“I know the God hypothesis has its partisans, but, oh, what a boring idea. Where did the universe come from? He did it. How do we account for rivers and rocks and ring-tailed lemurs? He made them. Ho-hum.”
Source: The Philosopher's Apprentice (2008), Chapter 5 (p. 108)
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James K. Morrow166
(1947-) science fiction author 1947Related quotes
Denis Diderot (1713–1784) French Enlightenment philosopher and encyclopædist
Prologue
Jacques le Fataliste (1796)
Thomas Edison (1847–1931) American inventor and businessman
Thomas Edison ""No Immortality of the Soul" says Thomas A. Edison. In Fact, He Doesn't Believe There Is a Soul — Human Beings Only an Aggregate of Cells and the Brain Only a Wonderful Machine, Says Wizard of Electricity". New York Times. October 2, 1910
1910s
Maimónides book The Guide for the Perplexed
Source: Guide for the Perplexed (c. 1190), Part III, Ch.24
Context: This is the way how we have to understand the accounts of trials; we must not think that God desires to examine us and to try us in order to know what He did not know before. Far is this from Him; He is far above that which ignorant and foolish people imagine concerning Him, in the evil of their thoughts. Note this.
“What did God do before he created the universe?”
Stephen Hawking book A Brief History of Time
Source: A Brief History of Time
Matka Tereza (1910–1997) Roman Catholic saint of Albanian origin
Quoted in: Honor Books, W. B. Freeman (2004), God's Little Devotional Book for Girls, p. 205
2000s
Robert G. Ingersoll (1833–1899) Union United States Army officer
Orthodoxy (1884)
Context: How do they answer all this? They say that God “permits” it. What would you say to me if I stood by and saw a ruffian beat out the brains of a child, when I had full and perfect power to prevent it? You would say truthfully that I was as bad as the murderer. Is it possible for this God to prevent it? Then, if he does not he is a fiend; he is no god. But they say he “permits” it. What for? So that we may have freedom of choice. What for? So that God may find, I suppose, who are good and who are bad. Did he not know that when he made us? Did he not know exactly just what he was making?
Dorothy L. Sayers (1893–1957) English crime writer, playwright, essayist and Christian writer
Essays, The Triumph of Easter (1938)
Source: The Whimsical Christian: 18 Essays
J. Howard Moore (1862–1916)
"The Source of Religion", International Socialist Review, Vol. 16, Iss. 12, Jun. 1916
Dylan Moran (1971) Irish actor and comedian
On behaviour displayed on foot and in cars.
Like, Totally (2006)