This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Friedrich Nietzsche, fully Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche
The belief in authority is the source of conscience; which is therefore not the voice of God in the heart of man, but the voice of some men in man.
Authority | Belief | Conscience | God | Heart | Man | Men | God |
The heresy of one age is the orthodox belief and “only infallible rule” of the next.
Wes Nisker, fully Wes "Scoop" Nisker
We live in a world of many illusions and much of human belief is ritualized nonsense.
The only idea man can affix to the name of God is that of a first cause, the cause of all things. Incomprehensible and difficult as it is for a man to conceive what a first cause is, he arrives at the belief of it from the tenfold greater difficulty of disbelieving it.
Today’s dogma holds that matter is eternal. The dogma comes from the intuitive belief of people who don’t want to accept the observational evidence that the universe was created – despite the fact that the creation of the universe is supported by all the observable data astronomy has produced so far. As a result, the people who reject the data can arguably be described as having a religious belief that matter must be eternal… Since scientists prefer to operate in the belief that the universe must be meaningless – that reality consists of nothing more than the sum of the world’s tangible constituents – they cannot confront the idea of creation easily, or take it lightly.
Belief | Dogma | Eternal | Evidence | Nothing | People | Reality | Universe | World |
Joseph Runzo and Nancy M. Martin
There is no one Hindu view of life or meaning, but rather multiple centers of meaning, belief and practice, all legitimately called Hinduism, and all connected yet radically different… Fundamentally, life and self-identity are seen as fluid, marked by impermanence, while ultimately there is an Absolute Oneness into which all the distinctions between multiple forms of the divine, the world, and human beings dissolve
Absolute | Belief | Life | Life | Meaning | Oneness | Practice | Self | Self-identity | World |
Roger L. Shinn, fully Roger Lincoln Shinn
The stumbling block of revelation is the belief in God in time, God in history.
Mao Tse-tung, alternatively Zedong, Ze dong, aka Chairman Mao
Many people think it impossible for guerillas to exist for long in the enemy’s rear. Such a belief reveals lack of comprehension of the relationship that should exist between the people and the troops. The former may be likened to water and the latter to the fish who inhabits it.
Belief | Enemy | People | Relationship | Think |
Eckhart Tolle, born Ulrich Leonard Tolle
Nobody can tell you who you are. It would just be another concept, so it would not change you. Who you are requires no belief. In fact, every belief is an obstacle.
Article 18 - Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others, and in public or in private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Belief | Change | Conscience | Freedom of thought | Freedom | Practice | Public | Religion | Right | Thought | Worship |
World Council of Churches NULL
Religious liberty includes freedom to change one’ religion or belief without consequent social, economic and political disabilities. Implicit in this right is the right freely to maintain one’s belief or disbelief without external coercion or disability.
Belief | Change | Coercion | Disbelief | Freedom | Liberty | Religion | Right |
Replacing religious institutions that are thousands of years old and hostile to reason with a reason-based belief system would transform society in a positive way more than any mere political change or economic-policy change ever could.
Belief | Change | Policy | Reason | Society | System | Society | Old |
The established religious institutions are bastions of ignorance in a world where knowledge has become the most valuable commodity. Well-entrenched, these institutions hold back social progress, dividing people who otherwise have no reason to oppose one another, fanning the flames of militarism and nationalism. Most of all, however, they are promoting ignorance and falsehoods at the expense of truth. How can society advance under such erroneous belief systems?
Belief | Ignorance | Knowledge | People | Progress | Reason | Society | Truth | World | Society |