How can you take seriously someone who likes to believe something because he finds it 'comforting'?
Interpretation
This quote questions the validity of beliefs based merely on their comforting nature.
Richard Dawkins critiques the tendency of individuals to adopt beliefs not based on evidence or truth, but for the sake of emotional comfort. He suggests that such an approach to belief undermines rational thought and genuine understanding, as it prioritizes personal comfort over objective reality.
In practice
During a debate about the importance of scientific evidence in decision-making.
No educated person believes the Adam and Eve myth nowadays, but it's surprising how many parents think that it's somehow fun to pass on this falsehood to their children...I would want to argue that the truth of evolution is more interesting and more poetic
If the history-deniers who doubt the fact of evolution are ignorant of biology, those who think the world began less than ten thousand years ago are worst than ignorant, they are the deluded to the point of perversity.
The population of the U.S. is nearly 300 million, including many of the best educated, most talented, most resourceful, humane people on earth. By almost any measure of civilised attainment, from Nobel prize-counts on down, the U.S. leads the world by miles.
When you make machines that are capable of obeying instructions slavishly, and among those instructions are 'duplicate me' instructions, then of course the system is wide open to exploitation by parasites.
Even if not a single fossil has ever been found, the evidence from surviving animals would still overwhelmingly force the conclusion that Darwin was right.
The bitter hatreds that now poison Middle Eastern politics are rooted in the real or perceived wrong of the setting up of a Jewish State in an Islamic region. In view of all that the Jews had been through, it must have seemed a fair and humane solution. Probably deep familiarity with the Old Testament had given the European and American decision-makers some sort of idea that this really was the historic homeland of the Jews.
The thing that will make the biggest difference to your business, your bank account, your health and your relationships in the next 12 months is your philosophy
Smell is important. It reminds a person of all the things he's been through; it is a sheath of memories and security.
What important truth do very few people agree with you on?
And each day brings it's pretty dust, Our soon-choked souls to fll And we forget because we must, And not because we will.
To give aid to every poor man is far beyond the reach and power of every man. Care of the poor is incumbent on society as a whole.
We - what we need is a dialogue among civilizations. And we need multiculturalism, respect for diversity, tolerance, respect for diverse faiths.
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