This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
"Philosophy is inseparable from scepticism, which follows it like a shadow that it chases away by refuting it, only to find it once again under its feet." - Emmanuel Lévinas , originally Emanuelis Lévinas
"The cause which is blocking all progress today is the subtle scepticism which whispers in a million ears that things are not good enough to be worth improving. If the world is good we are revolutionaries, if the world is evil we must be conservatives. These essays, futile as they are considered as serious literature, are yet ethically sincere, since they seek to remind men that things must be loved first and improved afterwards." - Gilbert Keith "G.K." Chesteron
"Truths turn into dogmas the instant that they are disputed. Thus every man who utters a doubt defines a religion. And the scepticism of our time does not really destroy the beliefs, rather it creates them; gives them their limits and their plain and defiant shape." - Gilbert Keith "G.K." Chesteron
"My main reason for scepticism about the Huxley/Sagan theory is that the human brain is demonstrably eager to see faces in random patterns, as we know from scientific evidence, on top of the numerous legends about faces of Jesus, or the Virgin Mary, or Mother Teresa, being seen on slices of toast, or pizzas, or patches of damp on a wall. This eagerness is enhanced if the pattern departs from randomness in the specific direction of being symmetrical." - Richard Dawkins
"Wielding his sword of reason in one hand and shield of acerbic scepticism in the other, Professor Richard Dawkins rides out against the forces of faith, superstition and New Age nonsense. It's hardly a fair fight, Dawkins easily destroys the arguments of astrologers, dowsers and the tricks behind the trade of mediumship. His manner may be off-putting but Dawkins' message is clear " - Richard Dawkins
"There is but one unconditional commandment, which is that we should seek incessantly, with fear and trembling, so to vote and to act as to bring about the very largest total universe of good which we can see." - William James
"Mercy among the virtues is like the moon among the stars, - not so sparkling and vivid as many, but dispensing a calm radiance that hallows the whole. It is the bow that rests upon the bosom of the cloud when the storm is past. It is the light that hovers above the judgment seat." - Edwin Hubbell Chapin