Quote of the Moment Archives
2001
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Quote of the Moment - October 13, 2001:
"For many centuries, the theory of 'contingent facts' was associated with a supernaturalistic
metaphysics; such facts, it was said, are the products of a divine creator who could have created
them differently - and who can change them at will. This view represents the metaphysics of
miracles - the notion that an entity's actions are unrelated to its nature, that anything is possible
to an entity regardless of its identity. On this view, an entity acts as it does, not because of its
nature, but because of an omnipotent God's decree." - Leonard Peikoff, "The Analytic-Synthetic
Dichotomy," in Ayn Rand, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology, Second Revised Edition,
(New York: Meridian, 1990), p. 109.
Quote of the Moment - October 10, 2001:
"A religion is a body of answers to questions that the human mind is naturally led to ask. But the
answers are rooted in faith, which means in mysticism and subjectivism. To ask, 'Why is that which is
mystical and subjective opposed to human life?' is to ask why that which denies reason as man's only
means of knowledge, is opposed to life. Reason has to be respected and has to be employed in any
attempt to gain knowledge or guidance in life. Religion, being rooted in the repudiation of reason
as man's means to knowledge, is therefore a threat to human life at the deepest philosophical level.
This is also why religion becomes a threat to human life in the derivative fields of ethics and
politics, and ends up advocating sacrifice and statism." - John Ridpath,
"Ideas Matter: An Interview with Dr. John Ridpath by Kevin Delaney", Ayn Rand
Bookstore catalogue, Fall 2001, p. 14.
Quote of the Moment - October 7, 2001:
"If mysticism advocates the promiscuous acceptance of ideas, skepticism advocates their promiscuous
doubt. The mystic 'just knows' whatever he wants to believe; the skeptic 'just doesn't know' whatever
he wants not to believe. The operative term and guiding force here is 'wants', i.e., feeling. Both
viewpoints reduce to emotionalism; both represent the reliance on feeling as a cognitive guide. Both
represent a denial of man's need of logic and an enshrinement of the arbitrary." - Leonard Peikoff,
Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, (New York: Meridian, 1993), p. 183.
Quote of the Moment - October 4, 2001:
"There was also Martin Luther, regarded by the Nazis as a major hero, who was the greatest single
power in the development of German religion and, through this means, an influence on the philosophies
of both Kant and Hegel. Luther is anti-reason ("Whoever wants to be a Christian should tear the eyes
out of his reason"), intensely pro-German, and crudely anti-Semitic ("[F]ie on you where you be, you
damned Jews, who dare to clasp this earnest, glorious, consoling Word of God to your maggoty, mortal,
miserly belly, and are not ashamed to display your greed so openly"). He formally enlists God on the
side of the state. Unconditional obedience to the government's edicts, he holds, is a Christian virtue."
- Leonard Peikoff, The Ominous Parallels, (New York: Meridian, 1993), p. 41.
Quote of the Moment - October 1, 2001:
"There is absolutely nothing in Isaiah 7 that would lead anyone to conclude that Isaiah was speaking
of anything but his own time. This is particularly true when we consider that Isaiah does speak of
things which are plainly meant to be future events, such as in chapter 11. Often he prefaces such
remarks with phrases such as 'in that day'. The doctrine of types is simply a way in which
fundamentalists get to have their cake and eat it too." - Tim Callahan, Bible Prophecy: Failure
or Fulfillment?, (Altadena, CA: Millennium Press, 1997), p. 116.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 28, 2001:
"The tribal premise underlies today's political economy. That premise is shared by the enemies and
champions of capitalism alike; it provides the former with a certain inner consistency, and disarms
the latter by a subtle, yet devastating aura of moral hypocrisy - as witness, their attempts to
justify capitalism on the ground of 'the common good' or 'service to the consumer' or 'the best
allocation of resources'. (Whose resources?)... If capitalism is to be understood, it is this tribal premise which must be checked - and
challenged." - Ayn Rand, "What is Capitalism?" Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, (New York: Signet,
1967), p. 14.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 25, 2001:
"To abstain from condemming a torturer, is to become an accessory to the torture and murder of his
victims... The moral principle to adopt in this issue, is: Judge, and be prepared to be judged."
- Ayn Rand, "How Does One Lead a Rational Life in an Irrational Society?" The Virtue of
Selfishness, (New York: Signet, 1964), p. 72.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 22, 2001:
"If men want to oppose war, it is statism that they must oppose. So long as they hold the
tribal notion that the individual is sacrificial fodder for the collective, that some men have the
right to rule others by force, and that some (any) alleged 'good' can justify it - there can be
no peace within a nation and no peace among nations." - Ayn Rand, "The Roots of War," Capitalism: The Unknown
Ideal, (New York: Signet, 1967), p. 42.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 19, 2001:
"Men are afraid that war might come because they know, consciously or unconsciously, that they have
never rejected the doctrine which causes wars, which has caused the wars of the past and can do it
again - the doctrine that it is right or practical or necessary for men to achieve their goals by
means of physical force (by initiating the use of force against other men) and that
some sort of "good" can justify it. It is the doctrine that force is a proper or unavoidable part
of human existence and human societies." - Ayn Rand, "The Roots of War," Capitalism: The Unknown
Ideal, (New York: Signet, 1967), p. 35.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 16, 2001:
"We do not need more evidence to "pinpoint" the perpetrators of any one of these
atrocities, including the latest and most egregious—we already have total
certainty with regard to the governments primarily responsible for the repeated
slaughter of Americans in recent years. We must now use our unsurpassed military
to destroy all branches of the Iranian and Afghani governments, regardless of
the suffering and death this will bring to the many innocents caught in the line
of fire. - Leonard Peikoff,
Fifty Years of Appeasement Led to Black Tuesday.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 13, 2001:
"The economic miracles of the modern age are not in countries with a Christian culture. Surely it
must be obvious to anyone, not totally blinded by faith, that Christianity is not a sufficient nor a
necessary cause for prosperity. The early Christians were never prosperous. They were all from the
lower rungs of the economic ladder." - Jim Peron,
Does God Really Bless America?.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 10, 2001:
"Honesty is the recognition of the fact that the unreal is unreal and can have no value, that neither
love nor fame nor cash is a value if obtained by fraud - that an attempt to gain a value by deceiving
the mind of others is an act of raising your victims to a position higher than reality, where you
become a pawn of their blindness, a slave of their non-thinking and their evasions, while their
intelligence, their rationality, their perceptiveness become the enemies you have to dread and flee -
that you do not care to live as a dependent, least of all a dependent on the stupidity of others, or
as a fool whose source of values is the fools he succeeds in fooling - that honesty is not a social
duty, not a sacrifice for the sake of others, but the most profoundly selfish virtue man can practice:
his refusal to sacrifice the reality of his experience to the deluded consciousness of others." - Ayn
Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 937.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 7, 2001:
"Integrity is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake your consciousness, just as honesty
is the recognition of the fact that you cannot fake existence - that man is an indivisible entity,
an integrated unit of two attributes: of matter and consciousness, and that he may permit no breach
between body and mind, between action and thought, between his life and his convictions - that,
like a judge impervious to public opinion, he may not sacrifice his convictions to the wishes of
others, be it the whole of mankind shouting pleas or threats against him - that courage and
confidence are practical necessities, that courage is the practical form of being true to
existence, of being true to one's own consciousness." - Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, pp. 936-937.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 4, 2001:
"Independence is the recognition of the fact that yours is the responsibility of judgment and
nothing can help you escape it - that no substitute can do your thinking, as no pinch-hitter
can live your life - that the vilest form of self-abasement and self-destruction is the
subordination of your mind to the mind of another, the acceptance of an authority over your brain,
the acceptance of his assertions as facts, his say-so as truth, his edicts as middle-man between
your consciousness and your existence." - Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 936.
Quote of the Moment - Sep. 1, 2001:
"Rationality is the recognition of the fact that existence exists, that nothing can alter the truth
and nothing can take precedence over that act of perceiving it, which is thinking - that the mind
is one's only judge of values and one's only guide of action - that reason is an absolute that
permits no compromise - that a concession to the irrational invalidates one's consciousness and
turns it from the task of perceiving to the task of faking reality - that the alleged short-cut
to knowledge, which is faith, is only a short-circuit destroying the mind - that the acceptance
of a mystical invention is a wish for the annihilation of existence, and, properly, annihilates
one's consciousness." - Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 936.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 29, 2001:
"Pride has to be earned; it is the reward of effort and achievement; but to gain the virtue of humility,
one has only to abstain from thinking - nothing else is demanded - and one will feel humble quickly
enough." - Nathaniel Branden, "Mental Health Versus Mysticism," in Ayn Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness, (New
York: Signet, 1964), p. 40.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 26, 2001:
"The fact that Jesus' name equals 888 is no lucky accident. The Greek name 'Iesous' is an artificial and
forced transliteration of the Hebrew name 'Joshua' which has been deliberately constructed by the gospel
writers to make sure that it expresses this symbolically significant number." - Timothy Freke and Peter
Gandy, The Jesus Mysteries, (London: Thorsons, 1999), p. 116.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 23, 2001:
". . . I never crusade for atheism per se outside of a wider
framework. Atheism is significant, to be sure. But it's significance derives
entirely from the fact that it represents the application of reason to a
particular field, specifically the area of religious belief. Atheism, unless
it is ingrained within this greater philosophical defense of reason, is
practically useless. When, however, it is the consequence of the habit of
reasonableness, then atheism stands in opposition to the wave of
supernaturalism and mysticism we are currently experiencing. In other words,
irrationalism in any form it may occur."
How to Defend Atheism,
by George H. Smith.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 20, 2001:
"It is the alternative of life or death which gives rise to the distinction between the beneficial and the
harmful, and hence to the distinction between a goal and a mere effect. For instance, consider two
concomitant effects of the human heartbeat: the circulation of the blood and the production of the
characteristic thumping sound. Of these two effects, only the circulation of the blood can be considered the
goal or function of the heartbeat. Why? - because circulating the blood is beneficial to survival while
producing the thumping sound makes no contribution to survival; the sound has no value-significance for
the organism." - Harry Binswanger, "The Goal-Directedness of Living Action," The Objectivist Forum,
August, 1986, p. 3.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 17, 2001:
"Finally, there is a contradiction, not to be set aside as trivial, between Luke's gospel and Acts (both
by the same author) concerning the ascension. In the gospel, Jesus ascends on resurrection day, but in
Acts only forty days later, having utilized the interval to give the disciples 'many proofs' that he was
truly risen and to instruct them 'concerning the kingdom of God' (Acts 1:3). It seems, then, that, by
the time Luke wrote Acts, he wanted to assure his readers that the disciples were fully instructed and
hence reliable guarantors of the teachings which they supposedly passed on." - G. A. Wells, The Jesus
Myth, (Chicago: Open Court, 1999), p. 136.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 14, 2001:
"Rand's [moral] thesis is that the foundation of morality resides in the nature of values. Values, in
turn, depend on the fact that organisms face the alternative of life or death. We can understand what
values are only against the background of this fundamental alternative. The requirements of human life
furnish the standard of value for human beings and, derivatively, the basis for all moral prescriptions.
Life is the yardstick by which we measure whether a thing is good or bad and whether an action is right
or wrong. A person should pursue value and abide by a moral code in order to advance his own life."
- Tara Smith, "Morality's Roots in Life," Viable Values: A Study of Life as the Root and Reward of
Morality, (Lanham, MD: Roman & Littlefield, 2000), p. 83.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 11, 2001:
"Serenity comes from the ability to say 'Yes' to existence. Courage comes from the ability to say
'No' to the wrong choices made by others." - Ayn Rand, "The Metaphysical Versus the Man-Made,"
Philosophy: Who Needs It, (New York: Signet, 1984), p. 27.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 8, 2001:
"There can be no philosophic breach between thought and action. The consequences of the epistemology of
religion is the politics of tyranny. If you cannot reach the truth by your own mental powers, but must
offer obedient faith to a cognitive authority, then you are not your own intellectual master; in such a
case, you cannot guide your behavior by your own judgment, either, but must be submissive in action as
well. This is the reason why, historically - as Ayn Rand has pointed out - faith and force are always
corollaries; each requires the other." - Leonard Peikoff, "Religion Versus America," in Ayn Rand,
The Voice of Reason, (New York: Meridian, 1990), p. 72.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 5, 2001:
"Consciousness is not metaphysically active. It no more creates its own contents than does the stomach.
But it is active epistemologically in processing these contents. What we are aware of is
determined by reality - there is nothing else to be aware of - but how we are aware of it is
determined by our means of awareness. How could there be any conflict between these facts?" - David Kelley,
The Evidence of the Senses, (Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press, 1986), p. 41.
Quote of the Moment - Aug. 2, 2001:
"Ayn Rand's objective theory of knowledge makes it possible for the first time fully to escape both
mysticism and skepticism and to uphold the absolutism of reason. The concept of objectivity is the theme
that underlies every aspect of Ayn Rand's philosophy." - Harry Binswanger, "Ayn Rand's Philosophic
Achievement, Part IV," The Objectivist Forum, December, 1982, p. 5.
Quote of the Moment - July 30, 2001:
"The wisest thinkers have always held happiness to be the ultimate goal of
living. But the 'naked' pursuit of happiness has always raised the specter of
hedonism — and rightly so. What is desperately needed is a moral individualism:
a naturalistic ethics that elucidates and justifies human, value-based
goal-seeking and the full flowering and vitality of the whole individual in
harmony with others." - Peter St. Andre, A
Philosophy for Living on Earth.
Quote of the Moment - July 27, 2001:
"The influence of the Jewish Wisdom literature on Paul is undeniable: statements made about Wisdom in this
literature are made of Jesus in the Pauline letters. At 1 Cor. 1:24 Paul actually calls Christ 'the power
of God and the Wisdom of God'; and Paul's Jesus, like the Jewish Wisdom figure, sought acceptance on Earth,
but was rejected, and then returned to heaven." - G. A. Wells, The Jesus Myth, (Chicago, IL: Open
Court, 1999), p. 97.
Quote of the Moment - July 24, 2001:
"A society based on and geared to the conceptual level of man's consciousness, a society dominated
by a philosophy of reason, has no place for the rule of fear and guilt. Reason requires freedom, self-confidence and self-esteem. It requires the right to think and to act on the guidance of one's thinking -
the right to live by one's own independent judgment." - Ayn Rand, "For the New Intellectual," For the
New Intellectual, (New York: Signet, 1961), p. 25.
Quote of the Moment - July 21, 2001:
"Men have been taught either that knowledge is impossible (skepticism) or that it is available without
effort (mysticism). These two positions appear to be antagonists, but are, in fact, two variants on the
same theme, two sides of the same fraudulent coin: the attempt to escape the responsibility of rational
cognition and the absolutism of reality - the attempt to assert the primacy of consciousness over
existence." - Ayn Rand, "Consciousness and Identity," Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology,
Expanded 2nd Edition, (New York: Meridian, 1990), p. 79.
Quote of the Moment - July 18, 2001:
"There were actually many different scriptures relating the deeds of the disciples in circulation amongst
early Christians, but no one considers the non-canonical tales of the apostles as historical
documents. Why should we treat the canonical Acts of the Apostles with any less scepticism, just because
the Roman Church authorities decided to include it in the New Testament?" - Timothy Freke and Peter Gandy,
The Jesus Mysteries: Was the 'Original Jesus' a Pagan God?, (London: Thorsons, 1999), p. 150.
Quote of the Moment - July 15, 2001:
"...religious attitudes often foster uncritical belief and acceptance. Indeed, in a religious context,
uncritical belief is often thought to be a value and doubt and skepticism are considered vices... Jesus'
own teaching reinforced this value. He advocated blind obedience. Even in our day we see religious
fundamentalists pride themselves on their rejection of the findings of science concerning, for example,
the age of the earth, and maintaining an unwavering commitment to the teachings of the Bible." -
Michael Martin, The Case Against Christianity, (Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press, 1991),
p. 154.
Quote of the Moment - July 12, 2001:
"It is a common claim by conservatives that liberal scholars have an anti-supernatural bias that forces
them to date [the book of] Daniel after the events. It is my belief that just the opposite situation is
occurring. Conservative Christians make an a priori assumption that Daniel is true prophecy and then
propose arguments to save it from a 2nd C date." - Darryl Kight,
The Book of Daniel:
Prophecy or Not?.
Quote of the Moment - July 9, 2001:
"Although there are about twenty million atheists in the United States, our organized numbers are tiny.
Religionists, on the other hand, have had massive resources and vast opportunities to advertise. They
have had their say. It is time the world heard another side." - Dan Barker, "Ethnics Without God,"
Losing Faith in Faith, (Madison, WI: FFRF, 1992),
p. 288.
Quote of the Moment - July 6, 2001:
"Jesus joined humanity in order to redeem it, and for this redemption to
take place, he HAD to be crucified, thus taking the sins of humanity onto
his own shoulders and expiating them. If that is so, then Judas, Pontius
Pilate and other villains had essential parts to play in this redemption,
and had they refused those parts, all of humanity would still be laboring
under original sin. That should make those men heroes, shouldn't it?" - David King,
Religion,
chapter 9 of A Guide to
the Philosophy of Objectivism.
Quote of the Moment - July 3, 2001:
"Epistemological subjectivism is the view that the subject has fundamental
priority in setting the terms for what is knowledge." - Stephen Hicks,
Chapter 5: Hierarchy and Context, in his
Foundationalism and the Genesis of Justification.
Quote of the Moment - June 30, 2001:
"So here's what evidence we have. There is a certain worldview, Nazism. Its
leader, Hitler, professes on many occasions to be religious, and he often states
that he's doing the will of god. The majority of his followers are openly
religious. There is no evidence anywhere that this leader
ever professed to anyone that he is an atheist. He and his
followers actively campaign against atheism, even to the point of physical
force, and this leader allies himself with religious organizations and churches.
This is the evidence." - Douglas Krueger,
Copin' with Copan.
Quote of the Moment - June 27, 2001:
"Criticism is not to be confused with being 'critical' or negative, but rather,
criticism is the freedom to come to interpretive conclusions that do not
necessarily conform to traditional religious views. If the study of the Bible
must agree with doctrinal norms, then the enterprise is a mere pretense from the
start. Criticism is a tool for looking at the NT from many fresh and exciting
directions in order to better understand what its authors were trying to
communicate." - James Still,
The Search for the Historical Jesus.
Quote of the Moment - June 24, 2001:
"The Bible wasn't written all at once but is a product of several authors, who
lived and wrote over a period of centuries. Primitive people created their gods
in their own image, so there is no reason to think that the ancient Hebrews were
any different. To the earliest biblical writers, their god Yahweh was
anthropomorphic in his nature, and so he had many humanlike characteristics and
limitations. Over time, the god-concept evolved, as it continues to do today,
and so God became more spiritual, loving, and merciful in his nature, unlike the
earlier concept of a barbaric warlike god, who ordered the genocide of entire
tribes of non-Hebraic people." - Farrell Till,
The Evolution of God,
The Skeptical Review, November/December, 2000.
Quote of the Moment - June 21, 2001:
"Sex had seemed of no importance to the earliest Christians. Believing, as most of them did, in
an imminent parousia, it seemed needless to devise rules for the correct means of perpetuating the
species... The Old Testament made no virtue of celibacy; on the other hand, the New Testament did, at least
by implication... The earliest Christian documents written with the parousia in mind,
seemed to stress celibacy as a virtue; so that when the parousia receded, and propogation was
again seen as necessary, or at any rate unavoidable, the Church confusedly adopted an uneasy coexistence
in which celibacy was praised but matrimony tolerated. The formula was reinforced in the fourth century
when the Trinitarian controversy, and the triumph of orthodoxy, hugely increased the cult of the Virgin
Mary, the theotokos. If, therefore, celibacy were superior, and marriage inferior, though licit,
did this not imply that sex was intrinsically evil and even in the context of marriage a form of licensed
sin?" - Paul Johnson, A History of Christianity, (New York: Touchstone,
1995), pp. 108-109.
Quote of the Moment - June 18, 2001:
"Universality and abstractness are features of and only of concepts; these
features allow the subject to deal with things differentially and appropriately,
according to their membership in specific categories. Any ability, then, that
involves the differential and appropriate handling of things will rest on a
concept that has some special relation to those things. Colloquially, we can say
that this is the concept 'for' those things." - Bryan Register,
The Universality and Employment of Concepts.
Quote of the Moment - June 15, 2001:
"While it is true that atheism (within the West) has its roots firmly planted in
the intellectual traditions of Europe, to simply dismiss it, or any idea, based
solely on its cultural antecedents, is incredibly erroneous. This fallacious
argument is what I term the 'Appeal to Culture'. This argument is generally
masked in more traditional fallacies, such as Argumentum Ad Hominem or the 'No
True Scotsman'... The argument simply assumes that any
position that is favored by the majority (White media), or has its roots in
White grass-roots movements, is automatically incorrect, and is ultimately
hostile or antithetical to the concerns of the African-American community." - Frances Parker,
African-American Atheism and the Appeal to Culture.
Quote of the Moment - June 12, 2001:
"The justification of sacrifice, that your morality propounds, is more corrupt than the corruption
it purports to justify. The motive of your sacrifice, it tells you, should be love - the love you
ought to feel for every man. A morality that professes the belief that the values of the spirit are more
precious than matter, a morality that teaches you to scorn a whore who gives her body indiscriminately to
all men - this same morality demands that you surrender your soul to promiscuous love for all comers." -
Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 950.
Quote of the Moment - June 9, 2001:
"Central to Rand's approach to ethics is her view of values as objective, rather
than intrinsic or subjective. Her definition of the good life, and of the
foundation of value, is essential to the objectivity of her approach. The good
is not good in itself, neither in the Kantian sense of duty divorced from man's
good, nor in the Aristotelian sense of being an aspect of man's good life; nor
is the good determined by man's wishes or conventions. The good is determined by
the requirements of man's survival, which are determined by his nature. We
discover what is the good life, as we discover all other facts, by observation." -
Eyal Mozes, Life as the
Standard of Value.
Quote of the Moment - June 6, 2001:
"The Gospels cannot really be dated, nor are the real authors known. Their names
were assigned early, but not early enough for us to be confident they were
accurately known. It is based on speculation that Mark was the first, written
between 60 and 70 A.D., Matthew second, between 70 and 80 A.D., Luke (and Acts)
third, between 80 and 90 A.D., and John last, between 90 and 100 A.D. Scholars
advance various other dates for each work, and the total range of possible dates
runs from the 50's to the early 100's, but all dates are conjectural. It
is supposed that the Gospels did not exist before 58 simply because neither Paul
nor any other epistle writer mentions or quotes them, and this is a reasonable
argument as far as things go." - Richard Carrier,
The
Formation of the New Testament Canon, (2000).
Quote of the Moment - June 3, 2001:
"Your code - which boasts that it upholds eternal, absolute, objective moral values and scorns the
conditional, the relative and the subjective - your code hands out, as its version of the absolute, the
following rule of moral conduct: If you wish it, it's evil; if others wish it, it's good; if the
motive of your actions is your welfare, don't do it; if the motive is the welfare of others, then
anything goes." - Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 947.
Quote of the Moment - May 31, 2001:
"Santa Claus is not a bad hypothesis at all for six-year-olds. As we grow up, no one comes forward to
prove that such an entity does not exist. We just come to seee that there is not the least reason
to think he does exist. And so it would be entirely foolish to assert that he does, or believe that
he does, or even think it likely that he does. Santa Claus is in just the same position as fairy
godmothers, wicked witches, the devil, and the ether. Each of these entities has some supernatural powers,
i.e., powers which contravene or go far beyond the powers that we know exist, whether it be the power to
levitate a sled and reindeer or the power to cast a spell.... So the proper alternative, when there is no
evidence, is not mere suspension of belief, for example, about Santa Claus, it is disbelief. It
most certainly is not faith." - Michael Scriven, "God and Reason," in Angeles, Peter, ed., Critiques of
God: Making the Case Against Belief in God, (Amherst, NY: Prometheus Books, 1997), p. 106.
Quote of the Moment - May 28, 2001:
"The word rapture derives from the Latin verb rapere meaning to seize or snatch away. Ironically,
rapere is also the root word for rape. While modern millenarians hope for the Rapture in their
lifetimes, Paul was probably telling the Thessalonians [cf. 4:13-5:11] that the end would come in their time.
This view is corroborated in 1 Corinthains 15:51, where Paul says 'We shall not sleep (i.e. die),' before
the return of Christ. earlier in the same epistle he urges the Corinthians to avoid marriage if they
possibly can, the reason given is in 1 Cor. 7:29: 'I mean, brethren, the appointed time has grown very
short; from now on let those who have wives live as though they had none.' Paul is saying here that the
time is so short to the end of the world that even married couples should prepare for it by practicing
celibacy. It is interesting to me that Paul's writings are considered divinely inspired even though he was
obviously wrong about how soon the world would end." - Tim Callahan, Bible Prophecy: Failure or
Fulfillment?, (Tim Callahan, 1997), pp. 189-190.
Quote of the Moment - May 25, 2001:
"The proof of egoism is not only important for ethical advocacy in the marketplace of ideas, but is also
important for an integrated view of reason. Reason is the human faculty that processes sensory input,
selects the motive and goal of action, and initiates action towards the goal. Reason is both a means
for knowledge and the primary means for survival. It is analogous to the central processing unit (CPU)
of a computer, validating input and generating valid output. For both the human and the computer, input
without output makes processing pointless and output without input disconnects 'processing' from
reality." - Robert Hartford,
Objectivity
and the Proof of Egoism (2001).
Quote of the Moment - May 22, 2001:
"Intellectually, to rest one's case on faith means to concede that reason is on the side of
one's enemies - that one has no rational arguments to offer." - Ayn Rand, "Conservatism: An Obituary,"
Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, (New York: Signet, 1967), p. 197.
Quote of the Moment - May 19, 2001:
"The Law of Identity (A is A) is a rational man's paramount consideration in the process of determining
his interests. He knows that the contradictory is the impossible, that a contradiction cannot be achieved
in reality and that the attempt to achieve it can lead only to disaster and destruction. Therefore, he does
not permit himself to hold contradictory values, to pursue contadictory goals, or to imagine that the
pursuit of a contradiction can ever be to his interest." - Ayn Rand, "The 'Conflict' of Men's Interests,"
The Virtue of Selfishness, (New York: Signet, 1964), p. 51.
Quote of the Moment - May 16, 2001:
"There is a widespread popular notion to the effect that the Catholic Church's motive in opposing birth
control is the desire to enlarge the Catholic population of the world. This may be superficially true of
some people's motives, but it is not the full truth. If it were, the Catholic Church would forbid the
'rhythm method' along with all other forms of contraception. And, more importantly, the Catholic Church
would not fight for anti-birth control legislation all over the world: if numerical superiority were
its motive, it would forbid birth control to its own followers, and let it be available to other
religious groups... The motive of the Church's doctrine on this issue is, philosophically, much deeper
than that, and much worse; the goal is not metaphysical, or political or biological, but psychological:
if man is forbidden to regard sexual enjoyment as an end in itself, he will not regard love or his own
happiness as an end in itself; if so, then he will not regard his own life as an end in itself; if so,
then he will not attain self-esteem." - Ayn Rand, "Of Living Death," The Voice of Reason, (New
York: Meridian, 1990), pp. 53-54.
Quote of the Moment - May 13, 2001:
"Doubting Thomas is such a useful negative role model that if he hadn't existed, it would have been smart
to invent him. And perhaps they did. The Synoptic Gosepls don't report this episode [referring to John
20:26-29], only John does. Mark (16:14) implies that Thomas had been present with the others, but John
(20:19, 24) says he was not." - Stephen Van Eck, Dissecting
Christianity's Mind-Snaring System.
Quote of the Moment - May 10, 2001:
"In the name of science, the theist posits a 'god of the gaps', a god who allegedly fills in the gaps
of human knowledge. But gaps of knowledge eventually close, leaving god without a home." - George H.
Smith, Atheism: The Case Against God, (Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books, 1989), 256.
Quote of the Moment - May 7, 2001:
"One of the hallmarks of a man of self-esteem, who regards the universe as open to his effort, is the
profound pleasure he experiences in the productive work of his mind; his enjoyment of life is fed by
his unceasing concern to grow in knowledge and ability - to think, to achieve, to move forward, to meet
new challenges and overcome them - to earn the pride of a constantly expanding efficacy." -
Nathaniel Branden, "The Psychology of Pleasure," in Ayn Rand, The Virtue of Selfishness,
(New York: Signet, 1964), p. 62.
Quote of the Moment - May 4, 2001:
"I don't think we should have commandments in morality any more than we should in physics." -
Dr. Leonard Peikoff, An Introduction to
Objectivism, Part 2: Q & A.
Quote of the Moment - May 1, 2001:
"Now I want to give you some hints and see if you can guess the next important development in the history
of space. Consider the attributes that space is said to possess: It is independent of matter; it is
ubiquitous, but not perceived; it is infinite, eternal and immutable. Now does that remind you of
anyone? It doesn't have to be anyone you know personally." - David Harriman, Physicists Lost in
Space (1999), Side A; available at Second Renaissance Books.
Quote of the Moment - April 28, 2001:
"I have said that faith and force are corollaries, and that mysticism will always lead to the rule of
brutality. The cause of it is contained in the very nature of mysticism. Reason is the only
objective means of communication and of understanding among men; when men deal with one another
by means of reason, reality is their objective standard and frame of reference. But when men
claim to possess supernatural means of knowledge, no persuasion, communication or understanding are
possible. Why do we kill wild animals in the jungle? Because no other way of dealing with them is open
to us. And that is the state to which mysticism reduces mankind - a state where, in the case of
disagreement, men have no recourse except to physical violence." - Ayn Rand, "Faith and Force:
Destroyers of the Modern World," Philosophy: Who Needs It, (New York: Signet, 1984), p.
70.
Quote of the Moment - April 25, 2001:
"The relationship between capitalism and egoism is manifest in every area of human life, spiritual and
material. Romantic love, for instance, being a selfish phenomenon, developed into a Western ideal only
with the rise of individualism. To this day, logically enough, collectivists scorn such love as
'bourgeois'. The most obvious expression of capitalism's egoism, however, occurs in the material realm.
Capitalism counts on the profit motive." - Dr. Leonard Peikoff, Objectivism: The Philosophy of
Ayn Rand, (New York: Meridian, 1993), p. 390.
Quote of the Moment - April 22, 2001:
"Rationalization [is] having a preset conclusion and rigging an explanation or argument such that
the conclusion appears well-founded; pouring your energy into making a conclusion look rationally
justified rather than investigating whether it truly is." - Tara Smith, Rationality and Objectivity,
Tape 3, Side A. (Available at Second Renaissance Books.)
Quote of the Moment - April 19, 2001:
"The reliability of the eyewitnesses to the empty tomb [of Jesus] is completely unknown. Indeed,
because the account of who discovered the empty tomb varies from Gospel to Gospel, it is not even
clear who the witnesses were. However, whoever they are - the two Marys, Salome, Joanna - they seem
to have been friends of Jesus, people who were probably not objective observers. Moreover, there
were no known contemporary eyewitnesses. What these witnesses reported was related by others to
the Gospel writers. We have no reason to suppose that these reporters were reliable." -
Michael Martin,
The Case Against Christianity, (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1991), p. 84.
Quote of the Moment - April 16, 2001:
"Since religion is a primitive form of philosophy - an attempt to offer a comprehensive view of reality -
many of its myths are distorted, dramatized allegories based on some element of truth, some actual, if
profoundly elusive, aspect of man's existence. one of such allegories, which men find particularly
terrifying, is the myth of a supernatural recorder from whom nothing can be hidden, who lists all of a
man's deeds - the good and the evil, the noble and the vile - and who confronts a man with that record
on judgment day." - Ayn Rand, "Philosophy and Sense of Life," The Romantic Manifesto, Revised
Edition (New York: Signet, 1975), p. 25.
Quote of the Moment - April 13, 2001:
"The reason that stolen concepts
are so prevalent is that most people (and most philosophers) have no idea of the 'roots' of a concept.
They treat every concept, in practice, as a primary, as a first-level abstraction, which means: they tear
the concept from any place in a hierarchy, and thereby detach it from reality. Thereafter, its use is
subject to nothing but caprice or unthinking habit, with no objective guidelines for the mind to follow.
The result is confusion, contradiction, and the conversion of language into mere verbiage." - Dr. Leonard
Peikoff, "Knowledge as Hierarchical," Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand, (New York: Meridian, 1993),
p. 136.
Quote of the Moment - April 10, 2001:
"It is superficial to say that Christianity is not the religion of one personal God, but of three
personalities. These three personalities have certainly an existence in dogma; but even there the
personality of the Holy Spirit is only an arbitrary decision which is contradicted by impersonal
definitions; as, for example, that the Holy Spirit is the gift of the Father and Son. Already the
very 'procession' of the Holy Ghost presents an evil prognostic for his personality, for a personal
being is produced only by generation, not by an indefinite emanation or by spiratio. And even
the Father, as the representative of the rigorous idea of the Godhead, is a personal being only
according to opinion and assertion, not according to his definitions; he is an abstract idea, a
purely rationalistic being. Only Christ is the plastic personality. To personality belongs form;
form is the reality of personality. Christ alone is the personal God; he is the real God of Christians,
a truth which cannot too often be repeated. In him alone is concentrated the Christian religion, the
essence of religion in general. He alone meets the longing for a personal God; he alone is an existence
identical with the nature of feeling; on him alone are heaped all the joys of the imagination, and all
the sufferings of the heart; in him alone are feeling and imagination exhausted. Christ is the blending
in one of feeling and imagination." - Ludwig Feuerbach, "The Mystery of the
Christian Christ," The Essence of Christianity, (Amherst, NY:
Prometheus Books, 1989), pp. 147-148.
Quote of the Moment - April 7, 2001:
"The threat of punishment for disbelief is the crowning touch of Christian misology. Believe
in Jesus - regardless of evidence or justification - or be subjected to agonizing torture.
With this theme reverberating throughout the New Testament, we have intellectual intimidation,
transcendental blackmail, in its purest form. Threats replace argumentation, and irrationality
gains the edge over reason through an appeal to brute force. Man's ability to think and question
becomes his most dangerous liability, and the intellectually frightened, docile, unquestioning
believer is presented as the expemplification of moral perfection." - George H. Smith, Atheism:
The Case Against God, (Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books, 1989), p. 169.
Quote of the Moment - April 4, 2001:
"By the primacy of existence, identification precedes evaluation, and thus the normativity of
the standard of objectivity is fundamental, and that of the standard of value, derivative. By
the primacy of existence, cognition precedes emotion, and passion without understanding is worse
than useless. And by the primacy of existence, the capstone of objective cognition is intellectual
independence, which consists of neither obedience to authority nor rebellion against authority,
but of placing no value or allegiance above one's principled, volitional adherence to reality.
Objectivity matters more than even one's allegiance to the views of Ayn Rand, to the philosophy
of Objectivism itself, and more than even one's own self-concept. Unfortunately there are a great
many within the Objectivist movement who have forgotten or never learned this." -
Timothy Chase,
Timothy Chase Responds.
Quote of the Moment - April 1, 2001:
"Did you want to know who is John Galt? I am the first man of ability who refused to regard it as
guilt. I am the first man who would not do penance for my virtues or let them be used as the tools
of my destruction. I am the first man who would not suffer martyrdom at the hands of those who
wished me to perish for the privilege of keeping them alive. I am the first man who told them
that I did not need them, and until they learned to deal with me as traders, giving value for
value, they would have to exist without me, as I would exist without them; then I would let
them learn whose is the need and whose the ability - and if human survival is the standard,
whose terms would set the way to survive." - Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, p. 966.
Quote of the
Moment - March 30, 2001:
"The failure to recognize that logic is man's method of cognition, has produced a brood of
artificial splits and dichotomies which represent restatements of the analytic-synthetic
dichotomy from various aspects. Three in particular are prevalent today: logical truth vs.
factual truth; the logically possible vs. the empirically possible; and the a priori vs.
the a posteriori." - Dr. Leonard Peikoff, "The Analytic-Synthetic Dichotomy," Introduction
to Objectivist Epistemology, 2nd Ed., (New York: Meridian, 1990), p. 113. See also David
Ross' essay IOE,
The Analytic-Synthetic Dichotomy (1992).
Quote of the
Moment - March 26, 2001:
"I lay it down as a position which cannot be controverted, first, that the agreement of all the parts of a story does not prove that story to be true, because the parts may agree and the whole may be false; secondly, that the disagreement of the parts of a story proves the whole cannot be true. The agreement does not prove true, but the disagreement proves falsehood positively." - Thomas Paine, The Age of Reason, (New York: Carol Publishing Group, 1995), p. 157 (in regard to the disharmony of the gospel accounts of Jesus).
Quote of the
Moment - March 23, 2001:
"Human
beings have always needed to justify their beliefs and practices, even their
sufferings, to invest them with greater-than-human significance, by anchoring
them in some divine precedent, in a time and setting which bestows on them a
venerable authority. This explains the fundamental appeal of religion: through
myth the individual is invested with significance; he or she is rendered sacred
by acknowledging a divine ancestry and entering into a new state of being - a
rebirth into union with the supernatural paradigm." - Earl
Doherty, The Jesus Puzzle, (Ottawa, Canada,
Canadian Humanist Publications, 1999), p. 97.