Secularisation Theory Quotes

We must endure the ignorant to protect the liberty of the majority. ~ James D. Best

The inquisition of public opinion overwhelms in practice the freedom asserted by the laws in theory. ~ Thomas Jefferson

Education, you know, means broadening, advancing; and if you limit a teacher to only one side of anything, the whole country will eventually have only one thought, be one individual. I believe in teaching every aspect of every problem or theory. ~ John T. Scopes

Just because we haven't seen a dragon, doesn't mean dragons don't exist." Louise stated the logic of why the scientists were reluctant to commit to a theory. ~ Wen Spencer

A while back, my friend Graydon Carter mentioned that he was opening a restaurant in New York. I cautioned him against this, because it's my theory that owning a restaurant is the kind of universal fantasy everyone ought to grow out of, sooner rather than later, or else you will be stuck with the restaurant. There are many problems that come with owning a restaurant, not the least of which is that you have to eat there all the time. Giving up the fantasy that you want to own a restaurant is probably the last Piaget stage. ~ Nora Ephron

The "flow of information" through human communication channels is enormous. So far no theory exists, to our knowledge, which attributes any sort of unambiguous measure to this "flow". ~ Anatol Rapoport

When you're upset, you do weights." "Is that another one of your theories, Mom?" "It's more than a theory, Ari. ~ Anonymous

Probably the institution of marriage had its origin in love of property. Both men and women were united in this
that whatever they loved best, they wished to possess. The usual theory holds that the communal system would not permit the gratification of this desire at the expense of communal rights, and that therefore men were driven to gratify their passion by purchasing or by capturing women from neighboring and hostile tribes. ~ Henry Adams

I'm a firm believer that in the theory that people only do their best at things they truly enjoy. It is difficult to excel at something you don't enjoy. ~ Jack Nicklaus

With the eventual acceptance of Darwin's theory we reach a modern understanding of nature, one which has since then changed in detail rather than in fundamentals. Only those who prefer religious faith to beliefs based on reasoning and evidence can still maintain that the human species is the special darling of the entire universe, or that other animals were created to provide us with food, or that we have divine authority over them, and divine permission to kill them. ~ Peter Singer

Its assimilation requires the reconstruction of prior theory and re-evaluation of prior fact, an intrinsically revolutionary process that is seldom completed a single man and never overnight ~ Thomas S. Kuhn

So here is one of my theories on happiness: we cannot know if we have lived a truly happy life until the very end. This view of life and death was reinforced by my close witnessing of the buildup to the death of Philip Gould. Philip was without doubt my closest friend in politics. When he died, I felt like I had lost a limb. ~ Alastair Campbell

Morality and freedom are as certainly the only bases of the happiness and dignity of the human race as the system of Galileo is the true theory of the celestial motions. ~ Germaine De Stael

Librarians. He'd never met one with a bad memory. He had a theory that words stuck to their minds like flies to flypaper. ~ Cornelia Funke

Note: When reading dry political theory, such as the texts you will find on the following pages, it may be useful to apply the Exclamation Point Test from time to time, to determine if the material you are reading is actually relevant to your life. To apply this test, simply go through the text replacing all the punctuation marks at the ends of the sentences with exclamation points. If the results sound absurd when read aloud, then you know you're wasting your time. ~ CrimethInc.

Here the attention of the research workers is primarily directed to the problem of reconciling the claims of the special relativity theory with those of the quantum theory. The extraordinary advances made in this field by Dirac ... leave open the question whether it will be possible to satisfy the claims of the two theories without at the same time determining the Sommerfeld fine-structure constant. ~ Werner Heisenberg

My theory is that you find out who your true friends are when something good happens to you, not when something bad happens to you. Everybody loves you when something bad happens to you. Then you're easy to love. ~ Lisa Scottoline

Osteopath
One who argues that all human ills are caused by the pressure of hard bone upon soft tissue. The proof of his theory isto be found in the heads of those who believe it. ~ H.L. Mencken

I used to have a theory about photographing. It was a sense of getting in between two actions, or in between acton and repose. ~ Diane Arbus

It is the fundamental theory of all the more recent American law ... that the average citizen is half-witted, and hence not to be trusted to either his own devices or his own thoughts. ~ H.L. Mencken

It is easy to prescribe improvement for others; it is easy to organize something, to institutionalize this or that, to pass laws, multiply bureaucratic agencies, form pressure groups, start revolutions, change forms of government, tinker at political theory. The fact that these expedients have been tried unsuccessfully in every conceivable combination for 6,000 years has not noticeably impaired a credulous unintelligent willingness to keep on trying them again and again. ~ Albert J. Nock

The only simple truth is that there is nothing simple in this complex universe. Everything relates. Everything connects ~ Johnny Rich

Freud made the discovery- quite genuinely, simply through working on his own material- that the more deeply one explores the phenomena of human individuation, the more unreservedly one grasps the individual as a self-contained and dynamic entity, the closer one draws to that in the individual which is really no longer individual. ~ Theodor W. Adorno

What do you call a conspiracy theory that's backed up by evidence? Oh yes, a conspiracy ~ Ian Shircore

And anyway who the devil should I want to murder?"
"That would be a very good question," said Miss Marple. "I have not yet had the pleasure of sufficient conversation with you to evolve a theory as to that."
Mr. Rafter's smile broadened.
"Conversations with you might be dangerous," he said.
"Conversations are always dangerous, if you have something to hide," said Miss Marple. ~ Agatha Christie

We thus find ourselves in the situation that the entire theory of man-made global warming-with its repercussions in science, and its important consequences for politics and the global economy-is based on ice core studies that provided a false picture of the atmospheric CO2 levels. ~ Zbigniew Jaworowski

Too bad you didn't just take Max up on his offer, Four. Well, too bad for you, anyway," says Eric quietly as he clicks the bullet into its chamber. My lungs burn; I haven't breathed in almost a minute. I see Tobias's hand twitch in the corner of my eye, but my hand is already on my gun. I press the barrel to Eric's forehead. His eyes widen, and his face goes slack, and for a second he looks like another sleeping Dauntless soldier. My index finger hovers over the trigger. "Get your gun away from his head," I say. "You won't shoot me," Eric replies. "Interesting theory. " I say. ~ Veronica Roth

I went to the University of Toronto to study the history and theory of film, in the back of my mind thinking I'd go to NYU film school and see if I could make a career of it. ~ Tom Rachman

When [Jesus] wanted fully to explain what his forthcoming death was all about He didn't give a theory. He didn't even give them a set of Scriptural texts. He gave them a meal. ~ Rachel Held Evans

The real test of 'knowledge' is not whether it is true, but whether it empowers us. Scientists usually assume that no theory is 100 per cent correct. Consequently, truth is a poor test for knowledge. The real test is utility. A theory that enables us to do new things constitutes knowledge. Over ~ Yuval Noah Harari