Freedom Of Thought Quotes

Some tourists think Amsterdam is a city of sin, but in truth it is a city of freedom. And in freedom, most people find sin. ~ John Green

I would say that not many German people are still alive, who experienced what happened during the third reich. We don't have to go to the Stasi, we can go to the Gestapo, and see what happens, when your human rights, your ability to a freedom of expression and a freedom of thought is infringed upon. This is terribly, terribly dangerous territory. ~ Ray McGovern

I understand you, and I shall not attempt to make you change your mind. I am too old to want to improve the world. I have told you what I think, and that is all. I shall remain your friend even if you act contrary to my convictions, and I shall help you even if I disagree with you. ~ Milan Kundera

Whatever the rationale, the suppression of unorthodox cancer therapies and the sustained persecution of their proponents by government and colleagues runs counter to freedom of thought, much less freedom of choice. ~ Marilyn Ferguson

But now, I, August Comte, have discovered the truth. Therefore, there is no longer any need for freedom of thought or freedom of the press. I want to rule and to organize the whole country. ~ Auguste Comte

The moment you say that any idea system is sacred, whether it's a religious belief system or a secular ideology, the moment you declare a set of ideas to be immune from criticism, satire, derision, or contempt, freedom of thought becomes impossible.
[Defend the right to be offended (openDemocracy, 7 February 2005)] ~ Salman Rushdie

A man who should undertake to inquire into everything for himself, could devote to each thing but little time and attention. His task would keep his mind in perpetual unrest, which would prevent him from penetrating to the depth of any truth, or of grappling his mind indissolubly to any conviction. His intellect would be at once independent and powerless. He must therefore make his choice from amongst the various objects of human belief, and he must adopt many opinions without discussion, in order to search the better into that smaller number which he sets apart for investigation. It is true that whoever receives an opinion on the word of another, does so far enslave his mind; but it is a salutary servitude which allows him to make a good use of freedom.

A principle of authority must then always occur, under all circumstances, in some part or other of the moral and intellectual world. Its place is variable, but a place it necessarily has. The independence of individual minds may be greater, or it may be less: unbounded it cannot be. Thus the question is, not to know whether any intellectual authority exists in the ages of democracy, but simply where it resides and by what standard it is to be measured. ~ Alexis De Tocqueville

Probably it is true enough that the great majority are rarely capable of thinking independently, that on most questions they accept views which they find ready-made, and that they will be equally content if born or coaxed into one set of beliefs or another. In any society freedom of thought will probably be of direct significance only for a small minority. But this does not mean that anyone is competent, or ought to have power, to select those to whom this freedom is to be reserved. It certainly does not justify the presumption of any group of people to claim the right to determine what people ought to think or believe. ~ Friedrich Hayek

The freedom of thought and expression is one of the most sacred rights in this country. ~ Eliot Engel

No body of knowledge needs an organizational policy. Organizational policy can only impede the advancement of knowledge. There is a basic incompatibility between any organization and freedom of thought. ~ William S. Burroughs

I want to be part of the happiness team - let's create the happiness team - from love, not greed, love of life & our planet, true & free. ~ Jay Woodman

The first step away from being manipulated, and towards a more autonomous outlook, is to stand back from a set of responses and think. ~ Jonathan Glover

A conditioned mind is never a free mind. ~ Bruce Lee

The imagination serves us only when the mind is absolutely free of any prejudice. A single prejudice suffices to cool off the imagination. This whimsical part of the mind is so unbridled as to be uncontrollable. Its greatest triumphs, its most eminent delights consist in smashing all the restraints that oppose it. Imagination is the enemy of all norms, the idolater of all disorder and of all that bears the color of crime. ~ Marquis De Sade

It took me 30 years to realize that being fearless doesn't mean not being afraid, but remaining steadfast despite it. ~ Kierra C.T. Banks

Freedom is being allowed to think your own thoughts and live your own life. ~ John F. Kennedy

I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. ~ James Madison

I always strive for freedom: freedom of thought and expression. ~ Lykke Li

Love and Freedom of Thoughts is a fast-acting antidote against the misanthropic cold sword of mass surveillance. ~ Kristian Goldmund Aumann

Freedom is an ingredient of humble facts. ~ Arif Naseem

If any man has drunk a little too deeply from the cup of physical pleasure; if he has spent too much time at his desk that should have been spent asleep; if his fine spirits have become temporarily dulled; if he finds the air too damp, the minutes too slow, and the atmosphere too heavy to withstand; if he is obsessed by a fixed idea which bars him from any freedom of thought: if he is any of these poor creatures, we say, let him be given a good pint of amber-flavored chocolate ... and marvels will be performed. ~ Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin

Freedom is an absolute state, there is no such thing as being half-free. ~ Daniel Delgado F.

A book is the only true land of the free: within its borders, anything is possible ~ Agona Apell

Wouldn't be very fair to the rest of them, would it?" Harper asked. "They're not bad people, most of them. All they want is to be safe."
"Isn't that always a permission slip for ugliness and cruelty? All they want is to be safe, and they don't care who they have to destroy to stay that way. And the people who want to kill us, the Cremation Crews, all they want is safety, too! ~ Joe Hill

What matters is the need to move from the rigidity of national stereotypes towards something more truly human; what matters is to discover the riches of human hearts and souls; what matters is the human content of poetry and science, the universal charm and beauty of architecture; what matters is the magnanimity of a nation's leaders and historical figures. only by exalting what is truly human, only by fusing the national with what is universally human, can try dignity - and true freedom - be achieved.
It is the struggle for freedom of thought and expression, the struggle for a peasant's freedom to sow what he wants to sow, for everyone's freedom to enjoy the fruits of their own work - this is the true struggle for national dignity.
The only real triumph of national freedom is one that brings about the triumph of all human freedom.
For small nations and large nations alike, this is the only way forward.
And it goes without saying that the Russians too - as well as Armenians, Georgians, Kazakhs, Kalmyks and Uzbeks - must understand that it is precisely through renouncing the idea of their own national superiority that they can truly affirm the grandeur and dignity of their own people, of their own literature and science. ~ Vasily Grossman

Freedom of speech is detestable only to those who have no desire to think for themselves. ~ Criss Jami

Lose your freedom, and become a slave by borrowing. ~ Auliq Ice

Driven from every other corner of the earth, freedom of thought and the right of private judgment in matters of conscience direct their course to this happy country as their last asylum. ~ Samuel Adams

There shall come a day when Birds shall be free ... and humans will see ... ~ K. Hari Kumar

While America will always, I think, feel foreign to me, New York City is my home. This is where I can construct my own identity freely and reject labels imposed on me. ~ Raquel Cepeda

The best path is to have no path. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Man must be able to think freely and he must be able to express his thoughts freely! He who is against this is not only fascist and primitive but at the same time is a very great coward also! Only the brave and the honourable men are never afraid of freedom of thought and freedom of expression of ideas! Just like the cockroaches do not like the light, evil minds also do not like the freedom of thoughts! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

Those who take refuge behind theological barbed wire fences, quite often wish they could have more freedom of thought, but fear the change to the great ocean of truth as they would a cold bath. ~ Luther Burbank

I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions. ~ George Carlin

Freedom is the freedom to say two plus two equals four. ~ George Orwell

Because Freedom is the most important thing on life, let me Be. ~ John Steinbeck

So long as you believe yourself to be 'only human' you have accepted life in a prison cell whose door remains locked only by your own mind.
By saying, 'well, I'm only human', you have blindly submitted to all the limitations, fears, pettiness, greed and hatreds which make the common person weak and fragile.
Most never become aware that another way is possible.
You are human, but much more, too.
The much-moreness is the vast, brilliant freedom and power which has confined itself in your humanity.
If you are willing (and not everyone is, which is also a perfectly valid choice), you can begin to explore your native powers and experience freedom within limitation. When you do this, you live fully while you are here and you are no longer afraid to die.
When you are not afraid of death but seek to live in a state of always-discovering, this is when life is transformed and you accept your birthright to choose and create in extraordinary fashion. ~ Jacob Nordby

A man of distinguished, beautiful eloquence, and persistent, over pressing thought ... Ameen Rihani was one of the foremost pioneers of modern illumination. He firmly believed in the significance of reviving the Arab spirit and protecting the freedom of thought and the freedom of human conscience ... ~ Mikhail Naimy

Since then your sere Majesty and your Lordships seek a simple answer, I will give it in this manner, neither horned nor toothed. Unless I am convinced by the testimony of the Scriptures or by clear reason (for I do not trust either in the pope or in councils alone, since it is well known that they have often erred and contradicted themselves), I am bound by the Scriptures I have quoted and my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything, since it is neither safe nor right to go against conscience. May God help me. Amen.
(Reply to the Diet of Worms, April 18, 1521) ~ Martin Luther

It is only in freedom that you can find out what is true, what is God, not through any belief, because your very belief projects what you think ought to be God, what you think ought to be true. ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti

Any country where there is no freedom of speech is no more than a Kingdom of Animals where only the powerful speaks! ~ Mehmet Murat Ildan

I believe in the complete freedom of thought and speech - alike for the humblest man and the mightiest, and in the utmost freedom of conduct that is consistent with living in organized
society. ~ H.L. Mencken

To menace the freedom of thought, religion, and personal safety of other citizens is not long permitted by a nation of free men, for freedom is their dearest possession, dearer even than life itself. ~ Gladys Hasty Carroll

One man's blasphemy doesn't override other people's free-speech rights, their freedom to publish, freedom of thought. ~ Dan Savage

Right now we live in an age of extreme Political Correctness. It has gone way too far. I hope it's just a phase. Political Correctness is now just a fancy word for censorship. It's no longer about protecting the weak. It has become an excuse to persecute others, because persecuting people is fun. Don't you dare say or think the wrong thing, or a Twitter mob of angry villagers will come after you with digital torches and metaphorical pitchforks. ~ Oliver Markus Malloy

I am afflicted with the power of thought, which is a heavy curse. The less a person thinks and inquires regarding the why and the wherefore and the justice of things, when dragging along through life, the happier it is for him, and doubly, trebly so, for her. ~ Miles Franklin

A mind cluttered with past thoughts, old conversations and unhealed wounds can only serve to drag us down and compromise our ability to live free. ~ Shannon Tanner

But, in making the sacrifices that the Government asks us to make, we are not protecting our freedom. We are giving away our freedom in exchange for a false sense of security. ~ Kenneth Eade

Ideas are far more powerful than guns. We don't let our people have guns. Why should we let them have ideas? ~ Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin

Tolerance and freedom of thought are the veritable antidotes to religious fanaticism. ~ Baron D'Holbach

I don't have a diary, I don't write things into a diary. I imprint myself into the sky and when the sunlight shines brightly, I can stand under the sun's rays and everything I have imprinted of myself into the sky, I will begin to see again, feel again, remember. And when the wind begins to blow, it blows the details over my face, and I remember everything I left in the sky and see new things being born. I am unwritten. ~ C. JoyBell C.

All thoughts are beautiful when they're free. ~ Marty Rubin

Let nobody be afraid of true freedom of thought. Let us be free in thought and criticism; but, with freedom, we are bound to come to the conclusion that science is not antagonistic to religion, but a help to it. ~ Lord Kelvin

Not enough people know or understand just how little freedom we have left. ~ Korban Blake

From a comparative perspective, the United States is unusual if not unique in the lack of restraints on freedom of expression. It is also unusual in the range and effectiveness of methods employed to restrain freedom of thought ... Where the voice of the people is heard, elite groups must insure their voice says the right things. ~ Noam Chomsky

Cram them full of non-combustible data, chock them so damned full of 'facts' they feel stuffed, but absolutely 'brilliant' with information. Then they'll feel they're thinking, they'll get a sense of motion without moving. And they'll be happy, because facts of that sort don't change. Don't give them any slippery stuff like philosophy or sociology to tie things up with. That way lies melancholy. ~ Ray Bradbury

I shall stand for freedom of thought and expression in a place where it has been trampled and penalized. ~ Jalal Talabani

1. a.Never throw shit at an armed man.
b.Never stand next to someone who
is throwing shit at an armed man.

2.Never fire a laser at a mirror.
3.Mother Nature doesn't care if you're having fun.
4.F x S = k. The product of Freedom and Security is a constant. To gain more freedom of thought and/or action, you must give up some security, and vice versa.
5.Psi and/or magical powers, if real, are nearly useless.
6.It is easier to destroy than create.
7.Any damn fool can predict the past.
8.History never repeats itself.
9.Ethics change with technology.
10.There Ain't No Justice. (often abbreviated to TANJ)
11.Anarchy is the least stable of social structures. It falls apart at a touch.
12.There is a time and place for tact. And there are times when tact is entirely misplaced.
13.The ways of being human are bounded but infinite.
14.The world's dullest subjects, in order:
a.Somebody else's diet.
b.How to make money for a worthy cause.
c.The Kardashians.

15.The only universal message in science fiction: There exist minds that think as well as you do, but differently.
Niven's corollary: The gene-tampered turkey you're talking to isn't necessarily one of them.
16.Fuzzy Pink Niven's Law: Never waste calories.
17.There is no cause so right that one cannot find a fool following it.
in variant form in Fallen Angels as "Niven's Law: No cause is so noble that it won ~ Larry Niven

Freedom of speech is useless without freedom of thought. ~ Spiro T. Agnew

Thus freedom of thought, in any valuable sense, includes freedom of speech. ~ John B. Bury

The only weapon that we have in our hands this evening is the weapon of protest. That's all. ~ Martin Luther King, Jr.

Your silent rebellion is unstoppable. ~ Strider Marcus Jones

Never let anyone put you in chains. ~ Abhijit Naskar

A Rule: Life without Islam is a naked tree,
Birds without trees can never feel free. ~ Leena Ahmad Almashat

An editor doesn't just read, he reads well, and reading well is a creative, powerful act. The ancients knew this and it frightened them. Mesopotamian society, for instance, did not want great reading from its scribes, only great writing. Scribes had to submit to a curious ruse: they had to downplay their reading skills lest they antagonize their employer. The Attic poet Menander wrote: "those who can read see twice as well." Ancient autocrats did not want their subjects to see that well. Order relied on obedience, not knowledge and reflection. So even though he was paid to read as much as write messages, the scribe's title cautiously referred to writing alone (scribere = "to write"); and the symbol for Nisaba, the Mesopotamian goddess of scribes, was not a tablet but a stylus. In his excellent book A History of Reading, Alberto Manguel writes, "It was safer for a scribe to be seen not as one who interpreted information, but who merely recorded it for the public good."
In their fear of readers, ancients understood something we have forgotten about the magnitude of readership. Reading breeds the power of an independent mind. When we read well, we are thinking hard for ourselves - this is the essence of freedom. It is also the essence of editing. Editors are scribes liberated to not simply record and disseminate information, but think hard about it, interpret, and ultimately, influence it. ~ Susan Bell

Dare to think for yourself. ~ Voltaire

Ask the majority of Christians what they consider the greatest evil from which Christ freed humanity and they will say: from Hell, from eternal fire, from punishment in the next world. As a corollary to this they think that salvation is something that someone else can achieve for us. The word hell, which is seldom met in the Holy Scriptures, has done much harm to Christianity as a result of false interpretations. People run away from external hell which they are made to fear most of all. The salvation that man needs most and that which gives him freedom is redemption from the evil within his soul. There is something far worse than external punishment. It is the sin of the soul being in rebellion against God; the soul, endowed with God's strength, yielding itself to the force of bestial instinct; the soul which exists before God, yet fears the threats and fury of men, preferring human glory to its own peaceful awareness of virtue. There is no fate worse than this. And it is this that the unrepentant person carries with him to the grave. And it is this we ought to fear.

To gain salvation, in the highest meaning of the word, means to raise your fallen spirit, cure the sick soul, give it back its freedom of thought, conscience and love. In this lies the salvation for which Christ died. It is for this salvation that we have been given the Holy Spirit, and it is towards this salvation that the Christian teaching should be directed. ~ William Ellery Channing

What does it mean that thirty thousand men, not athletes but rather weak and ordinary people, have subdued two hundred million vigorous, clever, capable, and freedom-loving people? Do not the figures make it clear that it is not the English who have enslaved the Indians, but the Indians who have enslaved themselves? ~ Leo Tolstoy

You must allow your free-will to roam as freely as you want and delve deep into your dreams. Never limit yourself nor live according to the appetite of someone else. ~ Mwanandeke Kindembo

Freedom of thought is meaningless without the freedom to act. ~ Marty Rubin

It is my duty as a free man to read so I'm not blind being lead around by my nose ~ Pierce Brown

Survival, true survival of the body and soul, requires creativity, freedom of thought, collaboration. You might have time and I might have land. You might have ideas and I might have strength. You might have a tomato and I might have a knife. We need each other. We need to say: I honor the things that you respect and I value the things you cherish. I am not better than you. You are not better than me. ~ Clemantine Wamariya

Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. The source of better ideas is wisdom. The surest path to wisdom is a liberal education. ~ Alfred Whitney Griswold

Let the human mind loose. It must be loose. It will be loose. Superstition and dogmatism cannot confine it.

{Letter to his son and 6th US president, John Quincy Adams, November 13 1816} ~ John Adams

Organized religion provides a model of the way all organizations, from the state down to the village garden club, end a price in terms of a member's freedom of thought and action. ~ Robert Shea

In any society freedom of thought will probably be of direct significance only for a small minority. ~ Friedrich Hayek

He was abusing Big Brother, he was denouncing the dictatorship of the Party, he was demanding the immediate conclusion of peace with Eurasia, he was advocating freedom of speech, freedom of the Press, freedom of assembly, freedom of thought, he was crying hysterically that the revolution had been betrayed - and all this in rapid polysyllabic speech which was a sort of parody of the habitual style of the orators of the Party, and even contained Newspeak words: more Newspeak words, indeed, than any Party member would normally use in real life. ~ George Orwell

The more people come together, the more borders will be opened and people and opinions get together, the more unrenouncable tolerance will be a fundamental part of our social life. Without tolerance there is no religious liberty, no freedom of conscience and no freedom of thought. ~ Thomas Klestil

The free-will of man cannot impune the sovereignty of God, and conversely the sovereignty of God would not impune the free-will of men. ~ R. Alan Woods

Freedom of thought, freedom of speech, freedom of identity. This is my Holy Trinity, each one an intrinsic aspect of my god: Freedom, the Holiest of Holies. Yes it bloody well is. It is absolutely sacred and inviolable, beyond any negotiation or compromise, now and forever. Amen. ~ Pat Condell

That so many of the well fed young television-watchers in the world's most powerful democracy should be so completely indifferent to the idea of self-government, so blankly uninterested in freedom of thought and the right to dissent, is distressing, but not too surprising. "Free as a bird", we say, and envy the winged creatures for their power of unrestricted movement in all the three dimensions. But alas, we forget the dodo. Any bird that has learned how to grub up a good living without being compelled to use its wings will soon renounce the privilege of flight and remain forever grounded. ~ Aldous Huxley

One may always attempt as much insight, love, freedom of thought and expression, justice and tolerance as possible for oneself and the very few people who share one's truest life. To be a 'free lord' in secret is better than being a public slave, a willing accomplice of repression and injustice. ~ Hakim Bey

To create a new belief is easy but to understand and improve someone's concept and to develop it for good is difficult. ~ Vikram Roy

Anxiety, and the physical symptoms it causes, is merely fog along the path of independence and discovery. ~ Charles F. Glassman

The only conception of freedom I can have is that of the prisoner or the individual in the midst of the State. The only one I know is freedom of thought and action. ~ Albert Camus

We all have vices, visible and invisible. Some we deliberately keep secret. Others we don't even realize or we refuse to admit we have ... Vices can be lots of fun, or they can turn your life into a living hell. Accept them for what they are, just another aspect of the mind's creation, and you can enjoy them - if you choose - without being broken by them.
- Zeena Schreck for VICE Magazine ~ Zeena Schreck

America's greatest contribution to the world is its concept of democracy, its concept of freedom, freedom of action, freedom of speech, and freedom of thought. ~ Benazir Bhutto

To the future or to the past, to a time when thought is free, when men are different from one another and do not live alone - to a time when truth exists and what is done cannot be undone: From the age of uniformity, from the age of solitude, from the age of Big Brother, from the age of doublethink - greetings! ~ George Orwell

A freedom given up is not so easily regained. ~ Rivera Sun

A man is allowed sufficient freedom of thought, provided he knows how to choose his subject properly ... But the scene is changed as you come homeward, and atheism or treason may be the names given in Britain to what would be reason and truth if asserted in China. ~ Edmund Burke

Freedom of thought is the only good that is perhaps more precious than peace, for the simple reason that, without it, peace would merely be another name of servitude. ~ Andre Comte Sponville

They were governed by private loyalties which they did not question. What mattered were individual relationships, and a completely helpless gesture, an embrace, a tear, a word spoken to a dying man, could have value in itself ~ George Orwell

In such a way is freedom of thought lost ... By small cuts. By small acts of disapproval. By a thousand discouragements of spirit. ~ Alexander McCall Smith

How absurd men are! They never use the liberties they have, they demand those they do not have. They have freedom of thought, they demand freedom of speech. ~ Soren Kierkegaard

We are faced with the paradoxical fact that education has become one of the chief obstacles to intelligence and freedom of thought. ~ Bertrand Russell

If religion is not all encompassing, and does not factor in freedom of thought and speech, it is bound to become reductionist eventually - An absolute reductionism can result into its disintegration also, as a possibility. ~ Sandeep Sahajpal

Rock n' roll to me is all about freedom of thought and to be whatever you want to be. ~ Noel Gallagher

True Freedom is freedom of thought & of action. How many of us can claim to be truly free? ~ Anno Nomius

Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.
[The One Un-American Act, Speech to the Author's Guild Council in New York, on receiving the 1951 Lauterbach Award (December 3, 1952)] ~ William O. Douglas

For you will find, as women have found through the ages, that changing the world requires a lot of free time. Requires a lot of mobility. Requires money, and, as Virginia Woolf put it so well, "a room of one's own," preferably one with a key and a lock. Which means that women must be prepared to think for themselves, which means, undoubtedly, trouble with boyfriends, lovers, and husbands, which means all kinds of heartache and misery, and times when you will wonder if independence, freedom of thought, or your own work is worth it all. We must believe that it is. For the world is not good enough; we must make it better. ~ Alice Walker