Christians hold that their faith does good, but other faiths do harm. At any rate, they hold this about the Communist faith. What I wish to maintain is that all faiths do harm. We may define “faith” as a firm belief in something for which there is no evidence. Where there is evidence, no one speaks of “faith”. We do not speak of faith that two and two are four or that the earth is round. We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence. Selections of sayings about christianity and the relationship of science and religion.
Christians hold that their faith does good, but other faiths do harm. At any rate, they hold this about the Communist faith. What I wish to maintain is that all faiths do harm. We may define “faith” as a firm belief in something for which there is no evidence. Where there is evidence, no one speaks of “faith”. We do not speak of faith that two and two are four or that the earth is round. We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence. Selections of sayings about christianity and the relationship of science and religion.
George Eliot on Evangelism and Truth
Where is that Goshen of mediocrity in which a smattering of science and learning will pass for profound instruction, where platitudes will be accepted as wisdom, bigoted narrowness as holy zeal, unctuous egoism as God-given piety?
Minds fettered by this doctrine no longer inquire concerning a proposition whether it is attested by sufficient evidence, but whether it accords with scripture. They do not search for facts as such, but for facts that will bear out their doctrine. It is easy to see that this mental habit blunts not only the perception of truth, but the sense of truthfulness, and that the man whose faith drives him into fallacies treads close upon the precipice of falsehood… So long as a belief in propositions is regarded as indispensable to salvation, the pursuit of truth as such is not possible.
George Eliot, Westminster Review, on Dr John Cumming, evangelist
Christians hold that their faith does good, but other faiths do harm. At any rate, they hold this about the Communist faith. What I wish to maintain is that all faiths do harm. We may define “faith” as a firm belief in something for which there is no evidence. Where there is evidence, no one speaks of “faith”. We do not speak of faith that two and two are four or that the earth is round. We only speak of faith when we wish to substitute emotion for evidence.
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The character and sufferings of the early Christians are mendaciously represented, the qualities of the Romans are miserably slandered, the utter viciousness of the mass of the Christians after Constantine is concealed, the triumph of Christianity is described as spiritual and not a word said about the score of imperial decrees which forced it upon the Romans, and the subsequent lapse into barbarism is concealed under vague and untruthful generalities… This tradition of lying is carried over the whole Christian Era… There is hardly a single aspect of the history of the last nineteen centuries as to which Christian literature is not radically untruthful.
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There’s a widely held perception that science is ’too hard’ for ordinary people. We can see this reflected in the statistic that only around 10 per cent of American high school students ever opt for a course in physics. What makes science too hard for Americans? What happened to the American genius for science, technical innovation and hard work? Americans once took enormous pride in their inventors, who pioneered the telegraph, telephone, electric light, phonograph, automobile and airplane. Except for computers, all that seems a thing of the past. Where did all that Yankee ingenuity go?
