QUOTES
CREATIVITY
It is the tension between creativity and skepticism that has produced the stunning
and unexpected findings of science.
EDUCATION
Our species needs, and deserves, a citizenry with minds wide awake and a basic
understanding of how the world works.
HUMAN
RIGHTS
In every country, we should be teaching our children the scientific
method and the reasons for a Bill of Rights. With it comes a certain decency,
humility and community spirit. In the demon-haunted world that we inhabit by virtue
of being human, this may be all that stands between us and the enveloping darkness.
LEADERSHIP
Widespread intellectual and moral docility may be convenient for leaders in the
short term, but it is suicidal for nations in the long term. One of the criteria
for national leadership should therefore be a talent for understanding, encouraging,
and making constructive use of vigorous criticism.
LITERACY
"One of the greatest gifts adults can give -- to their offspring and to their
society -- is to read to children."
LOVE
"For small creatures such as we the vastness is bearable only through love."
NO
NUKES
Except for fools and madmen, everyone knows that nuclear war would
he an unprecedented human catastrophe.
It
is now almost 40 years since the invention of nuclear weapons. We have not yet
experienced a global thermonuclear war -- although on more than one occasion we
have come tremulously close. I do not think our luck can hold forever. Men and
machines are fallible, as recent events remind us. Fools and madmen do exist,
and sometimes rise to power. Concentrating always on the near future, we have
ignored the long-term consequences of our actions. We have placed our civilization
and our species in jeopardy. Fortunately, it is not yet too late. We can safeguard
the planetary civilization and the human family if we so choose. There is no more
important or more urgent issue.
PEACE
It is clear that the nations of the world now can only rise and fall together.
It is not a question of one nation winning at the expense of another. We must
all help one another or all perish together.
SPIRITUALITY
Science is not only compatible with spirituality; it is a profound source of spirituality.
MORE
QUOTES
"We are a way for the Cosmos to know itself."
It
is of interest to note that while some dolphins are reported to have learned English
-- up to fifty words used in correct context -- no human being has been reported
to have learned dolphinese.
Skeptical
scrutiny is the means, in both science and religion, by which deep insights can
be winnowed from deep nonsense.
When
you make the finding yourself - even if you're the last person on Earth to see
the light - you'll never forget it.
"Extraordinary
claims require extraordinary proof."
Somewhere,
something incredible is waiting to be known.
There
are many hypotheses in science which are wrong. That's perfectly all right; they're
the aperture to finding out what's right. Science is a self-correcting process.
To be accepted, new ideas must survive the most rigorous standards of evidence
and scrutiny.
