“In that world, you'll be able to rise in the morning with the spirit you had known in your childhood: that spirit of eagerness, adventure and certainty which comes from dealing with a rational universe.” WorldAbleSpiritReligionUniverseKnownMorningChildhoodAdventureRationalCertaintyYour ChildrenEagerness Book:Atlas Shrugged Source: Atlas Shrugged
“The necessary precondition for the birth of science as we know it is, it would seem, the diffusion through society of the belief that the universe is both rational and contingent. Such a belief is the presupposition of modern science and cannot by any conceivable argument be a product of science. One has to ask: Upon what is this belief founded?” KnowsSeemsUniverseAsksBeliefModernProductsBirthArgumentRationalModern ScienceDiffusion Book:Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture Source: Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel and Western Culture
“When I was a kid, I thought that if everyone looked up the way I did then everyone would want to study the universe just like me - how could they not? This naiveté is what tells me that my interest was more a calling than a rational comparative assessment about what to be when I grew up.” IfsWayWantKidsUniverseInterestStudyGrewCallingGrew UpLike MeRationalAssessment Author:Neil deGrasse Tyson
“What is rational is actual and what is actual is rational. On this conviction the plain man like the philosopher takes his stand,and from it philosophy starts in its study of the universe of mind as well as the universe of nature.” MenMindWellsReasonPhilosophyRealityUniverseStudyPhilosophicalPhilosopherConvictionRationalRealism Book:Philosophy of right Source: Philosophy of right
“Since the Greeks, Western man has believed that Being, all Being, is intelligible, that there is a reason for everythingand that the cosmos is, finally, intelligible. The Oriental, on the other hand, has accepted his existence within a universe that would appear to be meaningless, to the rational Western mind, and has lived with this meaninglessness. Hence the artistic form that seems natural to the Oriental is one that is just as formless or formal, as irrational, as life itself.” MenMindReasonHandsSeemsFormUniverseNaturalExistenceWesternAcceptedRationalArtisticGreekCosmosMeaninglessIrrationalFormalMeaninglessness Author:William Barrett
“The visible universe is subject to quantification, and is so by necessity. … Between you and me only reason will be the judge … since you proceed according to the rational method, so shall I. … I will also give reason and take it. … This generation has an innate vice. It can’t accept anything that has been discovered by a contemporary!” GivingHas BeensReasonUniverseAcceptingGenerationsSubjectsJudgingMethodVicesContemporaryRationalVisibleInnateThis GenerationBetween You And Me Author:Adelard of Bath
“Rational thinking which is free from assumptions ends therefore in mysticism. To relate oneself in the spirit of reverence for life to the multiform manifestations of the will-to-live which together constitute the world is ethical mysticism. All profound world-view is mysticism, the essence of which is just this: that out of my unsophisticated and naïve existence in the world there comes, as a result of thought about self and the world, spiritual self-devotion to the mysterious infinite Will which is continuously manifested in the universe.” ThinkingWorldEndsSelfTogetherSpiritualSpiritUniverseResultsViewsExistenceEssenceInfiniteProfoundOneselfDevotionRationalMysteriousRelateManifestationAssumptionMysticismEthicalReverenceRational ThinkingWorld ViewReverence For LifeWill To Live Author:Albert Schweitzer
“I think we have a free will, and at the same moment we don't. We have to live with that. It doesn't make sense intellectually, but that's because our intellect is always trying to come up with a logical, rational explanation for things. To do that, it puts labels on things. But once you label something, you've got twoness. You've got the label, and you've got what you're labeling. And there is only oneness in the universe, even though we artificially believe in twoness.” ThinkingTryingBelieveMomentsUniverseCome UpIntellectRationalOnenessLabelsMake SenseExplanationThings To DoLogicalFree WillAlways TryingLabeling Author:Wayne Dyer