Jacob Folkman > Jacob's Quotes

“They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. Grief, terror, love, longing--these were intangibles, but the intangibles had their own mass and specific gravity, they had tangible weight. They carried shameful memories. They carried the common secret of cowardice.... Men killed, and died, because they were embarrassed not to.”
― Tim O'Brien, The Things They Carried

“To criticize a person for their race is manifestly irrational and ridiculous, but to criticize their religion, that is a right. That is a freedom. The freedom to criticize ideas, any ideas - even if they are sincerely held beliefs - is one of the fundamental freedoms of society. A law which attempts to say you can criticize and ridicule ideas as long as they are not religious ideas is a very peculiar law indeed.

It all points to the promotion of the idea that there should be a right not to be offended. But in my view the right to offend is far more important than any right not to be offended. The right to ridicule is far more important to society than any right not to be ridiculed because one in my view represents openness - and the other represents oppression”
― Rowan Atkinson

“The existence of God is not subjective. He either exists or he doesn’t. It’s not a matter of opinion. You can have your own opinions. But you can’t have your own facts.”
― Ricky Gervais

“Science seeks the truth. And it does not discriminate. For better or worse it finds things out. Science is humble. It knows what it knows and it knows what it doesn’t know. It bases its conclusions and beliefs on hard evidence -­- evidence that is constantly updated and upgraded. It doesn’t get offended when new facts come along. It embraces the body of knowledge. It doesn’t hold on to medieval practices because they are tradition.”
― Ricky Gervais

“If you live in Denver or Austin, or near another Ten Commandments monument on public land, go and examine it. See if the full text of each commandment is carved into the stone. See if slavery is recognized, if women are considered chattel, and if the supposed pinnacle of morality punishes innocent children to the third and fourth generations. If the Ten Commandments were truly moral, there would be no need to edit these displays to fit today’s standards. Morality evolves. These edited monuments undercut the very claim they were set up to make. They are monuments to a lie.”
― Andrew L. Seidel, The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American

“There is no freedom of religion without a government that is free from religion.”
― Andrew L Seidel, The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American

“[In] colonial history...we find true Christian nations—the colonies—founded on Christian principles. Those Christian governments were so tyrannical that they became examples for the founders of how not to build a nation.”
― Andrew L. Seidel, The Founding Myth: Why Christian Nationalism Is Un-American

“Heaven and hell seem out of proportion to me: the actions of men do not deserve so much.”
― Jorge Luis Borges

“Personally, I am a hedonistic reader; I have never read a book merely because it was ancient. I read books for the aesthetic emotions they offer me, and I ignore the commentaries and criticism.”
― Jorge Luis Borges, Seven Nights