The whole point of faith, in fact, is to believe regardless of the evidence, which is the very antithesis of science. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
Being a skeptic just means being rational and empirical: thinking and seeing before believing. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
There is a significant difference between having no belief in a God and believing there is no God. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
I’m a skeptic not because I do not want to believe, but because I want to know. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
People believe in God because we are pattern-seeking, storytelling, mythmaking, religious, moral animals. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
Ever since college, I have been a libertarian - socially liberal and fiscally conservative. I believe in individual liberty and personal responsibility. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
Smart people believe weird things because they are skilled at defending beliefs they arrived at for non-smart reasons. — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
Believing that the rustle in the grass is a dangerous predator when it is only the wind does not cost much, but… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
People who espouse Intelligent Design believe nature is so complex as to require an intelligent designer-God. Similarly, liberals believe the economy is… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
...evolution is not a religious tenet, to which one swears allegiance or belief as a matter of faith.. It is a factual… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
I’m a skeptic not because I do not want to believe, but because I want to know. How can we tell the… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
Belief is the natural state of things. It is the default option. We just believe. We believe all sorts of things. Belief… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
We want to be special. We want our place in the cosmos to be central. We want evolution-even godless evolution-to have been… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
I am an atheist. There, I said it. Are you happy, all you atheists out there who have remonstrated with me for… — Michael Shermer Copy Share Image
I’m a skeptic not because I do not want to believe, but because I want to know. — Michael Shermer Copy Share
“According to Dembski, for example, “scientific creationism has prior religious commitments whereas intelligent design does not.” — Michael Shermer Copy Share
The first-cause and prime-mover argument, brilliantly proffered by St. Thomas Aquinas in the fourteenth century (and brilliantly refuted by David Hume in the eighteenth… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
“Mind is just a word we use to describe neural activity in the brain. No brain, no mind. We know this because if a… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
Through no divine design or cosmic plan, we have inherited the mantle of life's caretaker on the earth, the only home we have ever… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
I always accepted the libertarian position of minimum regulation in the sale and use of firearms because I placed guns under the beneficial rubric… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
If spirituality is the sense of awe and humility in the face of the creation, what could be more awesome and humbling than the… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
We know evolution happened not because of transitional fossils such as A. natans but because of the convergence of evidence from such diverse fields… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
“Yet basically, libertarians are for freedom and liberty for individuals, while recognizing that in order to be free we must also be protected. Your… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
Scientists like Bjorn Lomborg in The Skeptical Environmentalist have, in my opinion, properly nailed environmental extremists for these exaggerated scenarios. — Michael Shermer Copy Share
When religious believers invoke miracles and acts of creation ex nihilo, that is the end of the search for them, whereas for scientists, the… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
Darwin matters because evolution matters. Evolution matters because science matters. Science matters because it is the preeminent story of our age, an epic saga… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
What can be more soul shaking than peering through a 100-inch telescope at a distant galaxy, holding a 100-million-year-old fossil or a 500,000-year-old stone… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
Skepticism is not a position that you stake out ahead of time and stick to no matter what. — Michael Shermer Copy Share
“Neuroscientist David Comings drew out the larger implications of such hallucinations for the relationship between our rational and spiritual brains: The psychedelic drugs like… — Michael Shermer Copy Share
