Quote

Our wills are simply not of our own making. Thoughts and intentions emerge from background causes of which we are unaware and over which we exert no conscious control. We do not have the freedom we think we have.

Sam Harris

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Sam Harris
Age: 57
Born: 1967
Born: April 9
Author
Blogger
Neuroscientist
Philosopher
Podcaster
Writer
LA
California
Samuel Benjamin Harris
Samuel Harris
Think
Intention
Thinking
Conscious
Exert
Thoughts
Wills
Simply
Unaware
Control
Emerge
Causes
Intentions
Freedom
Background
Making
Backgrounds

More quotes by Sam Harris

Image
The science of morality is about maximizing psychological and social health. It's really no more inflammatory than that.
Sam Harris
Image
We are all prisoners of our thoughts.
Sam Harris
Image
In my own case, the most inflammatory statements I have ever made are ones that I have written and remain willing to defend.
Sam Harris
Image
The problem is that religion tends to give people bad reasons to be good.
Sam Harris
Image
[I]t is difficult to imagine a set of beliefs more suggestive of mental illness than those that lie at the heart of many of our religious traditions.
Sam Harris
Image
We read the Golden Rule and judge it to be a brilliant distillation of many of our ethical impulses. And then we come across another of God’s teachings on morality: if a man discovers on his wedding night that his bride is not a virgin, he must stone her to death on her father’s doorstep (Deuteronomy 22:13-21).
Sam Harris
Image
I know of no society in human history that ever suffered because its people became too desirous of evidence in support of their core beliefs.
Sam Harris
Image
It is difficult to think of anything more important than providing the best education possible for our children. They will develop the next technologies, medical cures, and global industries, while mitigating their unintended effects, or they will fail to do these things and consign us all to oblivion.
Sam Harris
Image
Recently , crowds of thousands gathered throughout the Muslim world - burning European embassies, issuing threats, taking hostages, even killing people - in protest over twelve cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad that were first published in a Danish newspaper. When was the last atheist riot?
Sam Harris
Image
While religious tolerance is surely better than religious war, tolerance is not without its liabilities. Our fear of provoking religious hatred has rendered us incapable of criticizing ideas that are now patently absurd and increasingly maladaptive.
Sam Harris
Image
The most transformative experiences people have - bliss, devotion, self transcendence - are currently anchored to the worst parts of culture and to ways of thinking that merely amplify superstition, self-deception, and conflict.
Sam Harris
Image
Principle #1: Avoid dangerous people and dangerous places. Principle #2: Do not defend your property. Principle #3: Respond immediately and escape.
Sam Harris
Image
We are faced with the task of convincing a myth infatuated world that love and curiosity are sufficient and you don't have to delude yourself and frighten yourself with Iron Age fairy tales. This is a monumental task. I don't think there is an intellectual struggle more worthy of our efforts.
Sam Harris
Image
Religious moderation is the product of secular knowledge and scriptural ignorance.
Sam Harris
Image
The conflict between religion and science is inherent and (very nearly) zero-sum. The success of science often comes at the expense of religious dogma the maintenance of religious dogma always comes at the expense of science.
Sam Harris
Image
The fact that one can lose one's sense of self in an ocean of tranquility does not mean that one's consciousness is immaterial or that it presided over the birth of the universe.
Sam Harris
Image
Countries with high levels of atheism are . . . the most charitable both in terms of the percentage of their wealth they devote to social welfare programs and the percentage they give in aid to the developing world.
Sam Harris
Image
When considering the truth of a proposition, one is either engaged in an honest appraisal of the evidence and logical arguments, or one isn't. Religion is one area of our lives where people imagine that some other standard of intellectual integrity applies.
Sam Harris
Image
How we pay attention to the present moment...determin es the character of our experience and...the quality of our lives.
Sam Harris
Image
I consistently encounter people in academic settings and scientists and journalists who feel that you can't say that anyone is wrong in any deep sense about morality, or with regard to what they value in life. I think this doubt about the application of science and reason to questions of value is really quite dangerous.
Sam Harris