Top 442 Skeptical Quotes & Sayings - Page 7

I believe anything that anyone tells me. I have found that that is the best way to go through life. When I was younger, I used to be more skeptical, but then I found out that most things were true. So I believe tabloids. I believe legends. I believe anything anyone tells me.

The best way to stay away from They is really simple. Stay with the people who have some passion. Stay with the people who know the truth. I like to find the They and turn them into We. I like to take the Theys and herd them. People that are skeptical, the Theys, I can bring them to We as much as I can.

Ever since Sir Isaac Newton's times, scientists have worked in the same sort of way: They show a great respect for experiment and observation, They don't cherry pick data, They take a skeptical approach to what they do. And then scientists work together to get a consensus as to what should be believed And that generates very reliable knowledge and that reliable knowledge drives innovation

To a certain extent all philosophers have been involved in a systematic questioning that undermines confidence and certainty. Philosophy as a whole unleashed skeptical forces which, outside of the tightly controlled environment of a rigorous philosophical debate, led a lot of people to throw their hands up in despair and think 'what's the point?'. A lot of the public perception of philosophy is that it leaves you with no answers, and more confused than you were at the beginning.

I am too inquisitive, too skeptical, too arrogant, to let myself be satisfied with an obvious and crass solution of things. God is such an obvious and crass solution; a solution which is a sheer indelicacy to us thinkers - at bottom He is really nothing but a coarse commandment against us: ye shall not think!

In Kafka we have the modern mind, seemingly self-sufficient, intelligent, skeptical, ironical, splendidly trained for the great game of pretending that the world it comprehends in sterilized sobriety is the only and ultimate real one – yet a mind living in sin with the soul of Abraham. Thus he knows Two things at once, and both with equal assurance: that there is no God, and that there must be God.

History can come in handy. If you were born yesterday, with no knowledge of the past, you might easily accept whatever the government tells you. But knowing a bit of history--while it would not absolutely prove the government was lying in a given instance--might make you skeptical, lead you to ask questions, make it more likely that you would find out the truth.

A good rule of thumb is as follows: If the numbers come from somebody wearing a tie (Wall Street economist or analyst, industry public relations department, captive think tank academic and so on), you ought to be very skeptical. By design messages from these people are intended to move markets, move merchandise and/or move public policy and are not a comment on the state of the physical universe.

I'm skeptical about even educating voters as a chance for being successful. You know, when we look at what people retain from high school a year after they've graduated, they've forgotten most everything about history and civics and everything, and I think the main worry here is that because your individual vote counts for so little, you just don't have a strong incentive to invest in the knowledge, to retain the knowledge, to process information in a rational way.

I don't look at Putin as a friend. I don't look at Russia. And I am very skeptical of what they're doing, their intentions. There are a lot of good people in Russia that don't have any say whatsoever. And they're starting to basically express their frustration, and starting marching, and hopefully getting their point across. So we've got to make sure that we put the hurt on the oligarchs, all the money, the way the money flows through Russia, and the people that benefit by it.

By the time of Andi Parhamovich death, I had already grown skeptical of the Iraq war. What her death made me realize was what the actual price was. Going through that kind of loss and seeing how devastating it was on her family and friends made me decide that I was only going to write about things that I really believed in. I'm not going to compromise on that.

A new product, technology, or innovation - such as Bitcoin - has the potential to give rise both to frauds and high-risk investment opportunities. Potential investors can be easily enticed with the promise of high returns in a new investment space and also may be less skeptical when assessing something novel, new, and cutting-edge.

Marrying the right girl is even more imperative today than it was when I was 23 years old because it's so much harder to get on as an imaginative writer like me now. You need to have somebody who believes in what you're doing and who never is skeptical about what you're doing. My wife thought it was a great thing for me to be a writer because in practical terms it freed her to do what she wanted to do, which was work.

Market bashers ... might understand the claim that in some particular field, markets required no intervention--though they'd be skeptical--but the notion that, on general principle, complex systems ran themselves just fine without benign intervention seemed like it could only be the product of a quasi-religious faith. ... Of course, this gets things almost precisely backwards. It is the idea that all order must be explained by a functioning mind at the helm, not its denial, that has the closet affinity to the religious instinct.

In my twenties I would be skeptical of a bad haircut, but once you turn thirty it's more about whether he a nice person and does he open the door for me. Once you turn thirty-five, it's more about would he make a good father. And even if you're just liking somebody and digging on someone, I think you can't help but think in those terms.

Fiction seems to be more effective at changing beliefs than nonfiction, which is designed to persuade through argument and evidence. Studies show that when we read nonfiction, we read with our shields up. We are critical and skeptical. But when we are absorbed in a story, we drop our intellectual guard. We are moved emotionally, and this seems to make us rubbery and easy to shape.

And they are much more skeptical of the very idea of having immigration limits, whereas the public - again, independents and Democrats, as well as Republicans, although not necessarily all in the same proportions - have a much stronger sense of the American government and American law having responsibility to Americans specifically rather than to people around the world. So the polarization is up versus down, not really right versus left.

You were in Sweden?" Boomer asked. "No," I said. "The trip got called off at the last minute. Because of political the unrest" "In Sweden?" Priya seemed skeptical. "Yeah-isn't it strange how the Times isn't covering it? Half the country's on strike because of that thing the crown prince said about Pippi Longstocking Which means no meatballs for Christmas, if you know what I mean." "That's so sad!" Boomer said.

It is this idea 'decency' should be attached to wealth -and 'indecency'' to poverty - that forms the core of one strand of skeptical complaint against the modern status-ideal. Why should failure to make money be taken as a sign of an unconditionally flawed human being rather than of a fiasco in one particular area if the far larger, more multifaceted, project of leading a good life? Why should both wealth and poverty be read as the predominant guides to an individual's morals ?

If we're not vigilant foreign countries can have an impact on the political debate in the United States in ways that might not have been true 10, 20, 30 years ago in - in part because of the way news is transmitted and in part because so many people are skeptical of mainstream news organizations that - everything's true and everything's false.

Moral certainty is always a sign of cultural inferiority. The more uncivilized the man, the surer he is that he knows precisely what is right and what is wrong. All human progress, even in morals, has been the work of men who have doubted the current moral values, not of men who have whooped them up and tried to enforce them. The truly civilized man is always skeptical and tolerant.

Doubt is my boon companion, the faithful St. Bernard ever at my side. Whether writing essays or just going about daily life, I am constantly second-guessing myself. My mind is filled with 'yes, buts,' 'so whats?' and other skeptical rejoinders. I am forever monitoring myself for traces of folly, insensitivity, arrogance, false humility, cruelty, stupidity, immaturity and, guess what, I keep finding examples. Age has not made me wiser, except maybe in retrospect.

Basically, the Buddhist attitude is that you should not accept certain things through sheer faith. And for that you need a skeptical attitude. Buddha himself made this clear to his followers. He said you should not accept those things I taught out of respect for me, but rather through investigation by yourself.

People try to apply directly results from the cognitive neurosciences directly to classroom practice and I have to tell you I am very skeptical about the exercise. We don't know very much about how the brain works - we don't even know how you remember to write your name.

It was so enticing from the beginning to be this woman who was entrenched in The Flash's world. She's not there to just tell him what a great job he's doing, she's also there to push him further and help him to be the best that he can be. She's often the first person to be a little bit skeptical of him, which is kind of nice. She really challenges him.

It would be an instructive exercise for the skeptical reader to try to frame a definition of taxation which does not also include theft. Like the robber, the State demands money at the equivalent of gunpoint; if the taxpayer refuses to pay, his assets are seized by force, and if he should resist such depredation, he will be arrested or shot if he should continue to resist.

I think women are much more open to new ideas but approach a line more from a more personal and skeptical place - you need to seduce them into your clothes, whereas most men just like to be told what they should be wearing. Women are a bit like cats and men like dogs in that respect when it comes to clothes.

I think people were very skeptical always when they said, "Oh docs, they don't work. When you make depressing docs that don't have 'save this or save that,' they just can't do well." I fought very hard to say, "No. This is important. I think people care and I think it's interesting." I hope people go see it.

I do worry about the press and a President Trump. You know, I think it's dangerous the entire de-legitimization that he's engaged in against all of the media because the people, as much as it's fun to hate us, they do need us. You know, they need good, strong skeptical journalists to be covering whoever it is, whether it's Barack Obama or President Donald Trump.

It's natural to be skeptical of a story like Noah. However, the greatest miracle in the Bible is not Noah and the flood. The greatest miracle in the Bible is recorded in the first verse: "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth." If that miracle is true, then every miracle in the Bible is at least possible (including Noah's Ark). If God created the universe, then He can do whatever He wants inside it.

An unconscious people, an indoctrinated people, a people fed only partisan information and opinion that confirm their own bias, a people made morbidly obese in mind and spirit by the junk food of propaganda is less inclined to put up a fight, ask questions and be skeptical. And just as a democracy can die of too many lies, that kind of orthodoxy can kill us, too.

One might think of investment managers as astronomers and CEOs as astronauts. The two roles are radically different with distinct personality traits. Like astronomers, investment managers tend to be introverted, skeptical, and very analytical. CEOs, like astronauts, are the exact opposite, typically being extroverts, optimists, and, well, leaders.

This does not mean that the profession is about to abandon Darwin forever or indorse [sic] my views publicly. The situation remains much as it was: the inner circles are full of doubt, but the public utterances are confident. The doubts may be greater now and the confidence less serene, but it will be a long time before the public is given the full dark picture. There is still need for a dissenting voice, a devil's advocate, a skeptical whistle-blower.

I've been fighting for nine years and in the beginning there was a lot of backlash and non-supporters of women fighters. We could never find many women fighters and when we did sometimes we were put on the card for the wrong reasons. It was frustrating. When I'd go train in gyms, it seemed like the guys at the gym were skeptical and didn't think I was as serious as they were because I was a woman, but today things are different.

Prejudice is of ready application in the emergency; it previously engages the mind in a steady course of wisdom and virtue, and does not leave the man hesitating in the moment of decision, skeptical, puzzled and unresolved. Prejudice renders a man's virtue his habit; and not a series of unconnected acts. Through past prejudice, his duty becomes part of his nature.

Most women who are harassed don't come forward, they don't complain because they're skeptical of the process, or they don't think anything is going to come of it if they are found to have been harassed. We know from some very public cases that sexual assault isn't always punished even by the courts in the way that they should be. So, we have got to figure out, how are we going to embed women's experiences in the processes, so that they trust the processes, that there are fair investigations that get to the truth, and then there is appropriate punishment when abuse occurs?

Both my parents were agnostic. My mother was kind of a Buddhist. She had some spiritual tendencies, but they were kind of flaky - New Agey, you know? Which is partly why I'm suspicious of that sort of thing. I'm skeptical of any spiritual practice that doesn't involve other people and doesn't involve some sort of consistent tradition.

As a leader it is your job to protect the missional integrity of the Jesus gathering to which you have been called. It is your responsibility to see to it that the church under your care continues as a gathering of people in process; a place where the curious, the unconvinced, the skeptical, the used-to-believe and the broken, as well as the committed, informed and sold-out come together around Peter's declaration that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God.

I like the idea of reincarnation. I'm not a true believer, but I think the idea is beautiful, that life just doesn't stop. For soulmates, it's the term that I'm a little bit skeptical of. As soon as you put a label on something, it seems like that's it, you're done. Obviously I believe in love and making it last forever, but what's beautiful about that is you don't know if it's going to last forever. When you don't know that this is it, you, I think, enjoy it more.

What the world wants, what the world is waiting for, is not Modern Poetry or Classical Poetry or Neo-Classical Poetry - but Good Poetry. And the dreadful disreputable doubt, which stirs in my own skeptical mind, is doubt about whether it would really matter much what style a poet chose to write in, in any period, as long as he wrote Good poetry.

Most brain scientists have not taught 4th grade, and don't know very much about the classroom, even though they might study learning in some detail. Most education professionals, who often know a tremendous amount about the classroom, don't know much about the brain. That is one of the reasons why I am so skeptical about applying brain findings to the classroom.

There's a bigger question again about how to do prevention. It's not simply about putting out the early warning. The early warning was put out on Abyei; everybody knew that this was coming. This was intentional, and still it happened. So this idea that we fail to stop these things because there's not awareness about them, or that we need better early warning information, I'm increasingly skeptical of. I think it's about how you move that information into the policy process.

What the Republican National Committee did to Ron Paul was the height of rudeness and stupidity for this reason: Why would you alienate an individual who has the ability to attract a new generation of voters, who are already skeptical of your institution but are willing to at least listen through the vehicle of this individual and the words that he is saying? Why would you alienate them, get on the floor and not let them speak? Not have his name go up on the board and see the number of electoral votes that he receives? This is crazy!

I'm skeptical that the novel will be "re­invented." If you start thinking about a medical textbook or something, then, yes, I think that's ripe for reinvention. You can imagine animations of a beating heart. But I think the novel will thrive in its current form. That doesn't mean that there won't be new narrative inventions as well. But I don't think they'll displace the novel.

I try to encourage people to think for themselves, to question standard assumptions... Don't take assumptions for granted. Begin by taking a skeptical attitude toward anything that is conventional wisdom. Make it justify itself. It usually can't. Be willing to ask questions about what is taken for granted. Try to think things through for yourself.

I was very skeptical when he began, and there have been moments where I think he's shown absolute leadership, and I think the jury is out, still out. I haven't made any final decisions on him, but I've been surprised at times. I agree with him about one thing absolutely - George W. Bush said recently that he believed in prayer and exercise. So do I.

No justification of virtue will enable a man to be virtuous. Without the aid of trained emotions the intellect is powerless against the animal organism. I had sooner play cards against a man who was quite skeptical about ethics, but bred to believe that ‘a gentleman does not cheat’, than against an irreproachable moral philosopher who had been brought up among sharpers.

It’s a similar feeling from being in a community of punk rockers as a teenager and the feeling I still get today when I’m in a community of skeptical scientists. The idea with both is that you challenge authority, you challenge the dogma. You challenge the doctrine in order to make progress. The thrill of science is the process. It’s a social process. It’s a process of collective discovery. It’s debate, it’s experimentation and it’s verification of claims that might be false. It’s the greatest foundation for a society.

We should realize that, if [Socrates] demanded that the wisest men should rule, he clearly stressed that he did not mean the learned men; in fact, he was skeptical of all professional learnedness, whether it was that of the philosophers or of the learned men of his own generation, the Sophists. The wisdom he meant was of a different kind. It was simply the realization: how little do I know! Those who did not know this, he taught, knew nothing at all. This is the true scientific spirit.

Contemporary poets are skeptical and suspicious even, or perhaps especially, about themselves. They publicly confess to being poets only reluctantly, as if they were a little ashamed of it. But in our clamorous times it's much easier to acknowledge your faults, at least if they're attractively packaged, than to recognize your own merits, since these are hidden deeper and you never quite believe in them yourself.

When you write a business fable, people get caught up in the story and don't get judgmental about what you're teaching them. If you're teaching a bunch of concepts, people get skeptical and say, 'Where'd you get that research?' But if you tell them a story, they get caught up in it while they learn.

Think for yourself, and believe in yourself. Keep your skeptical antennae tuned in and in good working order at all times. We are free to develop our own hypotheses, which should be based in available evidence. When it comes to faith, have faith in yourself. And don't forget to love, laugh, be kind to each other. Don't take things so seriously, especially yourself. If the universe is a cosmic joke, remember to giggle. And remember to be astonished.

Incidentally, when we're faced with a "prove or disprove," we're usually better off trying first to disprove with a counterexample, for two reasons: A disproof is potentially easier (we need just one counterexample); and nitpicking arouses our creative juices. Even if the given assertion is true, our search for a counterexample often leads to a proof, as soon as we see why a counterexample is impossible. Besides, it's healthy to be skeptical.

No matter where the skeptical thought originates, or how it gets access to our minds, we see at once that it flattens the level of life and every aspiration. It makes our character less vigorous. The gospel is not simply a philosophy of religion or law of life, but it is an apocalypse, showing the heavens to our thought, and so bringing its spiritual benedictions to every heart and life.

A lot of the book [The Yoga of Max's Discontent] is about karma and rebirth. Things like that are very attuned to my life as an Indian, but when I approach it from a perspective of a Westerner, then I have a skeptical, yet kind of novice view on it. I think that choice really liberated the story to be its own story. A lot of the conclusions that Max reaches on his own are not mine at all. So, I think that allowed the story to take on its own momentum, to have its own propulsive force.

When you buy a used car, you kick the tires, you look at the odometer, you open up the hood. If you do not feel yourself an expert in automobile engines, you bring a friend who is. And you do this with something as unimportant as an automobile. But on the issues of the transcendent, of ethics, of morals, of the origins of the world, of the nature of human beings, on those issues should we not insist upon at least equally skeptical scrutiny?

I don't need a receipt for a doughnut. I'll just give you the money, and you give me the doughnut. End of transaction! We don't need to bring ink and paper into this! I can't imagine a scenario where I'd have to prove that I bought a doughnut. Some skeptical friend...'Don't even act like I didn't buy that doughnut! I've got the documentation right here! Oh, wait, it's back home, in the file. Under d...for doughnut.'

I find myself skeptical of music that forces you to have a certain experience, emotional reaction, or specific constructive arc of experience. But performers should still take care of that, to a certain extent - how does it add up? What you want from performance, because we're all in a room together, is that somehow we've gotten somewhere at the end, together. You could call that a sense of narrative, but it's not so obvious how that happens. One way it happens is by everyone caring about it happening.

In terms of being a kind of popular artist figure and knowing how isolating that is, and knowing what it feels like to be skeptical of people, and to be taken advantage of, especially by your friends. That's a hard to pill to swallow, and we've been through that together, or watched each other go through it. It helps to have somebody that close to you who can relate. I can say with some confidence that I feel like Sky saved my life.

I regard myself as a religious... the temper of my mind as religious, and because I regard the temper of my mind as religious, I am profoundly skeptical about any form of human authority, any form of human self-importance.