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Quote by Katha Pollitt

“As Stephen Jay Gould pointed out in Time, in no other Western country is the teaching of Evolution regarded as controversial. Throughout the world, one way or another, most Christian denominations have managed to reconcile belief in God with belief in the mechanisms of natural selection. A French or German or Scandinavian politician who called for students to entertain as a reasonable deduction from existing evidence the proposition that Earth is at most 10,000 years old would be bundled off to a mental hospital.”

Quote by Katha Pollitt

Author

Katha Pollitt is an American poet, critic, and writer known for her incisive political commentary and poetry, which often addresses themes of feminism, gender, politics, and social justice. more

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“Right now religion has the romantic aura of the forbidden - Christ is cool. We need to bring it into the schools, which kids already hate, and associate it firmly with boredom, regulation, condescension, makework and de facto segregation ... Prayer in the schools will rid us of the bland no-offense ecumenism that is so infuriating to us anticlericals: Oh, so now you say Jews didn't kill Christ - a little on the late side, isn't it?”

Source: Subject to Debate: Sense and Dissents on Women, Politics, and Culture

“In a better world, science teachers would teach creationism along with evolution as an exercise in critical thinking.”

Thinking World Teach Teacher Atheism Evolution Exercise Critical Positive Atheism Critical Thinking Creationism Science Teacher

Author:Katha Pollitt

“And when the Old Man wished to kill someone, he would take him and say: "Go and do this thing. I do this because I want to make you return to paradise." And the assassins go and perform the deed willingly.”

Men Want Atheism Return Deeds Paradise Old Man Assassins

Author:Marco Polo

“A system is empirical or scientific only if it is capable of being tested by experience. These considerations suggest that not the verifiability but the falsifiability of a system is to be taken as a criterion of demarcation... It must be possible for an empirical or scientific system to be refuted by experience.”

Ifs Taken Atheism Capable Positive Atheism Consideration Tested Criteria

Author:Karl Popper

“We have the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should tolerate even them whenever we can do so without running a great risk; but the risk may become so great that we cannot allow ourselves the luxury.”

Should May Running Can Do Risk Atheism Positive Atheism Luxury Tolerate Great Risk

Author:Karl Popper

“The moral decisions of others should be treated with respect, as long as such decisions do not conflict with the principle of tolerance.”

Should Long Decision Moral Principles Atheism Conflict Positive Atheism Tolerance Treated Moral Decisions

Author:Karl Popper

“The use of violence is justified only under a tyranny which makes reforms without violence impossible, and should have only one aim, that is, to bring about a state of affairs which makes reforms without violence possible.”

Should States Use Violence Impossible Atheism Should Have Aim Affair Positive Atheism Tyranny Reform Justified

Book:The Open Society and Its Enemies

Source: The Open Society and Its Enemies

“I do not expect that the mere fact that I was once an evangelical apologist and now see things differently should itself count as evidence that I must be right. That would be the genetic fallacy. It would be just as erroneous to think that John Rankin must be right in having embraced evangelical Christianity since he had once been an agnostic Unitarian and repudiated it for the Christian faith.”

Thinking Should Facts Would Be Christian Christianity Atheism Evidence Mere Positive Atheism Agnostic Christian Faith Evangelical Fallacy Unitarian

Author:Robert M. Price

“"Heresy," by the way, simply means "choice." It came to mean "thoughtcrime," implying it was blasphemy to presume to choose your own belief instead of swallowing what the bishops spoonfed you.”

Way Mean Choices Belief Atheism Positive Atheism Heresy Bishops Blasphemy Swallowing Implying

Author:Robert M. Price

“In broad outline and in detail, the life of Jesus as portrayed in the gospels corresponds to the worldwide Mythic Hero Archetype in which a divine hero's birth is supernaturally predicted and conceived, the infant hero escapes attempts to kill him, demonstrates his precocious wisdom already as a child, receives a divine commission, defeats demons, wins acclaim, is hailed as king, then betrayed, losing popular favor, executed, often on a hilltop, and is vindicated and taken up to heaven.”