Rationalists Quotes

“The rationalist imagines an imbecile-free society; the empiricist and imbecile-proof one, or even better, a rationalist-proof one.”
― Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Bed of Procrustes: Philosophical and Practical Aphorisms

“Like many another materialist, that is, he lied cleverly on the basis of insufficient knowledge, because the knowledge supplied seemed to his own particular intelligence inadmissible.

("The Wendigo")”
― Algernon Blackwood, Monster Mix

“I think nearly all people on this planet - both creators of knowledge and followers — are just and only rationalists. What is a rationalist? It's fundamentally an insane person that knows well how to explain himself out of his insanity. These are the people who can explain everything but know nothing. And the more I know, the more this issue becomes extremely obvious to me. A rationalist is in essence a psychotic, and the world is filled with them because this is a prison planet for crazy souls. The ancient ones used the words illusion and illusion-attachment, which sound very poetic and beautiful but literally mean insane. Now the question is, how can the rationalists (the insane of this planet) see their way out when all they can do is rationalize? That's the big question, that leads many in my direction. In all these many thousands of years, people have done nothing more than think and rethink, trying to find a way out of the brain through the brain. Everyone is still doing it, although science has definitely pointed in many valuable directions. Yet ironically most scientists are atheists. But that's the fundamental purpose of all this: the liberation of the soul. For most people it is still a very complex topic, or not even real. Most people don't really want to be free, they just want more money, more popularity and more "stuff". They don't value freedom. It's not easy to explain it either. I have tried many times. In fact, the opposite typically happens, as I have no idea of what people seek in me with their questions apart from confusion. If you ask the wrong questions, you will always depart further from the answers you need the most.”
― Dan Desmarques