We need to let our children grow up to face the world armed with knowledge, with much more knowledge than we ourselves had at their age. It is scary, but the alternative is worse.
Daniel DennettRead
Religion is defined as social systems whose participants avow a supernatural agent or agents whose approval is to be sought.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Religion involves social systems where participants believe in supernatural beings and seek their approval.
Daniel Dennett's quote defines religion as a societal construct where individuals acknowledge and engage with supernatural entities. It emphasizes the communal aspect of religious belief, highlighting that religion is not just a personal experience but a collective one, where group dynamics and social expectations play significant roles in how people perceive and seek approval from these higher powers.
Themes
ReligionBeliefSupernaturalSocial SystemsApproval
In practice
Example use cases
In a discussion about the role of religion in society during a community meeting.
More from Daniel Dennett
All quotes βPhilosophers are never quite sure what they are talking about - about what the issues really are - and so often it takes them rather a long time to recognize that someone with a somewhat different approach (or destination, or starting point) is making a contribution.
Daniel DennettRead
Words have a genealogy and it's easier to trace the evolution of a single word than the evolution of a language.
Daniel DennettRead
The secret of happiness is: Find something more important than you are and dedicate your life to it.
Daniel DennettRead
Some philosophers can't bear to say simple things, like "Suppose a dog bites a man." They feel obliged instead to say, "Suppose a dog d bites a man m at time t," thereby demonstrating their unshakable commitment to logical rigor, even though they don't go on to manipulate any formulae involving d, m, and t.
Daniel DennettRead
As every scuba diver knows, panic is your worst enemy: when it hits, your mind starts to thrash and you are likely to do something really stupid and self-destructive.
Daniel DennettRead
Similar quotes
This living, this living, this living Was never a project of mine.
Dorothy ParkerRead
The mad sometimes drilled holes in their own heads to let the demons out. To relieve the pressure of thoughts they could no longer bear. Jude understood the impulse. Each beat of his heart was a fresh and staggering blow felt in the nerves behind his eyes and in his temples. Punishing evidence of life.
Joe HillRead
It has always happened that tyrants, in order to strengthen their power, have made every effort to train their people not only in obedience and servility toward themselves, but also in adoration.
Etienne De La BoetieRead
I was born into the world as the king of truth for the salvation of the world.
BuddhaRead
I think that wealthy white people would like to have a country that resembles the Fifties, when all the minorities were tucked away in ghettos and paid in very low wages but on the surface it was very bright and shiny and free and the rest of the world would look on it longingly.
Alice WalkerRead
...in respect of riches, no citizen shall ever be wealthy enough to buy another, and none poor enough to be forced to sell himself.
Jean-Jacques RousseauRead