good reasons to believe, then those claims should be disregarded, just as most of us ignore claims about ESP, astrology, and alien abduction. After all, beliefs important enough to affect you for eternity surely deserve the closest scrutiny.”

Jerry Coyne book Faith vs. Fact: Why Science and Religion are Incompatible

Source: Faith vs. Fact (2015), p. 23

“The question to ask believers is this: “Does it really matter whether what you believe about God is true—or don’t you care?” If it does matter, then you must justify your beliefs; if it doesn’t, then you must justify belief itself.”

Jerry Coyne book Faith vs. Fact: Why Science and Religion are Incompatible

Source: Faith vs. Fact (2015), p. 63

“The God of the Jews was an absolute God, who believed in other gods himself, to be sure, but forbade me to obey them, contrary to our own beliefs in the North. We have many gods and obey them all, and they us, the god of the sea and the god of the land, the god of thunder and the god of poetry.”

Halldór Laxness (1902–1998) Icelandic author

Ólafur
Heimsljós (World Light) (1940), Book Four: The Beauty of the Heavens

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Derren Brown 136

Related quotes

Related topics