Rational Hub

“The great thing about science is that it’s a permanent revolution. It’s never complete. The journey to understanding is endless.

And to me, that’s the only appropriate humility in the face of the little we know about the cosmos, is that our understanding will never be complete.

But these little successive approximations of reality that science affords us are so precious and so magnificent, and give us a glimpse of what is possible.” - Ann Druyan ♥

“Our collective survival lies in recognizing that religion is not the solution; neither is nationalism. Both are divisive, embedding within us false notions of superiority and arrogant pride that are difficult to erase.
We have but one choice: the path of secular humanism, based upon the principles of logic and reason. This alone offers the hope of providing everybody on this globe with the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” - Dr. Pervez Hoodbhoy

“Faith is corrosive to the human mind. If someone genuinely believes that it is right to believe things without reason or evidence then they are open to every kind of dogma, whim, coercion, or dangerous infectious idea that’s around.

If someone is convinced that it is acceptable to base their beliefs on what is written in an ancient book, or what some teacher tells them they must believe, then they will have no true freedom of thought; they will be trapped by their faith into inconsistency and untruths because they are unable to throw out false ideas when evidence against them comes along.” - Susan Blackmore

“All the mythic versions of women, from the myth of the redeeming purity of the virgin to that of the healing, reconciliatory mother, are consolatory nonsenses; and consolatory nonsense seems to me a fair definition of myth, anyway. Mother goddesses are just as silly a notion as father gods. If a revival of the myths gives women emotional satisfaction, it does so at the price of obscuring the real conditions of life. This is why they were invented in the first place.” - Angela Carter

“I believe that we are chemicals, forged in dying stars, risen to consciousness by an amazing evolutionary process.  The miracle is that we are aware.  I think it is hubris for us to imagine we have a major purpose.” - Gentry Lee

“When a man projects into an ideal heaven that impossible synthesis of the for-itself and the in-itself that is called God, it is because he wishes the regard of this existing Being to change his existence into being.

But if he agrees not to be in order to exist genuinely, he will abandon the dream of an inhuman objectivity. He will understand that it is not a matter of being right in the eyes of a God, but of being right in his own eyes.” - Simone de Beauvoir

It might make some people feel good to talk about ‘‘a higher level of existence’’ or a ‘‘guiding force,’’ but there is no evidence for anything of the sort. I couldn’t and still can’t even figure out what such quasi-religious humbug means.

These liberal reconstructions also struck me as too far from what most people
in churches believe. The kind of religious beliefs that control people’s lives and
lead them to take stands on political and moral issues cannot be the watery spirituality that is vague enough to avoid conflicting with anything.

There is no point in going to Church or praying to something so indeterminate. No ‘higher level of existence’ could save believers or help them get to heaven or perform miracles or create the world. - Walter Sinnott-Armstrong

“Let’s teach our children about the story of the universe and its incredible richness and beauty. It is so much more glorious and awesome and even comforting than anything offered by any scripture or God-concept that I know of.” -Carolyn Porco

How rare it is that religions—especially established religions—take the lead in confrontation with the civil authorities when a monstrous injustice is being done?

How often it is that the religious authorities take the safe way and tempor