Quotes about Reasoning

If the book be false in its facts, disprove them; if false in its reasoning, refute it. But, for God's sake, let us freely hear both sides, if we choose.

[Science is] the desire to know causes.

G. W. Leibniz, codiscoverer of calculus and a towering intellect of eighteenth-century Europe, wrote: "The first question which should rightly be asked is: Why is there something rather than nothing?"[1] In other words, why does anything at all exist? This, for Leibniz, is the most basic question that anyone can ask. Like me, Leibniz came to the conclusion that the answer is to be found, not in the universe of created things, but in God. God

Thus, although arguments and evidence may be used to support the believer's faith, they are never properly the basis of that faith.

Ghazali frames his argument simply: "Every being which begins has a cause for its beginning; now the world is a being which begins; therefore, it possesses a cause for its beginning.

Reductio ad absurdum, or reduction to absurdity, is a form of argument that proves a statement by demonstrating that its opposite is absurd.

Leibniz's reasoning: 1. Everything that exists has an explanation of its existence. 2. If the universe has an explanation of its existence, that explanation is God. 3. The universe exists.

A good argument must obey the rules of logic; express true premises; and have premises more plausible than their opposites.

Beware of reasoning about God's Word - obey It.

Even a brilliant research scientist can waste his or her efforts, in [Stephan Hawking's] case on theoretically impossible lines of research, if he or she rejects clear evidence pointing to God.

In terms of doing things I take a fairly scientific approach to why things happen and how they happen. I don't know if there's a god or not, but I think religious principles are quite valid.

The deep emotional conviction of the presence of a superior reasoning power which is revealed in the incomprehensible universe forms my idea of God.