Interesting Vonnegut quotes on Science/Religion

[Gnosital]

Science doesn't kill people, governments do.

If I should ever die, God forbid, let this be my epitaph:

THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED
FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD
WAS MUSIC

From A Man Without a Country

For me there are a lot to choose from, so hold in mind the proper level of gravitas when I say this is my favorite Vonnegut quote:

I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.

Vonnegut was far more about being irreverent than cynical. He never stopped talking and writing about what was wrong as he found it in the world, and never stopped arguing for what was right. That hardly describes a cynic.

From Under the Banner of Heaven

"Faith is the antithesis of reason."

[Philboid Studge]

What the Gospels actually said was: don't kill anyone until you are absolutely sure they aren't well connected.

~ Slaughterhouse 5

[babrock]

One of the coolest aspects of me having gone to collage was that I worked in the theater and managed to hear both Madylan O'hair and Kurt Vonnegut, tho not at the same time.

My fav Vonnegut quote was this thing from one of his stories where there existed a specis whose sole activities were gaining sustinence from some vibrations and communicating "I'm here" to their companions, and their companions responding ''I'm glad".

[Kate]

[Eva]

so, babs, tell me about collage....

[ghoulslime]

Eva wrote

so, babs, tell me about collage....

Well, duh! In Collage, they read bokes and such.

[West491]

I confess. I didn't understand Kate's pic at first.

[lostsheep]

hmpf. I had to google kurt vonnegut and I was thinking kurt cobain for more than a moment. I obviously needed a better collage.

Also I must learn more about this interesting fellow.

[lostsheep]

ubs wrote

Great thread! My favorite quote from one of my favorite authors


"Any time I see a person fleeing from reason and into religion, I think to myself, There goes a person who simply cannot stand being so goddamned lonely anymore."

[Kurt Vonnegut Jr., quoted in 2000 Years of Disbelief, Famous People with the Courage to Doubt, by James A. Haught, Prometheus Books, 1996]

That reminds me of this quote:
@font-face { font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }table.MsoNormalTable { font-size: 10pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; } The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.




I don't agree with it, really, but I do like it, nonetheless! It's from Lovecraft, not Vonnegut: but I think there is some relation to the Vonnegut quote, in that some people might choose religious belief and explanations over scientific ones: perhaps they feel more comfortable in their ignorance?

[psychodiva]

lost- I 'lost' myself in the "font-family: "Times New Roman"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal," bit

[Kate]

Eva wrote

so, babs, tell me about collage....

[ghoulslime]

Kate wrote

Hey, it's Birmingham Alabama! What else are you going to do?