Bias Quotes

“The eye sees only what the mind is prepared to comprehend.”
― Robertson Davies, Tempest-Tost

“In an extroverted society, the difference between an introvert and an extrovert is that an introvert is often unconsciously deemed guilty until proven innocent.”
― Criss Jami, Venus in Arms

“Jasnah had once defined a fool as a person who ignored information because it disagreed with desired results.”
― Brandon Sanderson, Words of Radiance

“It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.”
― Jonathan Swift

“It is a well known fact that reality has liberal bias.”
― Stephen Colbert

“We all know that any emotional bias -- irrespective of truth or falsity -- can be implanted by suggestion in the emotions of the young, hence the inherited traditions of an orthodox community are absolutely without evidential value.... If religion were true, its followers would not try to bludgeon their young into an artificial conformity; but would merely insist on their unbending quest for truth, irrespective of artificial backgrounds or practical consequences. With such an honest and inflexible openness to evidence, they could not fail to receive any real truth which might be manifesting itself around them. The fact that religionists do not follow this honourable course, but cheat at their game by invoking juvenile quasi-hypnosis, is enough to destroy their pretensions in my eyes even if their absurdity were not manifest in every other direction.”
― H.P. Lovecraft, Against Religion: The Atheist Writings of H.P. Lovecraft

“All my life I'd been told what to believe about politics, coloreds, being a girl. But with Constantine's thumb pressed in my hand, I realized I actually had a choice in what I could believe.”
― Kathryn Stockett, The Help

“One of the biggest problems with the world today is that we have large groups of people who will accept whatever they hear on the grapevine, just because it suits their worldview—not because it is actually true or because they have evidence to support it. The really striking thing is that it would not take much effort to establish validity in most of these cases… but people prefer reassurance to research.”
― Neil deGrasse Tyson

“It's not at all hard to understand a person; it's only hard to listen without bias.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“Quiet people always know more than they seem. Although very normal, their inner world is by default fronted mysterious and therefore assumed weird. Never underestimate the social awareness and sense of reality in a quiet person; they are some of the most observant, absorbent persons of all.”
― Criss Jami, Healology

“When I look at a person, I see a person - not a rank, not a class, not a title.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“Before you call yourself a Christian, Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu or any other theology, learn to be human first.”
― Shannon L. Alder

“I'm convinced that most men don't know what they believe, rather, they only know what they wish to believe. How many people blame God for man's atrocities, but wouldn't dream of imprisoning a mother for her son's crime?”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“We all see only that which we are trained to see.”
― Robert Anton Wilson, Masks of the Illuminati

“When dealing with critics always remember this: Critics judge things based on what is outside of their content of understanding.”
― Shannon L. Alder

“But I think that no matter how smart, people usually see what they're already looking for, that's all.”
― Veronica Roth, Allegiant

“We find comfort among those who agree with us - growth among those who don't.”
― Frank A. Clark

“If you voted for a man who said "Grab em by the pussy," you have zero room to claim to protect anyone in bathrooms.”
― DaShanne Stokes

“I have yet to see a piece of writing, political or non-political, that does not have a slant. All writing slants the way a writer leans, and no man is born perpendicular.”
― E.B. White

“Calling it lunacy makes it easier to explain away the things we don't understand.”
― Megan Chance, The Spiritualist

“Men have sacrificed and crippled themselves physically and emotionally to feed, house, and protect women and children. None of their pain or achievement is registered in feminist rhetoric, which portrays men as oppressive and callous exploiters.”
― Camille Paglia

“Let's invite one another in. Maybe then we can begin to fear less, to make fewer wrong assumptions, to let go of the biases and stereotypes that unnecessarily divide us. Maybe we can better embrace the ways we are the same. It's not about being perfect. It's not about where you get yourself in the end. There's power in allowing yourself to be known and heard, in owning your unique story, in using your authentic voice. And there's grace in being willing to know and hear others. This, for me, is how we become.”
― Michelle Obama, Becoming

“I have a sense that God is unfair and preferentially punishes his weak, his dumb, his fat, his lazy. I believe he takes more pleasure in his perfect creatures, and cheers them on like a brainless dad as they run roughshod over the rest of us. He gives us a need for love, and no way to get any. He gives us a desire to be liked, and personal attributes that make us utterly unlikable. Having placed his flawed and needy children in a world of exacting specifications, he deducts the difference between what we have and what we need from our hearts and our self-esteem and our mental health.”
― George Saunders, CivilWarLand in Bad Decline

“Memory warps time, as it does the sights and sounds and smells of reality; for what shapes it is emotion, which can twist what seems clear, just as the surface of a pond seems to bend the stick thrust into the water.”
― Sherwood Smith, Crown Duel

“BLACK AND WHITE


I was born into
A religion of Light,
But with so many other
Religions and
Philosophies,
How do I know which
ONE
Is right?

Is it not
My birthright
To seek out the light?
To find Truth
After surveying all the proof,
Am I supposed
To love
Or fight?
And why do all those who
Try to guide me,
Always start by dividing
And multiplying me –
From what they consider
Wrong or right?
I thought,
There were no walls
For whoever beams truth and light.
And how can one speak on Light's behalf,
lf all they do
Is act black,
But talk WHITE?”
― Suzy Kassem, Rise Up and Salute the Sun: The Writings of Suzy Kassem

“Prejudice wears a variety of hats, none of them becoming.”
― Kevin Ansbro

“Every discussion which is made from an egoistic standpoint is corrupted from the start and cannot yield an absolutely sure conclusion. The ego puts its own interest first and twists every argument, word, even fact to suit that interest.”
― Paul Brunton, Healing of the Self, the Negatives: Notebooks

“Armed neutrality makes it much easier to detect hypocrisy.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“No one would ever say that someone with a broken arm or a broken leg is less than a whole person, but people say that or imply that all the time about people with mental illness.”
― Elyn R. Saks

“Mental illness" is among the most stigmatized of categories.' People are ashamed of being mentally ill. They fear disclosing their condition to their friends and confidants-and certainly to their employers.”
― Elyn R. Saks, Refusing Care: Forced Treatment and the Rights of the Mentally Ill