We rely on faith only in the context of claims for which there is no sufficient sensory or logical evidence. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Atheism is nothing more than the noises reasonable people make when in the presence of religious dogma. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Religious moderation is the product of secular knowledge and scriptural ignorance. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Faith does not offer a strong link between our beliefs and actual states of the world. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Faith is like a pickpocket who loans a person his own money on generous terms.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Atheism is not a philosophy; it is not even a view of the world; it is simply an admission of the obvious.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“There is no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
When the stakes are this high- when calling God by the right name can make the difference between eternal happiness and eternal… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
What I'm asking you to entertain is that there is nothing we need to believe on insufficient evidence in order to have… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Some ... sexist evil probably predates religion and can be ascribed to our biology, but there is no question that religion promulgates… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
[I]t is difficult to imagine a set of beliefs more suggestive of mental illness than those that lie at the heart of… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The only thing that guarantees an open-ended collaboration among human beings, the only thing that guarantees that this project is truly open-ended,… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Religion raises the stakes of human conflict much higher than tribalism, racism, or politics ever can, as it is the only form… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Countries with high levels of atheism are . . . the most charitable both in terms of the percentage of their wealth… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The problem with religion, because it's been sheltered from criticism, is that it allows people to believe en masse what only idiots… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
In fact, "atheism" is a term that should not even exist. No one ever needs to identify himself as a "non-astrologer" or… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
While believing strongly, without evidence, is considered a mark of madness or stupidity in any other area of our lives, faith in… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
About 120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. If our… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It is terrible that we all die and lose everything we love; it is doubly terrible that so many human beings suffer… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Our moral reasoning is plagued by two illusions. The first illusion can be called the wag-the-dog illusion: We believe that our own… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Atheism is not a philosophy; it is not even a view of the world; it is simply an admission of the obvious.… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Imagine a world in which generations of human beings come to believe that certain films were made by God or that specific… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“One of the most pernicious effects of religion is that it tends to divorce morality from the reality of human and animal… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“It is time we admitted, from kings and presidents on down, that there is no evidence that any of our books was… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“It is also worth noting that one can obtain a Ph.D. in any branch of science for no other purpose than to… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Advance warning of Katrina's path was wrested from mute Nature by meteorological calculations and satellite imagery. God told no one of His… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Atheism is not a philosophy; it is not even a view of the world; it is simply an admission of the obvious.… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
We have a choice. We have two options as human beings. We have a choice between conversation and war. That's it. Conversation… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
What we do in every other area of our lives (other than religion), is, rather than respect somebody's beliefs, we evaluate their… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Atheism is not a philosophy; it is not even a view of the world; it is simply a refusal to deny the… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“We have barely emerged from centuries of barbarism. It's not a surprise that there are shocking inequities in this world. It is… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It is taboo in our society to criticize a persons religious faith... these taboos are offensive, deeply unreasonable, but worse than that,… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
If faith is what you have to go on, if faith is the link between your beliefs and the world at large,… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It is safe to say that almost every person living in New Orleans at the moment Hurricane Katrina struck shared your belief… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The problem I want to talk to you about tonight is the problem of belief. What does it mean to believe? We… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
To speak plainly and truthfully about the state of our world - to say, for instance, that the Bible and the Koran… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Moderates in every faith are obliged to loosely interpret (or simply ignore) much of their canons in the interests of living in the modern… — Sam Harris Copy Share
There is no question but that nominally religious scientists like Francis Collins and Kenneth R. Miller are doing lasting harm to our discourse by… — Sam Harris Copy Share
We have Christians against Muslims against Jews, and no matter how liberal your theology, merely identifying yourself as a Christian or a Jew lends… — Sam Harris Copy Share
“Your principal concern appears to be that the Creator of the universe will take offense at something people do while naked. This prudery of… — Sam Harris Copy Share
“As manuals for contemplative understanding, the Bible and the Koran are worse than useless. Whatever wisdom can be found in their pages is never… — Sam Harris Copy Share
About 120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. If our polls are… — Sam Harris Copy Share
“If your golf instructor were to insist that you shave your head, sleep no more than four hours each night, renounce sex, and subsist… — Sam Harris Copy Share
The fact that one can lose one's sense of self in an ocean of tranquility does not mean that one's consciousness is immaterial or… — Sam Harris Copy Share
The second commandment is "Thou shall not construct any graven images." Is this really the pinnacle of what we can achieve morally? The second… — Sam Harris Copy Share
“But the reality of consciousness appears irreducible. Only consciousness can know itself—and directly, through first-person experience.” — Sam Harris Copy Share
“Whether or not one likes Huntington's formulation, one thing is clear: the evil that has finally reached our shores is not merely the evil… — Sam Harris Copy Share
Muslim moderates, wherever they are, must be given every tool necessary to win a war of ideas with their co-religionists. Otherwise, we will have… — Sam Harris Copy Share
The idea that any one of our religions represents the infallible word of the One True God requires an encyclopedic ignorance of history, mythology,… — Sam Harris Copy Share
“What could possibly cause billions of human beings to reconsider their religious beliefs? And yet, it is obvious that an utter revolution in our… — Sam Harris Copy Share