James Randi > Quotes

“There is a distinct difference between having an open mind and having a hole in your head from which your brain leaks out.”
― James Randi

“I want to be, if I can, as sure of the world--the real world--around me as is possible. Now, you can only attain that to a certain degree, but I want the greatest degree of control. I've never involved myself in narcotics of any kind, I don't smoke, and I don't drink because that can easily just fuzz the edges of my rationality--fuzz the edges of my reasoning powers--and I want to be as aware as I possibly can. That means giving up a lot of fantasies that might be comforting in some ways, but I'm willing to give that up in order to live in an actually real world, or as close as I can get to it.”
― James Randi

“No amount of belief makes something a fact.”
― James Randi

“Those who believe without reason cannot be convinced by reason.”
― James Randi

“Yes, I'm a materialist. I'm willing to be shown wrong, but that has not happened — yet. And I admit that the reason I'm unable to accept the claims of psychic, occult, and/or supernatural wonders is because I'm locked into a world-view that demands evidence rather than blind faith, a view that insists upon the replication of all experiments — particularly those that appear to show violations of a rational world — and a view which requires open examination of the methods used to carry out those experiments.”
― James Randi

“There used to be an intellectual class in America. . . . These people kept the world of ideas alive. But today the distinction between intellectuals and nonintellectuals doesn’t make any difference; celebrity is the only standard. . . . Everybody has become a talker of cheap philosophy that anybody can pick up.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“I want to be, if I can, as sure of the world--the real world--around me as is possible. Now, you can only attain that to a certain degree, but I want the greatest degree of control.”
― James Randi

“The sleep of reason brings forth monsters”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions

“On the contrary, to know that you are an individual not put here for some mysterious reason by some supernatural means, and that you are not protected by unknown powers or beings; to know that you are a product of millions of experiments in the evolutionary process and not the result of a seed thrown on this planet by extraterrestrials—that, to me, is very exciting.”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions

“Though all the Protestant denominations have historically condemned the veneration of holy objects (relics) and their use in healing, the Catholic church - until recently - preferred to depend entirely upon the magical qualities attributed to the possessions or actual physical parts of various saints and biblical characters for healing. The Vatican not only permitted but encouraged this practice, which entered history in the third century. Catholic churches and private collections still overflow with hundreds of thousands of items. Included are pieces of the True Cross (enough to build a few log cabins), bones of the children slain by King Herod, the toenails and bones of St. Peter, the bones of the Three Wise Kings and of St. Stephen (as well as his complete corpse, including another complete skeleton!), jars of the Virgin Mary’s milk, the bones and several entire heads and pieces thereof that were allegedly once atop John the Baptist, 16 foreskins of Christ, Mary Magdalene’s entire skeleton (with two right feet), scraps of bread and fish left over from feeding the 5,000, a crust of bread from the Last Supper, and a hair from Christ’s beard - not to mention a few shrouds, including the one at Turin.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“Сър, има съществена разлика между това да имаш отворен ум и да имаш дупка в главата си, през която изтича мозък.”
― James Randi

“Ben Franklin said it well: "Quacks are the greatest liars in the world, except their patients.”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions

“There used to be an intellectual class in America.... These people kept the world of ideas alive. But today the distinction between intellectuals and nonintellectuals doesn’t make any difference; celebrity is the only standard.... Everybody has become a talker of cheap philosophy that anybody can pick up.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“It appears that the easy, foolproof way to get rich in America is to learn about twenty quotations from the Bible, dress in an expensive suit with lots of gaudy jewelry, and rent an auditorium. Tell all the lies you want. Exaggerate your history or invent it entirely. Label all your opponents as “tools of Satan.” Answer any and all arguments and objections by quoting scripture. Beg for money, incessantly. Oh. I almost forgot. Ordain yourself as an Anointed Minister of God. Then watch the money roll in. It’s tax-free, and you can use it any way you want.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“Protected by the First Amendment, anyone capable of speaking in public became eligible to dispense interpretations of holy writ and to claim healing powers. An occasional individual took his or her inspiration from vaudeville, applying psychological techniques and razzmatazz to build an act that the IRS would never trouble, Congress would never question, and the law would find insulated by the Constitution against charges of fraud and deception.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“If we consider the scale of the universe, we begin to see just how ridiculous belief in astrology can be.”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam!: Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions

“The recent intense interest in faith-healing, largely brought about by the announced possible candidacy of faith-healer Pat Robertson for the presidency of the United States, captured my interest.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“Throw away the Tarot deck and ignore the astrology column.”
― James Randi

“In a life short and uncertain, in a time when—precisely because of the success of medicine—people die mainly from medically incurable disease, it seems heartless to deprive them of the consolation of superstition when science cannot cure their anguish. But we cannot have science in bits and pieces, applying it where we feel safe and ignoring it where we feel threatened. That way lies hypocrisy, self-deception, and a dangerously constrained future.”
― James Randi, The Faith Healers

“Death is the ultimate disappointment.”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam!: Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions

“By far, the oldest of the claptrap philosophies of mankind is astrology.”
― James Randi, Flim-Flam! Psychics, ESP, Unicorns, and Other Delusions Publisher: Prometheus Books