Quotes About Beliefs

Political beliefs, religious beliefs, and conspiratorial beliefs seem impenetrable to facts that contradict them.

The backfire and continued influence effects should be disheartening to those who think that the first step in arguing with those who base their beliefs on misinformation should be to get their opponents to see what the facts are. Correcting errors may be pointless when dealing with some people.

At the very least, one would hope that by becoming aware of the many ways our brain can trick us, we would arrive at the conclusion Bertrand Russell thought was a necessary consequence of the limits of knowledge: we should be less cocksure of our beliefs, hold them tentatively, and always be on guard against thinking our feeling of absolute certainty implies we're right.

One of the ironies of cults is that the craziest groups are often composed of the most caring people.

Learning an alien culture from so deeply inside it, he could no longer accept the superiority of one particular belief or value system. To

Cultures have norms that reflect centuries of shared beliefs and ideals. Do not expect to scoff at such things with impunity. You will be punished somehow, even if just through isolation — a position of real powerlessness.

We imagine we are looking for the truth, or being realistic, when in fact we are holding on to ideas that bring a release from tension and soothe our egos, make us feel superior. This pleasure principle in thinking is the source of all of our mental biases. If you believe that you are somehow immune to any of the following biases, it is simply an example of the pleasure principle in action

Your first impulse should always be to find the evidence that disconfirms your most cherished beliefs and those of others. That is true science.

In the end, think of this philosophy in the following terms: Since the beginning of human consciousness, our awareness of death has terrified us. This terror has shaped our beliefs, our religions, our institutions, and so much of our behavior in ways we cannot see or understand. We humans have become the slaves to our fears and our evasions.

The Greek philosopher Epictetus recognised this two thousand years ago when he wrote: 'What disturbs and alarms man are not the things but his opinions and fancies about the things.

Vegetarianism is harmless enough, though it is apt to fill a man with wind and self-righteousness.

traditional economic approaches fail to examine the role of public beliefs in major economic events—that is, narrative. By incorporating an understanding of popular narratives into their explanations of economic events, economists will become more sensitive to such influences when they forecast the future. In doing so, they will give policymakers better tools for anticipating and dealing with these developments.

My own opinion is that the intellect of modern man isn't that superior. IQs aren't that much different. Those Indians and medieval men were just as intelligent as we are, but the context in which they thought was completely different. Within that context of thought, ghosts and spirits are quite as real as atoms, particles, photons and quarks are to a modern man. In that sense I believe in ghosts. Modern man has his ghosts and spirits too, you know.

What helps define a particular culture? Values, beliefs, attributions, ideologies.

It matters what myths we tell ourselves -- which ideals we choose to honor.

Judgments are thoughts, and thoughts are living, moving energy. Because energy attracts like energy, judgment attracts judgmental people.

You cling to those beliefs because that is the reality you were raised in.

Some folks think they are luxuries,' I said, 'but at Ingleside we think they are necessities.

Facts are stubborn things, but, as some one has wisely said, not half so stubborn as fallacies.

All those Elliotts and Crawfords and MacAllisters are dyed-in-the-wool politicians. They're born Grit or Tory, as the case may be, and they live Grit or Tory, and they die Grit or Tory; and what they're going to do in heaven, where there's probably no politics, is more than I can fathom.

Heretics are wicked, but they're mighty int'resting.

I wondered why God created so many varieties of faiths in the world if He intended all of us to worship Him in the same fashion.

People got opinions, that's all they've got.

I can summon no wonder for what lies between Dallas and Washington. The south is memories, memories — it cannot help believing that yesterday was better than tomorrow can possibly be. Some of the memories are extraordinarily well packaged, it is true, but when a place has been reduced in its own estimation no amount of artful packaging can hide the gloom.