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The Wero Shop : Religion : Russell's teapot
BERTRAND RUSSELL'S ORBITING TEAPOT
"If I were to suggest that between the Earth and Mars there is a china teapot revolving about the sun in an elliptical orbit, nobody would be able to disprove my assertion provided I were careful to add that the teapot is too small to be revealed even by our most powerful telescopes. But if I were to go on to say that, since my assertion cannot be disproved, it is intolerable presumption on the part of human reason to doubt it, I should rightly be thought to be talking nonsense. If, however, the existence of such a teapot were affirmed in ancient books, taught as the sacred truth every Sunday, and instilled into the minds of children at school, hesitation to believe in its existence would become a mark of eccentricity and entitle the doubter to the attentions of the psychiatrist in an enlightened age or of the Inquisitor in an earlier time." |
- Bertrand Russell (1952)
Of course Russell was writing before space travel or the Hubble Telescope, so his teapot was much less detectable (and possible - maybe some mischievous astronaut has thrown one out there!) than it would be today. But it still makes a striking image for something you can't disprove but shouldn't believe in without compelling evidence.
A great conversation-starter, a way to talk about atheism without using the a-word.
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