Quotes about beliefs

“It becomes so easy to believe what one wishes to believe,” Jhary said wearily. “So easy.”

A time is marked not so much by ideas that are argued about as by ideas that are taken for granted. The character of an era hangs upon what needs no defense. Power runs with ideas that only the crazy would draw into doubt. The "taken for granted" is the test of sanity; "what everyone knows" is the line between us and them.

This means that sometimes a society gets stuck. Sometimes these unquestioned ideas interfere, as the cost of questioning becomes too great. In these times, the hardest task for social or political activists is to find a way to get people to wonder again about what we all believe is true. The challenge is to sow doubt.

It is far easier to argue that something nobody believes in actually exists than it is to argue that something everybody believes in is unreal.

[U]ncomprimising belief carries much more weight than some special philosophical notions... [T]he great majority... can scarcely have any well-founded judgement concerning the correctness of certain important general ideas or doctrines. ...[T]he word "belief" can for this majority not mean "perceiving the truth of something" but... only... as "taking this as the basis for life." ...[T]his second kind of belief is much firmer... much more fixed... it can persist even against immediate contradicting experience... not... shaken by added scientific knowledge... sometimes... to the point where it seems completely absurd, and ends... only with the death of the believer. Science and history can teach us that this... may become a great danger... [S]uch belief has always belonged to the great forces in human history.

The great driving force of the oligarchs is the belief that they are doing right.

Nothing helps you sleep at night so much as being absolutely certain that you're right, and everyone else is evil.

You're only so sure you're right because they're so sure you're wrong.

This is how humans are: We question all our beliefs, except for the ones that we really believe in, and those we never think to question.

Oh, I have strong opinions, but a thousand reasoned opinions are never equal to one case of diving in and finding out. Galileo proved that and it may be the only certainty we have.

Althea cried out in dismay: “Is that what you believe?”

“In the absence of evidence I believe nothing,” said Dr. Fiorio.

“As I listen to you I hear only ingenuousness and didactic theory.”

Lorcas compressed his lips. “Perhaps because you are hearing views which contradict your emotions.”

“Truth” is contained in the preconceptions of him who seeks to define it. Any organization of ideas whatever presupposes a judgment on the world.