“Someone who is perennially surprised that depravity exists, who continues to feel disillusioned (even incredulous) when confronted with evidence of what humans are capable of inflicting in the way of gruesome, hands-on cruelties upon other humans, has not reached moral or psychological adulthood.” WayFeelsHumansHandsMoralCapableEvidenceCrueltyPsychologicalAdulthoodDepravityDisillusioned Book:Regarding the Pain of Others Source: Regarding the Pain of Others
“Convictions following the admission into evidence of confessions which are involuntary, i.e., the product of coercion, either physical or psychological, cannot stand. This is so not because such confessions are unlikely to be true but because the methods used to extract them offend an underlying principle in the enforcement of our criminal law: that ours is an accusatorial, and not an inquisitorial, system - a system in which the State must establish guilt by evidence independently and freely secured, and may not, by coercion, prove its charges against an accused out of his own mouth.” MayStatesLawUsedPrinciplesProductsProveMouthsEvidenceMethodGuiltFollowingConvictionCriminalsPsychologicalBeing TrueConfessionEnforcementAccusedUnlikelyCoercionProve ItAdmissionSecuredInvoluntaryCriminal Law Author:Felix Frankfurter
“[T]he true natural sciences lock together in theory and evidence to form the ineradicable technical base of modern civilization. The pseudosciences satisfy personal psychological needs... but lack the ideas or the means to contribute to the technical base.” NeedsMeanIdeasTogetherFormReligionNaturalModernTheoryCivilizationEvidencePsychologicalLocksNatural SciencePseudoscienceModern CivilizationPsychological Needs Author:E. O. Wilson
“It is not true that a man can believe or disbelieve what he will. But it is certain that an active desire to find any proposition true will unconsciously tend to that result by dismissing importunate suggestions which run counter to the belief, and welcoming those which favor it. The psychological law, that we only see what interests us, and only assimilate what is adapted to our condition, causes the mind to select its evidence.” MenMindBelieveRunningLawDesireCertainBeliefCausesInterestResultsConditionsEvidenceActiveFavorsPsychologicalWelcomeSuggestionsPropositionsSelectAdaptedImportunate Book:Problems of Life and Mind Source: Problems of Life and Mind
“Some sort of belief in all-powerful supernatural beings is common, if not universal. A tendency to obey authority, perhaps especially in children, a tendency to believe what you're told, a tendency to fear your own death, a tendency to wish to see your loved ones who have died, to wish to see them again, a wish to understand where you came from, where the world came from, all these psychological predispositions, under the right cultural conditions, tend to lead to people believing in things for which there is no evidence.” PeopleIfsWorldBelieveChildrenBeliefWishPowerfulCommonConditionsAuthorityEvidenceUniversalDiedTendenciesPsychologicalLoved OnesSupernatural Beings Author:Richard Dawkins
“If we are to believe the evidence from clinical trials there are many effective pharmacological and psychological treatments for mental illness. Epidemiological data, on the other hand, says otherwise.” IfsBelieveHandsEvidenceIllnessTrialsMental IllnessPsychologicalDataTreatmentClinicalsClinical Trials Author:Richard Bentall
“You should not take the content of your intuitive response as evidence until you have submitted your psychological reaction to what I call cognitive psychotherapy. You should do what you can to learn as much as possible about the origin of your reaction.” ShouldEvidenceResponseReactionsPsychologicalIntuitiveCognitivePsychotherapy Author:Torbjorn Tannsjo
“Religious faith depends on a host of social, psychological and emotional factors that have little or nothing to do with probabilities, evidence and logic.” LittlesFaithSocialReligiousEmotionalDependsEvidenceLogicPsychologicalFactorsHostProbabilityReligious Faith Author:Michael Shermer