120 million of us place the big bang 2,500 years after the Babylonians and Sumerians learned to brew beer. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Faith is like a pockpocket who loans a person his own money on generous terms.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“We have been slow to recognize the degree to which religious faith perpetuates man's inhumanity to man.” — 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
It is utterly astonishing how ordinary a book can be and still be thought the product of omniscience. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It's simply untrue that religion provides the only framework for a universal morality. — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Because most religions offer no valid mechanism by which their core beliefs can be tested and revised, each new generation of believers… — 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
“Faith is the mortar that fills the cracks in the evidence and the gaps in the logic, and thus it is faith… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
On the subject of religious belief, we relax standards of reasonableness and evidence that we rely on in every other area of… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The position of the Muslim community in the face of all provocations seems to be: Islam is a religion of peace, and… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“The concessions we have made to religious faith - to the idea that belief can be sanctified by something other than evidence… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Religion is nothing more than bad concepts held in place of good ones for all time. It is denial - at once… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Religious moderation, insofar as it represents an attempt to hold on to what is still serviceable in orthodox religion, closes the door… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
And while Protestant reformers broke with Rome on a variety of counts, their treatment of their fellow human beings was no less… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The idea, therefore, that religious faith is somehow a sacred human convention—distinguished, as it is, both by the extravagance of its claims… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“What is the alternative to religion as we know it? As it turns out, this is the wrong question to ask. Chemistry… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Consider the case of alchemy: it fascinated human beings for over a thousand years, and yet anyone who seriously claims to be… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The usefulness of religion - the fact that it gives life meaning, that it makes people feel good - is not an… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“For many years, I have been a vocal critic of religion, and I won’t ride the same hobbyhorse here. I hope that… — 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
God is great"). Conversations about the practical impossibility of God's existence and the science-based irrationality of an afterlife slid seamlessly into xenophobia… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Countries with high levels of atheism are also the most charitable both in terms of the percentage of their wealth they devote… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“The fact that the universe is illuminated where you stand—that your thoughts and moods and sensations have a qualitative character in this… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“If religion addresses a genuine sphere of understanding and human necessity, then it should be susceptible to progress; its doctrines should become… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Indeed, religion allows people to imagine that their concerns are moral when they are highly immoral - that is, when pressing these… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Indeed, religion is as much a living spring of violence today as it was at any time in the past. The recent… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Man is manifestly not the measure of all things. This universe is shot through with mystery. The very fact of its being,… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“The idea that any one of our religions represents the infallible word of the One True God requires an encyclopedic ignorance of… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Given the link between belief and action, it is clear that we can no more tolerate a diversity of religious beliefs than… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
While liberals are leery of religious fundamentalism in general, they consistently imagine that all religions at their core teach the same thing… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“The fact that faith has motivated many people to do good things does not suggest that faith is itself a necessary (or… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
While religious tolerance is surely better than religious war, tolerance is not without its liabilities. Our fear of provoking religious hatred has… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
I think when you say to someone You are fool not to believe in evolution or a fool to believe the universe… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“If there is any kernel of truth in the religions we so deplore,and they are just a carnival of errors,the truth is… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“The truth, however, is that the conflict between religion and science is unavoidable. The success of science often comes at the expense… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Within a religious framework, a belief in free will supports the notion of sin—which seems to justify not only harsh punishment in… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The perpetrators of the Inquisition - the torturers, informers, and those who commanded their actions - were ecclesiastics of one rank or… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
When considering the truth of a proposition, one is either engaged in an honest appraisal of the evidence and logical arguments, or… — 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