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The scientist believes in proof without certainty, the bigot in certainty without proof.
Ashley MontaguWithout absolute certainty, what do we do? We do the best we can. Injustice is happening now; suffering is happening now. We have choices to make now. To insist on absolute certainty before starting to apply ethics to life decisions is a way of choosing to be amoral.
Richard StallmanThe language of judicial decision is mainly the language of logic. And the logical method and form flatter that longing for certainty and for repose which is in every human mind. But certainty generally is illusion, and repose is not the destiny of man.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.We are all of us invented. We are all of us cobbled together from cartilage and dust. Few of us know with certainty the name of our maker. But I do... Bram Stoker.
Steven DietzThere are many levels of life which we cannot see and know, yet which certainly exist. There is a larger world, vast enough to include immortality.... Our spiritual natures belong to this larger world ... If death is apparently an outward fact, immortality is an inner certainty.
Manly Hall[An artist] will sooner and with more certainty, establish the character of skeletons, than the most learned anatomist, whose eye has not been accustomed to seize on every peculiarity.
Rembrandt PealeI love seeing somebody act real earnest and serious, like Jackie Gleason. He makes me laugh because he reflects back to me my own serious-mindedness and how ridiculous it all is. It's always easier to see somebody else in that position than yourself, and you laugh. It's like the classic slipping on the banana peel, or someone getting hit by a pie in the face. Why do those things make us laugh? Is it from relief, like: Thank God it wasn't me? Or is it something else: I'm being very serious now. I'm pontificating earnestly and solemnly about-POW! PIE IN THE FACE! The bust-up of certainty.
Jeff BridgesIf art made you think, then this was Art. Staring at the ball, made of layers and layers of cloth, I wondered about the glass marble at its heart. What if you wanted to reach that marble? Make sure it was still whole? You'd have to remove the layers. You'd have to risk breaking the ball for a chance at freeing it. Fear, knowledge, certainty - you'd have to be willing to let them all go.
Justina ChenThat would be the death of anyone - to recognize false hopes with a certainty. One mustn't know that. If it is offered, refuse!
Jesse BallAudiences aren't going to get rid of me. One thing I can say, with absolute certainty, is that my shows will still be performed when I'm dead, buried and forgotten. They're going to absolutely outlive me, which is a wonderful thing to think about.
Cameron MackintoshI think I developed a culture of healthy skepticism of claims of certainty on any side of the aisle. A sort of boldness in using economics no matter where it leads you in political circles, you know, rather than worrying about being left-wing or right-wing or biased or this or that.
David PlotzHe stared at her, knowing with certainty that he was falling in love. He pulled her close and kissed her beneath a blanket of stars, wondering how on earth he'd been lucky enough to find her.
Nicholas SparksSpeculation and the exploration of ideas beyond what we know with certainty are what lead to progress.
Lisa RandallI don't believe anything. I only know some things to a greater degree of certainty than others.
John RymanIt seems to me that self confidence and the ability to stand one's ground are essential if we want to succeed in life. I am not talking of stupid self-assurance but of an awareness of our inner potential, a certainty that we can always correct our behavior, improve ourselves, enrich ourselves, and that things are never hopeless
Dalai LamaThis is what it is to be human: to see the essential existential futility of all action, all striving -- and to act, to strive. This is what it is to be human: to reach forever beyond your grasp. This is what it is to be human: to live forever or die trying. This is what it is to be human: to perpetually ask the unanswerable questions, in the hope that the asking of them will somehow hasten the day when they will be answered. This is what it is to be human: to strive in the face of the certainty of failure. This is what it is to be human: to persist.
Spider RobinsonAdventure upon all the tickets in the lottery, and you lose for certain; and the greater the number of your tickets the nearer your approach to this certainty.
Adam SmithFaith is not a question of basking in the certainty that there is a God and that God is taking care of us. Many of us are never granted this kind of assurance. Certitude is not the real substance of faith. Faith is a way of seeing things.
Ronald RolheiserDogmatism and skepticism are both, in a sense, absolute philosophies; one is certain of knowing, the other of not knowing. What philosophy should dissipate is certainty, whether of knowledge or ignorance.
Bertrand RussellFight for the value of your person. Fight for the virtue of your pride. Fight for the essence of that which is man: for his sovereign rational mind. Fight with the radiant certainty and the absolute rectitude of knowing that yours is the Morality of Life and that yours is the battle for any achievement, any value, any grandeur, any goodness, any joy that has ever existed on this earth
Ayn RandNever thought I'd see the day when Death was denied. That leaves taxes as the only certainty.
Piers AnthonySince Christ Himself said in reference to the bread: "This is My Body," who will dare remain hesitant? And since with equal clarity He asserted: "This is My Blood," who will dare entertain any doubt and say that this is not His Blood?... You have been taught these truths. Imbued with the certainty of faith, you know that what seems to be bread is not bread but the Body of Christ, although it seems to be bread when tasted. You also know that what seems to be wine is not wine but the Blood of Christ although it does taste like wine.
Cyril of JerusalemI am a product of endless books. My father bought all the books he read and never got rid of any of them. There were books in the study, books in the drawing room, books in the cloakroom, books (two deep) in the great bookcase on the landing, books in a bedroom, books piled as high as my shoulder in the cistern attic...In the seemingly endless rainy afternoons I took volume after volume from the shelves. I had always the same certainty of finding a book that was new to me as a man who walks into a field has of finding a new blade of grass.
C. S. LewisIt is a certainty that Herbalife is a pyramid scheme. We believe it's harming a population of low-income, principally Hispanic people in the U.S. to benefit a handful of super wealthy people at the top of the pyramid.
Bill AckmanIn short, is American life of the future to be characterized by freedom or by servitude, strength or weakness? The answer must be clear and unequivocal if we are to avoid the pitfalls toward which we are now heading with such certainty. In many respects it is not to be found in any dogma of political philosophy but in those immutable precepts which underlie the Ten Commandments.
Douglas MacArthurWhat has the Cross left in each of us? You see, it gives us a treasure that no one else can give: the certainty of the faithful love which God has for us. A love so great that it enters into our sin and forgives it, enters into our suffering and gives us the strength to bear it. It is a love which enters into death to conquer it and save us.
Pope FrancisThe underlying aim of practice . .is to create certainty through the development of high-quality listening.
Howard SnellIn the [John F.] Kennedy case, I believe the absence of a conspiracy can be proved to a virtual certainty.
Vincent BugliosiJust like moons and suns, With certainty of tides, Just like hopes springing high, Still I'll rise.
Maya AngelouYou can safely appeal to the UN in the comfortable certainty that it will let you down.
Conor Cruise O'BrienNothing happens carelessly. Weโre not brought into the world without reason, even though we may never understand the reason. An infant that lives an hour, that dies before it can lay eyes on those who made it, even that soul did not live without purpose: this is my sudden certainty.
Clive BarkerWas there another life she was meant to be living? At times she felt a keen certainty that there was โ a phantom life, taunting her from just out of reach. A sense would come over her while she was drawing or walking, and once while she was dancing slow and close with Kaz, that she was supposed to be doing something else with her hands, with her legs, with her body. Something else. Something else. Something else.
Laini TaylorWe all know that the theater and every play that comes to Broadway have within themselves, like the human being, the seed of self-destruction and the certainty of death. The thing is to see how long the theater, the play, and the human being can last in spite of themselves.
James ThurberFacts and theories are different things, not rungs in a hierarchy of increasing certainty. Facts are the world's data. Theories are structures of ideas that explain and interpret facts. Facts do not go away while scientists debate rival theories for explaining them. Einstein's theory of gravitation replaced Newton's, but apples did not suspend themselves in mid-air pending the outcome.
Stephen Jay GouldIf one puts an infinite number of monkeys in front of typewriters, and lets them clap away, there is a certainty that one of them will come out with an exact version of the 'Iliad.'
Nassim Nicholas TalebWhen the human mind exists in the light of reason and no more than reason, we may say with absolute certainty that Man and all that made him will be in that instant gone.
Loren EiseleyThis was my voice, but perfectly wise, calm and compassionate. This was what my voice would sound like if Iโd only ever experienced love and certainty in my life. How can I describe the warmth of affection in that voice, as it gave me the answer that would forever seal my faith in the divine?
Elizabeth GilbertHow sweet is the assurance, how comforting is the peace that come from the knowledge that if we marry right and live right, our relationship will continue, notwithstanding the certainty of death and the passage of time. Men may write love songs and sing them. They may yearn and hope and dream. But all of this will be only a romantic longing unless there is an exercise of authority that transcends the powers of time and death.
Gordon B. Hinckley