“You are a sceptic." "Never! Scepticism is the beginning of faith." "What are you?" "To define is to limit.”

Source: The Picture of Dorian Gray

Last update Sept. 27, 2023. History

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Irish writer and poet 1854–1900

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“My scepticism warns me of the danger of becoming a fanatic, a danger which no faith has yet averted.”

Karlheinz Deschner (1924–2014) German writer and activist

Meine Skepsis bewahrt mich davor, Fanatiker zu werden wovor noch kein Glaube geschützt hat.
deschner.info http://www.deschner.info/index.htm?/de/person/zitate.htm

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“The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin.”

Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–1895) English biologist and comparative anatomist

On the advisableness of improving natural knowledge (1866) http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/etext01/thx1410.txt
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Context: The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin. And it cannot be otherwise, for every great advance in natural knowledge has involved the absolute rejection of authority, the cherishing of the keenest scepticism, the annihilation of the spirit of blind faith; and the most ardent votary of science holds his firmest convictions, not because the men he most venerates hold them; not because their verity is testified by portents and wonders; but because his experience teaches him that whenever he chooses to bring these convictions into contact with their primary source, Nature — whenever he thinks fit to test them by appealing to experiment and to observation — Nature will confirm them. The man of science has learned to believe in justification, not by faith, but by verification.

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“People think there's a solution… If everything is distributed in the proper quarters, put into the right pigeonholes, everything will be fine. But I'm not so sure. … Nothing, absolutely nothing at all has emerged out of all these ideas of faith and scepticism, all these convulsions, these puffings and blowings.”

Ingmar Bergman (1918–2007) Swedish filmmaker

Jonas Sima interview <!-- p. 195 -->
Bergman on Bergman (1970)
Context: People think there's a solution... If everything is distributed in the proper quarters, put into the right pigeonholes, everything will be fine. But I'm not so sure. … Nothing, absolutely nothing at all has emerged out of all these ideas of faith and scepticism, all these convulsions, these puffings and blowings. For many of my fellow human beings on the other hand, I'm aware that these problems still exist — and exist as a terrible reality. I hope this generation will be the last to live under the scourge of religious anxiety.

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“It's easy to believe in something when you win all the time… The losses are what define a man's faith.”

Brandon Sanderson (1975) American fantasy writer

Source: The Well of Ascension

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