Refusal Quotes (2)
For the essence of science, I would suggest, is simply the refusal to believe on the basis of hope.
In Robert Paul Wolff, Barrington Moore, Herbert Marcuse, A Critique of Pure Tolerance (1965), 55. Worded as 'Science is the refusal to believe on the basis of hope,' the quote is often seen attributed to C. P. Snow as in, for example, Richard Alan Krieger, Civilization's Quotations: Life's Ideal (2002), 314. If you know the time period or primary print source for the C.P. Snow quote, please contact Webmaster.
So far from science being irreligious, as many think, it is the neglect of science that is irreligious—it is the refusal to study the surrounding creation that is irreligious.
'What Knowledge is of Most Worth'. Lectures in Education delivered at the Royal Institution (1855). In The Westminster Review (Jul 1859), 22. Collected in Essays on Education and Kindred Subjects (1911), 41.
