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
“We have been slow to recognize the degree to which religious faith perpetuates man's inhumanity to man.” — 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
“There is no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too reasonable.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It's simply untrue that religion provides the only framework for a universal morality. — 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
“The problem is that most people, most of the time, are desperate to believe ridiculous and divisive ideas for patently emotional reasons,and… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
The second commandment is "Thou shall not construct any graven images." Is this really the pinnacle of what we can achieve morally?… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Spirituality must be distinguished from religion—because people of every faith, and of none, have had the same sorts of spiritual experiences.” — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
If history reveals any categorical truth, it is that an insufficient taste for evidence regularly brings out the worst in us. Add… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
While the religious divisions in our world are self-evident, many people still imagine that religious conflict is always caused by a lack… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
It is still fashionable to believe that how you organize yourself religiously in this life may matter for eternity. Unless we can… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Although many things can be said in criticism of religious faith, there is no discounting its power. Millions among us, even now,… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Religious faith represents so uncompromising a misuse of the power of our minds that it forms a kind of perverse, cultural singularity… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“What one believes happens after death dictates much of what one believes about life, and this is why faith-based religion, in presuming… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
To speak specifically of our problem with the Muslim world, we are meandering into a genuine clash of civilizations, and we're deluding… — 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
Religious faith is the only area of discourse where immunity through conversation is considered noble . It's the only area of 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
The problem is not that religious people are stupid. It's not that religious fundamentalists are stupid. I happen to think that you… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
A kernel of truth lurks at the heart of religion, because spiritual experience, ethical behavior, and strong communities are essential for human… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
Missionaries in the developing world waste a lot of time and money (not to mention the goodwill of non-Christians) proselytizing to the… — 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
“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
“Norway, Iceland, Australia, Canada, Sweden, Switzerland, Belgium, Japan, the Netherlands, Denmark, and the United Kingdom are among the least religious societies on… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“I am often asked what will replace organized religion. The answer, I believe, is nothing and everything. Nothing need replace its ludicrous… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Our situation is this: most of the people in this world believe that the Creator of the universe has written a book.… — 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
“There seems, however, to be a problem with some of our more cherished beliefs about the world: they are leading us, inexorably,… — 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
You are using your own moral intuitions to authenticate the wisdom of the Bible - and then, in the next moment, you… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“Religious moderation springs from the fact that even the least educated person among us simply knows more about certain matters than anyone… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
I was actually already doing my Ph.D. in neuroscience when September 11 happened. 'The End Of Faith' is essentially what September 11… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
We will see that the greatest problem confronting civilization is not merely religious extremism: rather, it is the larger set of cultural… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
“It is time we acknowledged that no real foundation exists within the canons of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or any of our other… — Sam Harris Copy Share Image
My concern with religion is that it allows us by the millions to believe what only lunatics or idiots could believe on… — 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
“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
“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