You can learn something about a person by the company she keeps. Sam Harris More Quotes by Sam Harris More Quotes From Sam Harris You can't take credit for your talents, but it matters that you use them. You can't really be blamed for your weaknesses, but it matters that you correct them. So pride and shame don't make a lot of sense, in the final analysis, but they weren't much fun anyway. Sam Harris weaknesspridefun The habit of spending nearly every waking moment lost in thought leaves us at the mercy of whatever our thoughts happen to be. Meditation is a way of breaking this spell. Sam Harris wakingmeditationway If faith is what you have to go on, if faith is the link between your beliefs and the world at large, your beliefs are very likely to be wrong. Beliefs can be right or wrong. If you believe you can fly, that belief is only true if indeed you can fly. Somebody who thinks he can fly, and is wrong about it, will eventually discover there's a problem with his view of the world. Sam Harris atheistbelievethinking By lying, we deny others a view of the world as it is. Our dishonesty not only influences the choices they make, it often determines the choices they can make—and in ways we cannot always predict. Every lie is a direct assault upon the autonomy of those we lie to. Sam Harris choicesviewslying It is time that scientists and other public intellectuals observed that the contest between faith and reason is zero-sum. Sam Harris scientistzeroreason You are not controlling the storm, and you are not lost in it. You are the storm. Sam Harris stormlost It is time we recognized that belief is not a private matter; it has never been merely private. In fact, beliefs are scarcely more private than actions are, for every belief is a fount of action in potential. Sam Harris beliefmatterfacts It is merely an accident of history that it is considered normal in our society to believe that the Creator of the universe can hear your thoughts while it is demonstrative of mental illness to believe that he is communicating with you by having the rain tap in Morse code on your bedroom window. Sam Harris atheistrainbelieve We have Christians against Muslims against Jews. They're making incompatible claims on real estate in the Middle East as though God were some kind of omniscient real estate broker parsing out parcels of land to his chosen flock. People are literally dying over ancient literature. Sam Harris landrealchristian What we do in every other area of our lives (other than religion), is, rather than respect somebody's beliefs, we evaluate their reasons. Sam Harris atheismatheistbelief Most of us are wiser than we may appear to be. On one level, wisdom is nothing more profound than an ability to follow ones own advice. Sam Harris levelsadviceprofound A kernel of truth lurks at the heart of religion, because spiritual experience, ethical behavior, and strong communities are essential for human happiness. And yet our religious traditions are intellectually defunct and politically ruinous. While spiritual experience is clearly a natural propensity of the human mind, we need not believe anything on insufficient evidence to actualize it. Sam Harris strongreligiousspiritual About 120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. If our polls are to be trusted, nearly 230 million Americans believe that a book showing neither unity of style nor internal consistency was authored by an omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent deity. Sam Harris beerbelievebook Faith enables many of us to endure life's difficulties with an equanimity that would be scarcely conceivable in a world lit only by reason. Sam Harris faithwould-beworld One of the worst things about breaking the law is that it puts one at odds with an indeterminate number of other people. This is among the many corrosive effects of having unjust laws: They tempt peaceful and (otherwise) honest people to lie so as to avoid being punished for behavior that is ethically blameless. Sam Harris oddslawlying Islam, at the moment, is the motherlode of bad ideas. Sam Harris islammomentsideas Mahavira, the Jain patriarch, surpassed the morality of the Bible with a single sentence: Do not injure, abuse, oppress, enslave, insult, torment, torture, or kill any creature or living being. Imagine how different our world might be if the Bible contained this as its central precept. Sam Harris abuseour-worldmight In the year 2006, a person can have sufficient intellectual and material resources to build a nuclear bomb and still believe that he will get seventy-two virgins in Paradise. Sam Harris twobelieveyears The moral truth here is obvious: anyone who feels that the interests of a blastocyst just might supersede the interests of a child with a spinal cord injury has had his moral sense blinded by religious metaphysics. Sam Harris religiousmightchildren Atheism is just a way of clearing the space for better conversations. Sam Harris atheismspaceway
