“Debate is an art form. It is about the winning of arguments. It is not about the discovery of truth. There are certain rules and procedures to debate that really have nothing to do with establishing fact—which creationists have mastered. Some of those rules are: never say anything positive about your own position because it can be attacked, but chip away at what appear to be the weaknesses in your opponent's position. They are good at that. I don't think I could beat the creationists at debate. I can tie them. But in courtrooms they are terrible, because in courtrooms you cannot give speeches. In a courtroom you have to answer direct questions about the positive status of your belief. We destroyed them in Arkansas. On the second day of the two-week trial we had our victory party!”
After the McLean v. Arkansas creationism trial, as quoted in Review of the National Center for Science Education Vol. 24, No. 6 (November–December 2004) http://www.ncseweb.org/resources/rncse_content/vol24/620_then_a_miracle_occurs_12_30_1899.asp
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Stephen Jay Gould 274
American evolutionary biologist 1941–2002Related quotes
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Source: To Bill O'Reilly, in discussion about the supposed War on Christmas, as quoted in "In Letterman appearance, O'Reilly repeated false claim that school changed 'Silent Night' lyrics" http://mediamatters.org/items/200601040009, Media Matters for America, (4 January 2006).
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As quoted in the New York Times Magazine (11 September 1994).
Mansion House Speech (17 October 1985), quoted in The View from No. 11: Memoirs of a Tory Radical (London: Bantam, 1992), pp. 480-481.
Stephen M. Kosslyn, "Mental images and the brain." Cognitive Neuropsychology 22.3-4 (2005): p. 333
