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“Tell me something. Do you believe in God?'

Snow darted an apprehensive glance in my direction. 'What? Who still believes nowadays?'

'It isn't that simple. I don't mean the traditional God of Earth religion. I'm no expert in the history of religions, and perhaps this is nothing new--do you happen to know if there was ever a belief in an...imperfect God?'

'What do you mean by imperfect?' Snow frowned. 'In a way all the gods of the old religions were imperfect, considered that their attributes were amplified human ones. The God of the Old Testament, for instance, required humble submission and sacrifices, and and was jealous of other gods. The Greek gods had fits of sulks and family quarrels, and they were just as imperfect as mortals...'

'No,' I interrupted. 'I'm not thinking of a god whose imperfection arises out of the candor of his human creators, but one whose imperfection represents his essential characteristic: a god limited in his omniscience and power, fallible, incapable of foreseeing the consequences of his acts, and creating things that lead to horror. He is a...sick god, whose ambitions exceed his powers and who does not realize it at first. A god who has created clocks, but not the time they measure. He has created systems or mechanisms that serves specific ends but have now overstepped and betrayed them. And he has created eternity, which was to have measured his power, and which measures his unending defeat.'

Snow hesitated, but his attitude no longer showed any of the wary reserve of recent weeks:

'There was Manicheanism...'

'Nothing at all to do with the principles of Good and Evil,' I broke in immediately. 'This god has no existence outside of matter. He would like to free himself from matter, but he cannot...'

Snow pondered for a while:

'I don't know of any religion that answers your description. That kind of religion has never been...necessary. If i understand you, and I'm afraid I do, what you have in mind is an evolving god, who develops in the course of time, grows, and keeps increasing in power while remaining aware of his powerlessness. For your god, the divine condition is a situation without a goal. And understanding that, he despairs. But isn't this despairing god of yours mankind, Kelvin? Is it man you are talking about, and that is a fallacy, not just philosophically but also mystically speaking.'

I kept on:

'No, it's nothing to do with man. man may correspond to my provisional definition from some point of view, but that is because the definition has a lot of gaps. Man does not create gods, in spite of appearances. The times, the age, impose them on him. Man can serve is age or rebel against it, but the target of his cooperation or rebellion comes to him from outside. If there was only a since human being in existence, he would apparently be able to attempt the experiment of creating his own goals in complete freedom--apparently, because a man not brought up among other human beings cannot become a man. And the being--the being I have in mind--cannot exist in the plural, you see? ...Perhaps he has already been born somewhere, in some corner of the galaxy, and soon he will have some childish enthusiasm that will set him putting out one star and lighting another. We will notice him after a while...'

'We already have,' Snow said sarcastically. 'Novas and supernovas. According to you they are candles on his altar.'

'If you're going to take what I say literally...'

...Snow asked abruptly:

'What gave you this idea of an imperfect god?'

'I don't know. It seems quite feasible to me. That is the only god I could imagine believing in, a god whose passion is not a redemption, who saves nothing, fulfills no purpose--a god who simply is.”
― StanisÅ‚aw Lem, Solaris

“In ancient times people weren't just male or female, but one of three types: male/male, male/female, or female/female. In other words, each person was made out of the components of two people. Everyone was happy with this arrangement and never really gave it much thought. But then God took a knife and cut everybody in half, right down the middle. So after that the world was divided just into male and female, the upshot being that people spend their time running around trying to locate their missing other half.”
― Haruki Murakami, Kafka on the Shore

“He had a theory that musicians are incredibly complex, and know far less than other artists what they want and what they are; that they puzzle themselves as well as their friends; that their psychology is a modern development, and has not yet been understood.”
― E.M. Forster

“Life had stepped into the place of theory and something quite different would work itself out in his mind.”
― Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Crime and Punishment

“Do you see this egg? With this you can topple every theological theory, every church or temple in the world.”
― Denis Diderot

“Science is not about making predictions or performing experiments. Science is about explaining.”
― Bill Gaede

“Whereas a novice makes moves until he gets checkmated (proof), a Grand Master realizes 20 moves in advance that it’s futile to continue playing (conceptualizing).”
― Bill Gaede

“What is especially striking and remarkable is that in fundamental physics a beautiful or elegant theory is more likely to be right than a theory that is inelegant.”
― Murray Gell-Mann

“Theology is just not important in Judaism, or in any other religion, really. There's no orthodoxy, as you have it in the Catholic Church. No complicated creeds to which everybody must subscribe. No infallible pronouncements by a pope. Nobody can tell Jews what to believe. Within reason, you can believe what you like... We have orthopraxy instead of orthodoxy. Right practice rather then right belief. That's all. You Christians make such a fuss about theology, but it's not important in the way you think. It's just poetry, really, ways of talking about the inexpressible.”
― Hyam Maccoby

“Get back to work, he would tell himself sternly. There's a garuda to get airborne.”
― China Miéville, Perdido Street Station

“There is a common tendency to turn off one's imagination at certain points and refuse to contemplate the possibility of having to do certain things and cope with the attendant moral problems. The things simply get done by the social machine, and one can keep one's clear conscience and one's moral indignation unsullied.”
― John Fraser, Violence in the Arts

“Criticism talks a good deal of nonsense, but even its nonsense is a useful force. It keeps the question of art before the world, insists upon its importance. ”
― Henry James

“Is that all?" asked Flambeau after a long pause. "Have we got to the dull truth at last?"

"Oh, no," said Father Brown.

As the wind died in the most distant pine woods with a long hoot as of mockery Father Brown, with an utterly impassive face, went on:

"I only suggested that because you said one could not plausibly connect snuff with clockwork or candles with bright stones. Ten false philosophies will fit the universe; ten false theories will fit Glengyle Castle. But we want the real explanation of the castle and the universe. But are there no other exhibits?"

Craven laughed, and Flambeau rose smiling to his feet and strolled down the long table.

[Ch.6]”
― G.K. Chesterton, The Innocence of Father Brown

“My contention is that good men (not bad men) consistently acting upon that position would act as cruelly and unjustly as the greatest tyrants. They might in some respects act even worse. Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Humanitarian Theory of Punishment

“[F]or a social theorist ignorance is more excusable than vagueness. Other investigators can easily show I am wrong if I am sufficiently precise. They will have much more difficulty showing by investigation what, precisely, I mean if I am vague. I hope not to be forced to weasel out with 'But I didn’t really mean that.' Social theorists should prefer to be wrong rather than misunderstood. Being misunderstood shows sloppy theoretical work.”
― Arthur Stinchcombe

“Do not be afraid of the word 'theory'. Yes, it can sound dauntingly abstract at times, and in the hands of some writers can appear to have precious little to do with the actual, visual world around us. Good theory however, is an awesome thing. [...] But unless we actually use it, it borders on the metaphysical and might as well not be used at all.”
― Richard Howells, Visual Culture

“[According to 1348 theorists, poisoning of Christian water by Jews was the cause of Black Death.]

Even the poison used to contaminate the Christian water supply was described in meticulous detail. It was "about the size of an egg," except when it was the "size of a nut" or a "large nut," "a fist" or "two fists"- and it came packaged in "a leather pouch," except when it was packaged in "linen cloth," "a rag," or a "paper coronet"; and the poison was variously made from lizards, frogs, and spiders- when it was not made from the hearts of Christians and from Holy Communion wafers.”
― John Kelly, The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death, the Most Devastating Plague of All Time

“Proof' is the hallmark of religion.”
― Bill Gaede

“Though his invention worked superbly [...] his theory was a crock of sewage from beginning to end.”
― Vernor Vinge, The Peace War

“In short, philosophical theories are largely the product of the hidden hand of the cognitive unconscious.”
― George Lakoff

“I think actually if you take the analogy with other areas of engineering, and increasingly of science and even mathematics, you can see people do not have to learn the vast number of formulae they used to learn. Instead, they have to learn to use the computer effectively. This frees them, I feel, to understand concepts and the foundations while they’re learning the mechanics of the application of the theory.”
― C.A.R. Hoare

“There ought not be two histories, one of political and moral action and one of political and moral theorizing, because there were not two pasts, one populated only by actions, the other only by theories. Every action is the bearer and expression of more or less theory-laden beliefs and concepts; every piece of theorizing and every expression of belief is a politcal and moral action.”
― Alasdair McIntyre

“…let us point out precisely the difficulties of empiricism as a theory of knowledge. First, it begins with two fixed, unchangeable ultimates--mind and matter. Second, it asserts that knowledge is the agreement of ideas with each other, in which case we are not dealing with nature or things at all, and consequently, have left out one of our ultimates. Third, it then asserts (for it is essential that knowledge should somehow or other be connected with things) that knowledge consists in the agreement between an idea and a thing; and in this case we can never tell when the agreement takes place; and furthermore, it is impossible for ideas and things to disagree, for, according to the theory, ideas are copies of things. This means that empiricism can not account for the fact of error. Every theory of knowledge must make a place for error, for, as is evident, error seems to be as industrious as truth.
Consequently, if knowledge actually does take place, if there is such an activity, thing, or relation as knowledge, empiricism fails to give an account of it which is free from contradictions. The moral is, as the stories in our school readers say, don't begin with fixed things, for they beguileth one into inconsistencies.”
― Holly Estil Cunningham

“Die Kunst des Rezensierens besteht nicht zuletzt darin, selbst über langweilige Bücher fesselnd zu schreiben.”
― Thomas Anz, Literaturkritik. Geschichte â€� Theorie â€� Praxis

“The word theory is often interpreted as meaning something that is unfounded or speculative, not accurately tied down to reality. We say "That's only a theory," meaning that it is subject to doubt and challenge by alternative theories. And we also say "This is a fact," meaning it is not to be doubted or challenged by alternative theories. Though it may be all right to distinguish between theory and fact this way in common language, the greater fact of the matter is that in science we have learned to accept the likelihood that two or more theories can account for the same pattern of observed facts (often called laws). We can prove as facts both that light is a series of particles and that it is a series of waves. Given such alternative explanations, it is proper for us to call everything that we understand mentally a theory, thereby recognizing that theory and thought are two ways of describing the same thing. It is impossible to theorize without thinking, and thinking is always a theoretical process. What we think is factual today, that is, our current theory, may on new evidence, or simply throgh re-analysis of existing evidence, turn out to be an error tomorrow.”
― Joseph F. Rychlak, Introduction to Personality and Psychotherapy: A Theory-Construction Approach

“Theory is a core support of science, its reality, and its visibility.”
― Ehsan Sehgal

“Fieldwork is where theory meets truth.”
― Aloo Denish Obiero

“The Term 'Conspiracy Theory' is nothing more than a provocative Catchword, which every unknowing Fool can throw against a critical Thinker's Head, just to desperately try to humiliate him.”
― Sino Melo

“Theory must, as a dialectical one â€� like the Marxist one, by far and away â€� be immanent, even when it ultimately negates the entire sphere in which it moves.”
― Theodor W. Adorno, Negative Dialectics

“Ultimately, I think [anomalies]'re great for the community, for both experimentalists and theorists. They motivate excitement and interest.”
― Harry Cliff, Space Oddities: The Mysterious Anomalies Challenging Our Understanding of the Universe