Logical - Quotes
The religious reply to the moral sceptic`s question, `Why should I behave in such-and-such a way?` is simply `Because God requires it of you.` But this is merely a polite way of saying, `Because you`ll be punished if you don`t. [...] But a threat is never a logical justification for acting one way rather than another. If there exists a deity with the punitive vengefulness of the Judaeo-Christian variety, then it might be prudent to obey it, and thus avoid the flames of hell; but the threat of punishment is not a principled reason for obedience.
What I’m really interested in is whether God could have made the world in a different way; that is, whether the necessity of logical simplicity leaves any freedom at all.
It seems that scientists are often attracted to beautiful theories in the way that insects are attracted to flowers - not by logical deduction, but by something like a sense of smell.
If someone doesn`t value evidence, what evidence are you going to provide that proves they should value evidence? If someone doesn`t value logic, what logical argument would you invoke to prove they should value logic?
Science is best defined as a careful, disciplined, logical search for knowledge about any and all aspects of the universe, obtained by examination of the best available evidence and always subject to correction and improvement upon discovery of better evidence. What`s left is magic. And it doesn`t work.
Some philosophers can`t bear to say simple things, like "Suppose a dog bites a man." They feel obliged instead to say, "Suppose a dog d bites a man m at time t," thereby demonstrating their unshakable commitment to logical rigor, even though they don`t go on to manipulate any formulae involving d, m, and t.
I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them.
A theory in science is a logical creation. It reflects the most accurate experimental observations and the best understanding of how the world works. Yet a scientific theory doesn’t necessarily represent absolute truth. It can only capture the state of our knowledge so far. There’s every chance that a new piece of evidence will come to light that disproves the theory, and sends the theoreticians back to the drawing board.
You can prove anything you want by coldly logical reason - if you pick the proper postulates.